UN World Humanitarian Day 2016 Has Hillary & Album Plug, Omits Yemen
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
August 19 -- This year the commemoration of
the death of
22 UN staff in
Iraq on August
19, 2003, morphed into a promotion of outgoing Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's ineffective World Humanitarian Summit, ignoring of even covering up his UN's recent abandonment of aid workers in the Terrain Apartment in Juba, South Sudan, to rapes and beatings.
The UN's speech for 2016, delivered by Ban's deputy while he is "on leave" or vacation, mentioned South Sudan but not Terrain. Aid workers launched a petition to try to get the UN back on track but it is too late, it seems clear, with Ban Ki-moon. Who will be Next SG? 2012's World Humanitarian Day at the UN had Beyonce. 2016's list, in the UN's robo-response to Inner City Press after Ban Ki-moon and his Under Secretary General for Communications Cristina Gallach ousted and evicted Inner City Press, NY Times here, Petition here, first-draft film here:
Congratulations! We are delighted to inform you that your entry has been selected in the random lottery to attend a Special Event “WORLD HUMANITARIAN DAY: ONE HUMANITY” featuring performances by Mohammed Assaf, Leslie Odom, Jr., and Alisan Porter, as well as speeches by Natalie Dormer and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Yasmine Al Masri and Hala Kamil, a Syrian refugee whose family was featured in Marcel Mettelseifen’s documentary Children of Syria, will address the audience.
Then for the event itself, Inner City Press was escorted by one of Ban Ki-moon's minders -- required since Ban and Gallach evicted it, covering UN corruption -- to the “Blue Carpet” and set up. Some of it was troublingly vacuous: the click-click-click of cameras, no substance. In fact, Alisan Porter, who sang well, was selling her album at the stakeout. Yasmine Al Masri was brought by a handler over and said Hillary Clinton, hopefully she's going to be President. (Vine here). Full Periscope (for now) here.
Inside, Chimamanda Adichie spoke movingly of her parents during the Biafra war in 1967, and closed with a quote from Samuel Coleridge. Natalie Dormer didn't mention Game of Thrones, staying focused on gender equality. The clip from “Children of Syria” was moving. There was, however, a decided lack of references to Yemen. Was Saudi Arabia's funding to OCHA used for the event?
In 2012 the anniversary was
marked by the
filming of a
Beyonce video
in the General
Assembly Hall,
and a ceremony
with new
Deputy
Secretary
General Jan
Eliasson in
the GA lobby.
Then
outside the
UN, on the
other side of
First Avenue
in the Church
Center,
survivors held
their own
quiet service.
They spoke of
being excluded
by the UN, of
the
investigation
of the
killings being
called off or
covered up.
One
speaker
recounted
asking Kofi
Annan why he
hadn't acted
on warning
prior to the
bombing of the
Canal Hotel:
the killing of
an Iraq driver
and a Filipino
staffer, a
sermon on
Mosul calling
for attacks on
the IOM and
UN.
It
was said that
Annan's
successor as
Secretary
General Ban
Ki-moon had
said he would
do better but
hasn't.
Ironies were
inescapable:
Ban named
Annan as envoy
to Syria.
After Annan
quit, Ban
today named
Lakhdar
Brahimi, who
was assigned
to report on,
or some say
cover up, the
bombing of UN
staff in his
native
Algeria.
The
survivors in
the Church
Center praised
Hedi Annabi,
for having
come to
previous
remembrances
before he
himself was
killed in
rubble during
the Haiti
earthquake.
To
their credit
they cited
subsequent UN
staff victims,
in not only in
Haiti and
Algiers but
also
Afghanistan.
One wanted to
ask what they
thought of the
UN's failure
to follow up
on the murder
of UN staff
member Louis
Maxwell,
defending his
colleagues in
Afghanistan,
but held off
due to
decorum. Click
here for
Inner City
Press coverage
of Louis
Maxwell.
On
Friday a
speaker about
the Canal
Hotel bombing
was dismissive
of the 16 page
report by
Martti
Ahtisaari --
another
candidate for
the Syria
envoy post --
and of one
delivered in
2008 as a "UN"
report but
written
entirely by
the US.
More
than one
speaker
questioned why
the "one
witness" to
how the
bombing was
done was
turned over to
Iraqi
authorities by
the US and
killed by
hanging before
anyone in the
UN interviewed
him.
Inner
City Press has
previously
questioned the
lack of
finality in
the UN's
investigation
of the Canal
Hotel bombing.
Click
here for that
and see below.
Update
of August 21:
at the next
noon briefing
after the
Church Center
ceremony,
Inner City
Press asked
Ban Ki-moon's
lead spokesman
Martin Nesirky
if any
response to
the criticism
of Ban and
treatment of
survivors and
loved
ones. He
said UN would
only respond
to complaints
through
"official
channels, not
through you."
Inner City
Press asked,
but is your
office aware
of the
criticism?
Nesirky
said, that's
not what you
asked, and
turned to
another
questioner.
At the
Church Center,
August 19,
2012, (c)
MRLee
In a March
2004
report by
the UN's
Security in
Iraq
Accountability
Panel, the
still-withheld
threat
assessment
report by
Bruno Henn and
Leo Powell is
referenced:
130.
A UNSSS
assessment
mission, led
by the Deputy
Chief UNSSS,
visited
Baghdad in
late
June-early
July to
ascertain
whether the
CPT, as then
constituted
and equipped,
was able to
assist the
SRSG in the
discharge of
his mission...
The Panel felt
that there had
been no
determined or
focused effort
to address the
principal
recommendations,
especially as
some envisaged
actions fell
to people
outside UNSSS.
Failure in
following up
these
recommendations
is not
surprising, as
the report
remained an
internal one
and was not
shared,
including with
UNSECOORD,
until after
the attack on
19 August, at
which time an
unsigned and
undated copy
was passed to
UNSECOORD by
UNSSS.
That the
threat
assessment was
reportedly
turned in only
after the
bombing, and
then only
"unsigned and
undated,"
makes it
release all
the more
important.
Inner City
Press directly asked Ban Ki-moon's
then-spokesperson
for the
report:
Inner
City Press:
There was the
threat
assessment
report that
was done
before the
bombing took
place.
But I think it
has never been
re[leased],
and I'm not
sure why,
given that
it's been
outdated.
Even some
Member States
complained
that they
haven't seen
it. So I
guess I'm
requesting if
that document
can be
released.
It was called
the threat
assessment.
It was done in
2003 prior to
the bombing.
Spokesperson:
Well, I think
if it contains
information
that can
jeopardize the
lives of our
own people
right now in
Iraq -- no, it
will not be
released.
Inner
City Press:
But I think it
was all about
--
Spokesperson:
If it was
about what
happened at
the building,
I would be
surprised if
it hasn't been
released.
I know a
number of
things were
released in
2004. I
can check for
you what was
released but a
threat
assessment, I
don't think
will be
released as
such.
Inner
City Press:
But it was an
assessment
done before
the bombing,
you see what I
mean?
It's all about
the
building.
Some people
have said that
the problem
was that it
had assessed
the threat as
low. I
don’t know if
that's true or
not.
That's why I'm
asking.
That's why I
would like to
see the
report.
Spokesperson:
I'll try to
find out for
you.
But
nothing was
provided.
As it
turns out,
there is another buried
report, a
post-bombing
audit carried
out by
Francois
Pascal, then
of the UN's
Office of
Internal
Oversight
Services.
Reportedly,
then-OIOS
chief Dileep
Nair ordered
Pascal to
remove from
his audit the
names of those
responsible
for various
acts. Then the
audit was
concealed.
One of the
copies of the
Bruno Henn
threat
assessment in
Iraq report
was held by a
UN security
staffer, as
raised in the May
26, 2006 noon
briefing:
Question:
When the Hotel
was struck in
August, either
the
Secretary-General
or the Deputy
Secretary-General
asked for
those reports
to be
returned.
Nothing has
been heard of
the report
since
then.
The Mission
didn't see it
nor the
Security
Council.
About a month
ago, a
security
officer told
me he had a
copy he picked
up in the
wreckage when
he went on a
search-and-rescue
team in August
of 2003.
A commanding
officer
verified that
this officer
had the report
as personal
property for
two years.
Stephane
Dujarric:
Let me stop
you here and
answer... the
issue of
security in
the Canal
Hotel was
examined by
two reports,
the Ahtisaari
report and the
Volcker
report, and I
have nothing
to add.
I will just
say the
security of
the staff in
Baghdad is at
the forefront
of the
Secretary-General's
mind when
considering
deployment or
increase of UN
presence.
Question:
But this guy
had the UN
report as
personal
property.
People have
been making
inquiries.
Mr.
Dujarric:
I’m glad they
have and you
can keep
bringing this
up
The
above-quoted UN
transcript,
when compared
to the video of
the briefing,
is
inaccurate.
And so it goes
at the UN.
, 
