In Other Media-eg New Statesman, AJE, FP, Georgia, NYT,  Azerbaijan, CSM Click here to contact us     .

By Matthew Russell Lee, Video, New Petition

UNITED NATIONS GATE, January 11 – At the UN World Intellectual Property Organization, whose work on North Korea's cyanide patents and retaliation Inner City Press has reported on, is at it again, had been poised for months to terminate a whistleblower. Now, after UNSG Antonio Guterres and his spokesmen refused for many weeks to answer banned Inner City Press' written questions about the scandal - and questions about a threat to sue Inner City Press for its coverage of a murky "Chinese Art" event in Guterres' UN, here -- this: WIPO CIO and whistleblower Wei LEI has finally been summarily dismissed by WIPO Director General Francis Gurry. This has been years in the making, ever since Wei Lei testified against Gurry in an OIOS investigation.     Wei Lei, at the D2 level, was alleged of fraudulently using a colleague’s bankcard to make a withdrawal of CHF 300 from an ATM at WIPO premises. The allegation goes like this:  For weeks Lei kept the card that was sent to his office by mistake, running the risk of having the card been reported as missing and blocked; On the day he planned to commit the fraud, Lei intentionally notified the owner of the card that he received the card by mistake and that he had forward the card to the owner, running the risk that the owner might walk over to his office asking for the card; An hour later Lei made the withdrawal of 300 Swiss Francs with full knowledge of the presence of security cameras, although the card was reported to the bank as missing 3 days earlier and a replacement was already sent and his assistant denied receiving the PIN.    Not only did the WIPO administration believe such a story is credable, it also convinced itself that the crime was beyond a reasonable doubt although the bank had refused to provide the basic information such as where the card was sent and if the card was blocked.     Even Chitra Radhakishun, the WIPO Chief Ethics Officer, initially determined that the bank card investigation against Lei should be investigated as retaliation. But the WIPO administration immediately put Radhakishun under investigation. Sylvie Forbin, Deputy Director General of WIPO who received Radhakishun’s recommendation, also wrote to Radhakishun and asked her to reconsider. Three weeks after that, Radhakishun was sufficiently convinced that her position needed to change and, therefore, issued a new determination that reversed her earlier determination.     To make the whole story even more dramatic, the Ethics Office of UNOPS - on which Inner City Press has also been reporting - who was contracted by WIPO to review the WIPO Ethics Office’s determinations, ruled that WIPO Chief Ethics Officer’s initial determination was not a determination, although it was in the memorandum to Lei under the heading of “Determination”, and that Radhakishun’s second determination should be accepted, although WIPO policy does not allow its Ethics Office to conduct a review of its own determination and Radhakishun should have recused herself by then as she was under investigation with allegation of her misconduct against Lei.     Lei has now complained to OIOS and to Guterres -- good luck, a fish rots from the head -- and asked an investigation into the possible collusion between the Ethics Office of UNOPS and the WIPO Administration.  But could people other than retaliation master Guterres take action? Watch this site. That's WIPO -  the wider UN of Antonio Guterres has banned Inner City Press from entering its campus since 3 July 2018, claiming that its Lieutenant Ronald Dobbins targeted ouster of Inner City Press from a speech by Secretary General Antonio Guterres on June 22 then from a meeting about his budget on July 3 were "altercations." Next this ban was extended  beyond the UN campus to the Pierre Hotel on Fifth Avenue, for a July 10 press conference by the UN affiliated but ostensibly independent World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) which as Inner City Press has previously reported helped North Korea with its cyanide patents and retaliated against it staff and media. Inner City Press was e-mailed an invitation on July 2 and replied with an RSVP to cover it. Marshall Hoffman of WIPO's public relations firm Hoffman PR wrote back, "Thanks. We will see at the press conference." After that, Guterres spokesman Farhan Haq was asked why Inner City Press is banned and said it is pending a review of two "altercations" - both of which were improper and unilateral ousters of Inner City Press by UN Security's Dobbins and officers, four of whom refused to give their names. Soon, there was this follow up e-mail from WIPO's flak Marshall Hoffman: "Dear Matthew, It has come to my attention that your accreditation to the UN has been suspended pending an investigation into an incident. Given the suspension, I regret you will not be able to attend the WIPO press conference."

Now the UN has gone so far as to put Inner City Press on a "banned from UN" list it does not make public; Guterres' security nearly got Park East Synagogue security to oust Inner City Press from Guterres' October 31 speech... on tolerance. This is today's UN: the ban must be reversed. We'll have more on this - and on this: how untransparent and inaccessible is Antonio Guterres, as UN Secretary General? The day he canceled his first UN Headquarters press conference in six months, he was ironically the guest of honor of the United Nations Correspondents Association. He was scheduled to make remarks at 6 pm - but it was not in the UN Media Alert. Inner City Press, whose RSVP to UNCA was never responded to, streamed the event from the tourists' balcony, edited here. Then Guterres' UN Security guards physically ousted Inner City Press from covering the UN Fifth Committee's July 3 meeting on his proposal to fire UN staff and move the jobs- then on July 5 banned Inner City Press from entering the UN. Fox News story here, GAP blogs I and II. While Guterres' UNCA fan club said nothing, others did. Guterres blathered on about how he supported the media in Portugal - dubious - and then cuts a cake for his UN Censorship Alliance. Earlier Inner City Press asked Guterres' lead spokesman Stephane Dujarric, who previously lent the UN Press Briefing Room to UNCA, if the event was open press but he refused to answer and ran off. Inner City Press asked the spokesman from the President of the General Assembly, who is listed as attended but will not speak, why it is not in the UN Media Alert. The spokesman said to ask UNCA. But UNCA never responded to the RSVP of Inner City Press through the Free UN Coalition for Access. In the middle of the event the claim was that UN correspondents didn't have to RSVP - not what the notice said. The event was not even in the June 26 UN Media Alert. Last week, Dujarric spoonfed sound bytes to a prominent UNCA members and is working with them to try to further restrict Inner City Press, here - Inner City Press was in fact ousted on June 22, video here, story here). The Free UN Coalition for Access questions this and the propriety of this explicit focus by the UN Correspondents Association on the UN's "causes" rather than simply covering the UN as it is; it and corruption are among the reasons Inner City Press quit UNCA (and co-founded FUNCA).

***

Feedback: Editorial [at] innercitypress.com

Past (and future?) UN Office: S-303, UN, NY 10017 USA
For now: UN Delegates' Gate entrance
and PO Box 20047 Dag Ham Sta, NY NY 10017

Reporter's mobile (and weekends): 718-716-3540

Search innercitypress.com  Search WWW (censored?)

Other, earlier Inner City Press are listed here, and some are available in the ProQuest service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.

 Copyright 2006-2019 Inner City Press, Inc. To request reprint or other permission, e-contact Editorial [at] innercitypress.com for