Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un1gskdrugs022309.html
UNITED NATIONS, February 23 -- The UN's love affair with corporations became overheated on Monday, when commitments by pharmaceutical and furniture companies to disease prevention were praised without reference to their roots or limitations. With Bill Clinton slated to arrive later in the afternoon, the UN's own noon briefing was cancelled to allow, among others, GlaxoSmithKline to be praised by Kari Stoever of the Global Network for Neglected Tropical Diseases.
Inner City Press asked about criticism of GSK by Medecins Sans Frontieres, for continuing to gouge on pricing on HIV/AIDS medications. MSF's Sophie Delaunay, the participant in the briefing to whom most questions ended up being directed, responded that GSK's exclusion of AIDS drugs was "not satisfactory." Video here, from Minute 32:20.
Later Inner City Press asked Ms. Delaunay about MSF's report criticizing the UN's own performance in Northern Congo as civilians were being killed by the Lord's Resistance Army. Ms. Delaunay called the situation outrageous. Video here, from Minute 43:40.
Of North Korea, she said that the UN's refugee agency UNHCR is incapable of guaranteeing safe passage from that dictatorship where, she said, nothing has improved for people since at least 2002. Off-camera, she told Inner City Press that MSF has not been able to access the conflict zone in Sri Lanka, click here for that story.
When Bill Clinton came to the UN in the afternoon, a handful of reported waited by the elevator. The UN's own photographers were whisked up for a photo-op with Ban Ki-moon. Afterwards Clinton stopped to shake hands but not to answer questions. A diplomat representing the Polisario Front of Western Sahara, approached by Bill Clinton, thanked him for James Baker's role in trying to mediate with Morocco. Afterwards he asked Inner City Press, "Did Clinton know who I was?" It seemed doubtful. "But he felt your pain."
The day ended with an upbeat tropical diseases reception facing over the East River in the Delegates' Dining Room, where corporate philanthropy was praised without equivocation. Omnipresent through the day were IKEA and UNICEF, with pamphlets about their partnership and children in India. Not long ago, IKEA was found using child labor in India. Perhaps they've turned the corner. UNICEF says it will take only six percent of the commitment. Meanwhile Bill's wife Hillary is said to be looking for a new head of UNICEF, at latest in 2010. Beneath the happy surface there are power games at work.
