By Matthew Russell Lee,
UNITED NATIONS, November 16, updated: following report of fleas in UN basement by Inner City Press and questions, UN has confirmed the fleas. On bedbugs in the briefing room and Al Jazeera, the fumigation will not happen until November 20.
With the UN still refusing to disclose the results of the bedbug tests in did after the pests' presence was exposed, first by Inner City Press, on the evening of November 15 a bedbug sniffing dog inspected the press briefing room in the Dag Hammarskjold Library auditorium.
Inner City Press witnessed it, including meeting and petting the dog, a Jack Russell named Jack. He found bedbugs on chairs in the briefing room, which the UN now says “have been cordoned off.” Bedbugs were also discovered in the studios of Al Jazeera on the second floor, AFTER the studios of BBC and NHK had been fumigated. The press corps is in an uproar. But the fumigation planned as of 6:50 pm on November 16 is only of the briefing room and Al Jazeera (not the whole second floor), and not until Nov. 20.
Meanwhile other vermin have been found in the UN. In the publications area, for example, the talk has been of fleas. On November 15, Inner City Press asked New York City Mayor Bloomberg a question about the UN's refusal to comply with NYC laws, including on bedbugs and even food safety. This last was an inquiry begun on November 1, when Inner City Press asked UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Martin Nesirky:
Inner City Press: in New York now, the Health Department has a system under which the representing letter grades for health. They inspect restaurants and any other food facility. And apparently they have… they do inspect… I wasn’t aware of this, but they inspect the UNICEF cafeteria and the DC-One cafeteria, and both have received grades that would be B or in one case C. What I am wondering is whether the facility here in UN Headquarters, does the UN consider this to be outside of that system of health inspections, and if so what can it say about the… given, across the street what the grades are? And also, not to say that the two are related, but what interface has there been with the city government on this bedbug issue and what update can you provide as to the tests that you said last week were being performed in various locations, some here, some out, including one that was supposedly going to be done and or may soon be done on the 2nd floor? So it’s the food issue, and then the bedbug issue.
Spokesperson Nesirky: Well, on the second, I don’t have an update, and let’s see if we can get one. I don’t have an update. But I do know, as you yourself have said, you’ve been in direct touch with the relevant people from Facilities Management Service. I am sure that if you wanted to, you could do the same again. But for the benefit of others, of course, and for you as well, we’ll see if there is an update. On the first part, health inspections, I would defer to my colleagues who liaise with the city authorities. I don’t know the answer to that.
Inner City Press: Should I follow up with them or can you [inaudible]?
Spokesperson Nesirky: As I said, I will see what we can find out.
[The Spokesperson later added that Aramark said that the cafeteria at United Nations Headquarters was not being inspected.]
This bracketed response, which was never directly provided to Inner City Press but only read out over a speaker system that is not audible in the areas Inner City Press covers in the day, gives rise to these questions, among others:
On what basis are the UN's cafeteria facility at UNICEF and the UN's cafeteria in the DC building inspected, but the UN cafeteria not inspected? Is it a legal basis?
Is the UN's main cafeteria not being inspected because the UN is forbidding the inspection?
Does the SG have an objection to NYC inspectors visiting the UN cafeteria? Doesn't the UN allow inspections from the Fire Department of the UN premises?
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