By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, March 5 -- More than two months after UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said that in Libya NATO had entirely complied with the UN Security Council resolutions and international law, last week the UN's own International Commission of Inquiry quietly issued a report including 60 killings of civilians by NATO. Click here to view.
In a single incident "in the town of Majer on 8 August 2011... the Commission found NATO bombs killed 34 civilians and injured 38. After the initial airstrike killed 16, a group of rescuers arrived and were hit by a subsequent attack, killing 18."
The report was put online on the website of the UN Human Rights Commission, and NATO chief Rasmussen was asked and answered about it on Monday. Later on March 5, Inner City Pres asked Ban's deputy spokesman Eduardo del Buey about the report, how it related to Ban's earlier statements on NATO and international humanitarian law.
"It only came on out Friday," del Buey replied, "give us time." How much time?
Inner City Press asked asked del Buey if, after two months, the UN finally had an estimate of how many people were killed in Pibor in South Sudan when the UN arrived late due to operating without military helicopters from mid-November onward. Del Buey had nothing on that, either.
While afterward other UN officials cautioned that the UN's lack of answers might be attributable to laziness and incompetence, it seems that this UN makes political decisions on, for example, when to count the dead. In Pibor, where it bears some responsibility, it will not count, or delays the count.
In Sri Lanka in 2009, the UN actively cover-up casualty figures, until they were leaked and published by Inner City Press. Meanwhile the UN is loud about broadcasting casualty figures in places it has it has no access to. And so it goes in Ban Ki-moon's UN.
