By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, March 14 -- On Syria, the UN hyped up Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's briefing to the General Assembly on March 14, and then didn't televise any of it, nor the reply by Syrian Ambassadar Bashar Ja'afari.
Ja'afari came out to the stakeout and criticized the blackout, and Ban Ki-Moon and his envoy Lakhdar Brahimi for offering "no hint of terrorism."
Soon some at the stakeout tried to cut in, as they wouldn't with Ban Ki-moon. Video here, from Minute 6:23. Ja'afari told them if they wanted to leave, they could. He denounced Saudi Arabia, perhaps pointedly at one of the interveners.
Ironically, later on March 14 the Syrian Coalition was given a long, uninterrupted press conference not at a stakeout that any UN journalist could attend, but in the United Nations Correspondents Association clubhouse, a room the UN gives to Gulf and Western journalists. See this debate.
Before the cut-off attempts, Ja'afari alleged that Qatar paid millions of dollars to Al Nusra for the released of the Ma'aloula nuns, in violations of a recent Security Council resolution on the topic. He spoke against unilateral sanctions, saying they are only supported by the US "and the Marshall Islands, or Kiribati."
Previously, Ja'afari was cut off UNTV, when Stephane Dujarric was in charge of it. Click here for that. Now, Dujarric is Ban Ki-moon's spokesman, and suddenly the Syrian National Coalition, unlike in September, is back in the UNCA club. Meanwhile questions Inner City Press sent to Duarric, not only about Nigeria and UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous but also about the apparently disappearing of UN video, have gone unanswered. This is the new UN. Watch this site.
