By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, March 18 -- The UN says it is for press freedom, but on March 18, UN Peacekeeping chiefHerve Ladsous told the Security Council of "unacceptable vilification of the UN by some... media articles."
After the meeting, while neither Ladsous nor the UN's envoy to South Sudan Hilde Johnson came to answer questions, the president of the Security Council for March, Sylvie Lucas of Luxembourg, did.
Inner City Press asked her about Ladsous' line, and if the UN and Security Council were now in the business of critiquing articles in countries with peacekeeping missions.
Lucas, who has held more stakeouts this month by far that recent presidencies, replied by citing a protest sign depicting Hilde Johnson and a revolver. Inner City Press has seen a picture of the sign - but it is well within the bounds of protected First Amendment speech and protest in the US. Is the UN, or Ladsous and Johnson, promoting a lower standard?
South Sudan's Permanent Representative Francis Deng, himself a former UN official, said that the government plans to "contain hostile publicity." So now if the Kiir government shuts down a newspaper, or beats protesters for holding "bad" signs, are the UN and its Security Council, or Ladsous and Johnson, complicit?
Already, Ladsous refuses to answer Press questions on topics ranging from the introduction of cholera in Haiti torapes by the UN's partners in the Congolese Army in Minova, video here.
Now when the UN speaks on unacceptable media articles, what does it mean? Salva Kiir's information minister said that to broadcast interviews with rebels into South Sudan would be illegal. The UN had no comment
A Kiir adviser admitted his government gives "advise" to journalists on what and what not to write -- just as Inner City Press has been told, in connection with UN Accreditation, how to write about Ladsous. This is called censorship.
Now Ladsous explicitly joins the censors. Some say it's Ladsous who should be censured -- if, that is, the UN believes in free press.
Though it was UN Peacekeeping own admitted "error" that gave rise to articles, Ladsous now blames the government for not agreeing to a joint investigation. He said, "We offered to the Government to conduct a joint investigation, to prove our good faith and provide full transparency. Unfortunately, the offer was declined."
Back on March 6, the UN issued a rare admission of error, saying that contrary to policy weapons were moved by road, not air, in South Sudan for the Ghana peacekeepers recently arrived from Cote d'Ivoire.
The UN issued this:
Juba, 6 March 2014: It is the policy of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) that during the crisis in South Sudan all arms and ammunition for peacekeeping contingents are flown into respective areas of deployment and not taken by road. This is an important security measure.
In connection with the transport of cargo of general goods belonging to the Ghanaian battalion on its way to Bentiu, several containers were wrongly labelled and inadvertently contained weapons and ammunition. This is regrettable. The Ghanaian troops are part of the surge of UNMISS troops to assist South Sudan and the goods were en route to Bentiu, passing through Rumbek.
UN Headquarters intends to dispatch a high level investigation team to look into this matter on an urgent basis, in cooperation with the Government of South Sudan.
Pressed for more details, spokesperson Martin Nesirky declined. One wondered, if the UN can in essence apologize so quickly for weapons transport in South Sudan, why not for the 8,000 people killed by the cholera introduced into Haiti?
Then Inner City Press was sent links to the photos of the (UN) trucks, and of the weapons. Click here and here; h/t.
Perhaps it's that the UN was caught red-handed, so to speak. So now what? Watch this site.
