By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, January 29 -- The UN's Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations on Janary 29 was dominated by Sudan and Mauritania, Cuba and Nicaragua. Led by Sudan, questions were directed at NGOs like Shi'a Rights Watch and the International Association of Independent Journalists. Inner City Press as before covered the Committee's back and forth, here and here.
The United States spoke up on the former, not the latter. At 6 pm the meeting abruptly ended, with the scheduling of a closed door session for 9:30 am on January 30 about the Committee's “work methods.”
After that, US Ambassador Samantha Power, speaking by Twitter, said “very concerning initiative in NGO Committee to prevent UN from publicly reporting what member states say about NGO's seeking accreditation.... In an era of global crackdown on civil society, the UN's NGO Committee must set the example for openness & transparency. RT if you agree.”
Among the re-tweeters was the UN Correspondents Association, a group that decided does not support the rights in independent journalists, having tried for example to get the investigative Press thrown out of the UN, see here and here and here (UK Guardian here). This led to the new Free UN Coalition for Access, which presses for increased access to the UN.
The feed of UNCA, more properly known as the UN's Censorship Alliance, is in fact run by censors, here. They didn't even cover the NGO Committee, only playing sycophant to Power after the fact. And so it goes at the UN. Watch this site.
Footnotes: the day before in the UN's NGO Committee the proposal was made to proceed, in meetings making up for those cancelled by snow, without interpretation. Cuba and Nicaragua objected, as others were sure to. We'll see.
