After Ban Insulated from Rape & Lanka Qs, UN Spox Tweets GOP Debate

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, September 17 -- When a Press question about UN Peacekeepers' rapes was put to UN Spokesperson Stephane Dujarric during a Reddit "Ask Me Anything" on September 15, he declined to answer it, saying such questions are answered in the UN Press Briefing Room.

  But Dujarric did not allow the questions to be asked to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on September 16, nor questions about such other UN (and Ban) failures as in Sri Lanka.

  (The @UN_Spokesperson did, however, find time totweet about the #GOPdebate later on September 16, here. While that might be deleted, Inner City Press and the Free UN Coalition for Access believe that the output of official accounts constitute a public record, and disagrees with the close-down or censorship of accounts which preserved deleted (UN) diplomatic tweets.)

With the UN being less than successful in mediating inYemen and Libya, Syria and South Sudan, accused of rapes in Central African Republic and killing 8,000 in Haiti with cholera (after 40,000 died in Sri Lanka with little response from the UN), Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on September 16 was asked, What is your legacy?

  Neither that question, nor none of the other 11 Ban's spokesman Stephane Dujarric selected, referred to the rape scandal, much less deadly cholera or the Sri Lanka report released earlier in the day in Geneva, after months of delay and supposed concern by Ban.

  Inner City Press asked, before the press conference ended and then again before Ban left the room, “Anything on Sri Lanka?” But there was nothing. Ban's spokesman Dujarric didn't even allow Inner City Press to put a question to UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous, who covered up rapes in DR Congo, Darfur and now CAR.

  Most recently, Ladsous linked rapes to a lack of “R&R,” rest and relaxation, video here. 

Dujarric himself cut off Inner City Press questions on what Ladsous said, and declined to answer on Reddit in an “Ask Me Anything.” (He didn't say he'd ANSWER everything, one wag pointed out.)

  But even beyond the scandals, Ban did not in his opening statement mention Somalia, or CAR, or Darfur; none of the questions selected by Dujarric was about Africa. (One wire points out Africa was part of a UN-at-70 question; noted.)

    Inner City Press also tried to ask about Burundi -- nothing - and South Sudan, on which we are preparing a story.

  It was Voice of America with the “What is your legacy” question. Ban said he'd answer next year. Inner City Press might answer sooner. Watch this site.