By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, July 6 -- As Ban Ki-moon prepares to leave the UN, and try to run for president of South Korea, his stated committed to transparency is coming up empty.
Ban said he would be disclosing the nationalities of peacekeepers accused of rape. But after Ban's spokesman Stephane Dujarric didn't follow through on this on July 1, when Inner City Press asked in writing on July 5 for the information or just the reasons it was being withheld,Dujarric made no response at all.
Likewise on July 5 Inner City Press asked Dujarric about the financing of the UN-facilitated, and failing, Yemen talks in Kuwait, where delegates from Sana'a have had to take out personal loans to participate.
No answer from Dujarric, who was in his office getting paid by global taxpayers, pacing by the glassed-in focused booth Inner City Press must use to return calls now that Ban and his Under Secretary General for “Public Information” Cristina Gallach have evicted Inner City Press from its long time UN office, to put in Egyptian state media Akhbar Al Youm's rarely present Sanaa Youssef, a former UNCA president who never asks questions.
Dujarric has outright refused to answer about the shifting rationale for Ban's eviction, calling questions about the UN's written justifications to the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee and UN Special Rapporteurs Kaye and Forst mere “personal issues.”
In fact, Dujarric has participated in falsifying Inner City Press' principled stand against his privatization of the UN Press Briefing Room into an “altercation” -- the wordGallach used in her response to UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression David Kaye -- and has then refused to answer any questions about it.
On July 5, since Dujarric has refused to answer during briefings, going so far as to walk out of the room as Inner City Press asks questions, Inner City Press asked Dujarric and his deputy in writing:
“In an email to Nobel Peace Prize winner Jose Ramos Horta, USG Gallach said her February 19 decision on Inner City Press was based on an 'internal report.' Please confirm the existence of this internal report and provide a copy - to Inner City Press - or explain why UN refuses to provide a copy. Also, please square or explain the contradiction between UN “Note Verbale” to US Senate Foreign Relations Committee / USUN state that there are no records regarding 'closed' meeting in the UN Press Briefing Room on January 29 with USG Gallach's statement to Ramos Horta that she had and based her decision on an 'internal report' - and provide the report, see above.”
Dujarric didn't answer this question, or even confirm receipt before leaving the UN for the day, the next day and maybe more. Nor did he answer the simplest of factual financial / DPI questions:
“With regard to an event in UN 1B today, list as 'Malko Investment Group' with DPI/GPU, please state who or what the Malko Investment Group is and what due diligence was done.”
No answer to this either, despite the fact that the UN's own Office of Internal Oversight Service found that Gallach failed to do due diligence before letting now indicted Ng Lap Seng sponsor the UN's slavery memorial. To this has Ban's UN sunk. It must all be reversed. Watch this site.
