By Matthew Russell Lee, Scoop
UNITED NATIONS, April 18 – The UN Security Council is headed for a retreat in Sweden, accompanied by UN Secretary General and, Inner City Press can report, UN Disarmament chief Izumi Nakamitsu, on the issues of Douma and the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons. Inner City Press ran into Nakamitsu after she had a meeting preparing for the retreat with Guterres and his Political (some say, Cameroon) adviser Khassim Diagne. The UN Secretariat has yet to release a list of the officials it is bringing to the retreat, so this report is a scoop-lette. Sweden's Deputy Ambassador Carl Skau's joke the previous day about making the Council members sit silent and listen to music, perhaps Bach as Dag Hammarskjold famously did, came up. But what music? Inner City Press is covering this.
At an April 18 press conference Inner City Press asked what seemed an obvious journalistic question: who's paying? Video here.
Sweden's Deputy Ambassador Carl Skau replied that Sweden will be paying for all of the Security Council members. And Guterres? Skau said the costs of Guterres and his team - again, size and composition undisclosed - will be borne by the UN, that is to say, the public. He used a state visit to Stockholm to justify this.
Inner City Press asked, did any Security Council member offer to pay its own costs? No, it seems. So Sweden will pay for all countries on the divided Security Council. So Swedes know? Skau told Inner City Press the financial expenditure is “on the website.” But it does not seem to be on this one, entitled “Sweden and the UN in Figures.”
Soon it was argued no harm no foul. But could smaller countries elected to the Security Council afford to compete with Sweden? We'll have more on this - and on the retreat. Watch this site.
