By Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Q&A Video
BBC - Guardian UK - Honduras - ESPN
UN GATE, Nov 6 – Each day, the current United Nations gets worse. Usually we focus on Secretary General Antonio Guterres moving from concealing his links to UN briber CEFC China Energy to banning the Press that asks, to failures on Sri Lanka, Cameroon, Haiti, Honduras (JOH) & Nigeria (Nnamdi & Igboho).
This year the UN lost a journalist of integrity, Apostolis Zoupaniotis, who retired to return to Greece. Even after the UN in retaliation threw Inner City Press out of its UN office, Apostolis offered the use of his cubicle.
By contrast the insiders of the UN Correspondents Association, while purporting to praise this journalist among with UN Spokesman Stephane Dujarric on three week vacation in Greece, have neither responded to or offered any explanation when a lawyer's letter - to each UNCA Executive Committee member - urged them to have a dialogue about ending the UN's banning and censorship of Inner City Press. No answers - video here.
Instead they are taking UN system money - from the "Alliance of Civilizations" no less - to give prizes to their own members, at overprice Cipriani by Wall Street on December 8:
"Guterres will be the guest of honor of the evening. We are also pleased to announce the winners of the 2021 UNCA Awards and the 2021 Dag Hammarskjold Journalism Fellows below. They're giving prizes to their own James Bays, who worked with Stephane Dujarric to get Inner City Press banned, their own Mauricio Guerrero who first resisted but their censored, Pass Blue, and others to be named.
Beyond its role under current management as the UN Censorship Alliance, here's a recent pitch: "UNCA is extending an invitation to the online launch of the third annual Hyundai Motor ‘Re:Style 2021’ Sustainable Fashion Collection, introducing 12 fashion items created with discarded wearable materials from vehicles, launching in partnering shops in Seoul and Paris. Hyundai Motor Company will donate all profits from the project to charitable programs of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). Valeria Robecco President, United Nations Correspondents Association." Cars for the environment. Watch this site.
The letter was received by the UN's Melissa Fleming, Maria Luiza Vioti and Tal Mekel and to each UNCA Executive Board member, to them citing UNCA's stated goals that it has a charter to supposedly uphold.
What's next? Since the letter, Inner City Press has published exclusive stories not only from the U.S. court systems but about the United Nations, including its agencies UNOPS, UNFPA, UNITAR and UNESCO. (Also credited in AP, Daily Mail, and Nigeria's Sahara Reporters, amid answers from the IMF.)
But none of its written questions have been answered by the UN Spokespeople, and it remains banned from entry to the UN's briefings. This must end.
Having asked for a colleagial discussion, and while still offering it, things must turn to the law. UNCA is a New York State non-profit which has not only not abided by its stated goals - it has tortiously interfered with a journalist's right to cover the United Nations. The United Nations itself propounds Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and has other legal duties that must be addressed by national courts, particularly in the UN's host country...
Those in receipt of the first, friendly letter: melissa.fleming@un.org, marialuiza.viotti@un.org, mekel@un.org, malu@un.org, and UNCA
Valeria Robecco, ANSA News Agency, Nabil Abi Saab, Al-Araby, Jianguo Ma, Xinhua News Agency, Edith Lederer, Associated, Giampaolo Pioli, Quotidiano, Linda Fasulo, Ibtisam Azem, Al-Araby Al-Jadeed Newspaper, Ali Barada, France 24, Asharq Al-Awsat; Oscar Bolanos, OMB News, Sherwin Bryce-Pease, SABC South Africa - Alexander Hassanein, The Tokyo Shimbun, Maria Khrenova, TASS, Philippe Rater, Agence France-Presse, Kaori Yoshida, Nikkei, Betul Yuruk, Anadolu Agency at president@unca.com, valeria.robecco@gmail.com, nabisaab@gmail.com, mjg222888@gmail.com, elederer@ap.org, giampioli@aol.com, lindafasulo@gmail.com, ibtisam.azem@alaraby.co.uk, abarada@hotmail.com, ombyvozque@gmail.com, s.brycepease@gmail.com, alexander@tokyoshimbun.us, khrenova_m@tass.ru, philippe.rater@afp.com, kaori.yoshida@nex.nikkei.com, byuruk@aa.com.tr
We'll have more on this. Watch this site.
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