by Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Book Substack
UN GATE, April 9 – If one is sure of having the right message, how far to go in shutting down disagreement? In China, for example, the answer is locking up critics and erecting the Great Firewall of China.
The United Nations is similar, but different.
Central to the UN's current work in this field is Under Secretary General Melissa, headed on April 10 to brag in two Ohio talks (see below), sure not to mention her censoring role.
But Inner City Press has a longer experience with Fleming as a censor.
Every weekday for three years, Inner City Press has written to Fleming seeking to end her Department of Global Communications' ban on its entering the UN and asking questions, as it had for years before she and Antonio Guterres decide to Sinofy the place, and ban critics.
No answer. A pro bono law firm, Quinn Emanuel, wrote to Fleming, here. No answer.
But she will apparently answer questions in Ohio - but ignore protests. "the Alliance Against Islamic Regime of Iran Apologists has urged Fleming "to reconsider her appearance" Monday. The group includes relatives of Iranians killed in a series of 1988 prison massacres in that country, Iranian-Americans, Oberlin College students and alumni, and others. It has accused Oberlin College professor Mohammad Jafar Mahallati of playing a role in the massacres. Mahallati was Iran's permanent representative to the U.N. in New York in 1988. He is now the Nancy Schrom Dye Chair in Middle East and North African Studies at Oberlin College. More than 600 people signed a letter to Oberlin College President Carmen Twillie Ambar calling for Mahallati to be fired in late 2020. Of Fleming, the censor, they write "by agreeing to speak at an institution that has celebrated and promoted a figure like Mahallati, she risks" - being herself, a censor. No answers.
We have appealed the ban to UN Security chief Gilles Michaud, without any answer. We'll have more on this.
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