As UN Banned from S. Kordofan, Ging Tells ICP It's Failure, “Insane,” UNSC Quietly Meets

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, February 26, updated – Before the pending Sudan draft Presidential Statement was taken up by the UN Security Council on Tuesday afternoon, the UN humanitarian chief of operations John Ging told Inner City Press that despite a “Security Council resolution nine months ago calling for immediate access,” no aid has since gotten into South Kordofan and Blue Nile States. Video here, from Minute 34:17.

  After Inner City Press asked about any progress on the so-called Tripartite Agreement to get aid into the two areas, Ging said, “we have to stay focused on results, which have been failure. We have to be honest about prospects are... nil.”

  Ging concluded that to keep doing the “same thing, the same way, with the same result” -- failure -- means “as someone famously said, that you're insane.”

  But three hours later at the Security Council, a meeting of Deputy Permanent Representatives began on a long pending Presidential Statement on Sudan and South Sudan, including not only Abyei but also the Two Areas.

  This followed a briefing last week by Haile Menkerious, after which US Ambassador Susan Rice told Inner City Press the draft PRST would be updated. 

  Since then, as Iner City Press on February 21 exclusively reported, Sudan dropped what would have been its position atop the humanitarian pillar of ECOSOC, switching for Pakistan's "Coordination" position.

   Outside the Council Tuesday afternoon, a non-permanent member said “it's mostly about the oil, neither side will give in because each side thinks they can win.”

  But there is less and less focus on this; most talk about Syria or even for now Mali, Ging's lead topic on Tuesday. Sudan has been left behind, the people of the two areas the most. Watch this site.

Footnote: Inner City Press also asked the UN on Tuesday what it was doing to about Sudan's inability to open a bank account in the United States, one of the responsibilities of the US as host country.

  UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's deputy spokesman Eduardo Del Buey told Inner City Press that is up to the host country. But Ban's Controller, months ago, said that “good news” would been announced soon.

“The good news is that I'm here,' Del Buey said with a smile. Indeed. We'll have more on this.

Update of 4:30 pm, Feb 26 - and after Security Council Deputy Permanent Representatives met on Sudan for less than an hour and a half, when they emerged several shook their heads. "Not today, let's say," one told Inner City Press. "Oh we agree on everything," another said sarcastically. The candor was appreciated, but there was none of the seriousness (or posturing) of the Syria issue today, or perhaps of the Sudan issue in the past... 

On Syria, Russia Amends Its Draft, Deputy-Level Meeting After Kosovo Tuesday

By Matthew Russell Lee, Partial Exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, July 17 -- As the Syria resolution showdown looms, late Monday French Ambassador Gerard Araud told the press that "no one is raising the Russian draft."

  But Tuesday morning Russian Deputy Permanent Representative Sasha Pankin told the Press that the Russian draft -- which Inner City Press first put online, here -- is being amended again.

  UK Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant stopped and told the press that while the vote on the UK-table draft is scheduled for Wednesday afternoon, that could be extended if there are "serious negotiations."

  And other sources exclusively told Inner City Press that a DPR level meeting about the Russian draft has been scheduled for Tuesday afternoon, after a closed door session about Kosovo. Nevertheless Morocco's Permanent Representative Loulichki told the press that there is no meeting on Syria resolution(s) on Tuesday.

After hearing from Pankin, Inner City Press directly asked Araud of Russia amending its draft. "Yes," he says, "they have amended their draft."

Moments later Herve Ladsous, the fourth Frenchman in a row to head UN Peacekeeping, once again refused to answer ANY questions from Inner City Press, including on DPKO killings in the Congo -- more on that soon.

The Kosovo session, Pankin told Inner City Press, focused not just on two Serbs recently killed in Kosovo, but on what he called the 1000 murders of returning Serbs in Kosovo, of which he said only one killer voluntarily turned himself in to police.

He also mentioned a visit to Kosovo by "fighters in Syria." Other talk of a more recent visit to Kosovo by Libyans, and of two more possible recognitions of Kosovo, by Libya once the government is settled, and prospectively by Syria if Assad is overthrown. There are side-stakes on all this. Watch this site.