As Whistleblower Wasserstrom Calls for Cut in US Funds to UN, Ban Ki-moon's UN Is Silent, Raids Press Offices, Leaks Photos to BuzzFeed

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, April 8 -- After the UN staffer James Wasserstrom blew the whistle in 2007 on corruption in the UN Peacekeeping mission in Kosovo, he was retaliated against. For example, his home was illegally searched, and the UN arranged to attack him in the media.

  Inner City Press wrote in 2007 about the corruption, by Joachim Ruecker, Stephen Schook, and Alexander Borg-Olivier and others. Click here for one example. On Monday Inner City Press asked Wasserstrom where these individuals are now.

  Wasserstrom said Rucker is an official in the German foreign service, while Schook is an adviser to a senior political official in Kosovo and Borg-Olivier is a lawyer in private practice in Kosovo.

  There has been no accountability for those who retaliated against Wasserstrom for blowing the whistle; he has been awarded a mere $65,000, far less than his costs.

  As Shelley Walden of the Government Accountability Project put it, at the UN even when whistleblowers win, they lose.

  Inner City Press asked Walden if she or GAP have been able to raise this issue and the need to reform to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon or his team. No, she said, despite requests there was been total silence.

  So much for the supposedly reforming Secretary General.

  Wassterstrom is calling for activation of the whistleblower protection criteria adopted in the 2012 US Consolidated Appropriations Act (H.R. 2055).

   HR 2055 requires a 15% withholding of the US contribution to any UN agency if it "is not taking steps to … implement best practices for the protection of whistleblowers from retaliation, including best practices for legal burdens of proof, access to independent adjudicative bodies, [and] results that eliminate the effects of retaliation..."

  Inner City Press asked if the US Mission to the UN, particularly Ambassador for reform Joe Torsella has been helpful. 

  Walden said they've met with Torsella before, he's done what he can -- that, we'd like to hear more about -- and they they hoped to meet with later on Monday, if his schedule permits.

  Inner City Press has been covering Torsella's involvement in the negotiations around the UN Senior Advisory Group on Peacekeeping Operations, click here for that.

  Inner City Press asked Walden how whistleblower protections could be extended to actual UN peacekeepers and police, and to victims. Walden said none of these are currently covered by UN policies, only UN staff. And even then...

The UN also retaliated against the investigative press. On March 18, 2013, UN official raised Inner City Press' office without notice or consent.

On March 21, after Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson's office was contacted by outside media about the raid, photos taken during the raid were sent to BuzzFeed.com through an anonymous “Concerned UN Reporter” e-mail account. This seems to be a pattern, and will be confronted and combated, including by the new Free UN Coalition for Access. Watch this site.

Footnote: Inner City Press asked Walden about a previous UN system whistleblower case about North Korea. She said that the case of Artjon Tony Shkurtaj, on which Inner City Press extensively reported, showed the need for a UNDP ethics office. But how is it performing? We'll have more on UNDP.

Kosovo "Respects Dual Citizenship," But Dodges Abkhazia Question, Downed Drone Deferred

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
www.innercitypress.com/un1udis042108.html

UNITED NATIONS, April 21 -- Kosovo's prime minister Hashim Thaci was asked on Monday what he would do face with a request for recognition by the breakaway republic of Abkhazia. "We will see very carefully," he said, walking away from the microphone. Video here, at Minute 7:09.

The exchange highlighted the fall-out from Kosovo's February 17 unilateral declaration of independence and subsequent entropy in Georgia, even Bolivia and the Far East. Georgia has requested an emergency Security Council meeting on the situation in Abkhazia, including what it calls Russia's shoot-down of a Georgia unmanned drone. Monday morning Inner City Press asked Georgian Ambassador Irakli Alasania about reports the Abkhaz shot it down. We have proof, Amb. Alasania said. Asked about reports of electricity being cut to the Russian CIS peacekeepers, he said he hadn't heard about it. Video here.

Late Monday the Security Council decided that the requested Georgia meeting will be held Wednesday, although participation by the Abkhaz has still not been determined. Previously, Russia complained that the U.S. declined to grant visas to Abkhaz representatives. Russia's Ambassador Vitaly Churkin late Monday alluded to countries which talk a lot about free speech but don't want all sides to be heard.

While many at the UN on Monday said there was "no news" in the Council's meeting on Kosovo, at the stakeout afterwards several things emerged. The UN Mission in Kosovo, which the U.S. says is winding down but Serbia and Russia say must remain, as apparently backed off from opposing Serbs in Kosovo voting in Serbian parliamentary elections on May 11. Since UNMIK's Joachim Ruecker never came to take questions from reporters, Inner City Press asked Kosovo's prime minister Thaci for his position on the elections. "We respect dual citizenship," he said, but "local elections" by Serbs in Kosovo "would be illegal."

Some say that these too will be allowed, and may even benefit UNMIK and Pristina -- how else would they know who to deal with, going forward, other than through elections? Inner City Press asked Serbian President Boris Tadic about the elections, and he said there "is no problem" with the parliamentary elections, and that about the local, they will talk to UNMIK.

At the UN's noon briefing on Monday, Inner City Press asked about reports that UN Under Secretary General for Peacekeeping Jean-Marie Guehenno will travel to Belgrade for meetings. Afterwards an answer arrived by e-mail, that you "asked whether Jean-Marie Guehenno will visit Belgrade. Yes, he expects to visit Kosovo and the region soon, in his role as head of peacekeeping."

Later Monday, Inner City Press asked President Boris Tadic what Serbia would be asking Mr. Guehenno for. "I'm not going to meet Mr. Guehenno," Tadic said. "Some other members of our government are going to, they are in charge."

Sources tell Inner City Press that Guehenno requested a one on one meeting with Tadic, and was turned down. Meanwhile, on his way into the Security Council, UNMIK's Joachim Ruecker was asked, "Are you resigning?" He answered, "Should I?" For more on Ruecker, click here.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un1udis042108.html

Blog of UN's Kovoso Envoy Ruecker Invites Questions, But Financial Disclosures Not Made

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un1ruecker042108.html

UNITED NATIONS, April 21 -- Jan Pronk, it turns out, was not the only blogging Special Representative of the Secretary-General. Joachim Ruecker, who is said to be under review for promotion from the UN Mission in Kosovo to the Under Secretary General for Management post at UN Headquarters, if and when Alicia Barcena leaves, has a blog, or at least a private website. It's www.joachim-ruecker.de, and it has pages not only in German but also in English and French -- always an important pairing in seeking a high UN post. There are pictures of his family and a thumbnail bio, with stints as mayor of Germany city of Sindelfingen, home of the largest Mercedes plant, and perhaps relatedly as Germany's consul in Detroit.

In 1993 Ruecker was quoted as the new mayor of Sindelfingen by the Toronto Star that in light of cut-backs, "we'll never be as well off as we were... it's hard to conceive how a community can cope with such drastic setbacks."

Reucker's online presence, of the type that got Jan Pronk thrown out of Sudan, is particularly surprising in light of his refusal of Ban Ki-moon's urging to make at least basic public financial disclosure. On Ban Ki-moon's website, Rucker's form states that "I choose not to disclose." Joachim, we hardly knew ye...

Ruecker's web site says, in English, "if you want to ask me something, please do it here: ruecker@un.org." So on the morning of April 21 he was sent a question: why did you decline to follow Ban Ki-moon's urging to make at least basic public financial disclosure? By 9 p.m. on Monday, he had not answered the question. On his way past the press in front of the Security Council Monday afternoon he was asked, Are you resigning? He answered, "Should I?" Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un1ruecker042108.html

At UN, Some Call Management Reform an Oxymoron, G to P Barriers and Breakaway UNDP, Ban Soldiers On

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un1mgmtreform040808.html

UNITED NATIONS, April 8 -- "Get the Secretariat out of the information Stone Age and into a modern one," UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon intoned Tuesday to a chamber full of Ambassadors and the his most senior officials. The topic was Management Reform, and what was called a debate consisted of the serial reading-out of speeches, many of them at cross purposes. The Group of 77 and China spoke of the need to make UN procurement more diverse -- that is, to stop favoring European and American companies with the largest contracts. The European Union, who spoke immediately after, did not even mention procurement as a reform issue. If you're getting the contracts, why would you complain?

Ban spoke of equality, saying he has "proposals to introduce one UN contract under one set of Staff Rules." The trend however in the UN system in the past year, in which the UN Development Program was allowed to exempt itself from the UN's Ethics system and its ostensible whistleblower protections, has gone in the opposite direction. And Ban does not, it seem, propose to abolish the wall between so-called General Service and Professional staff, a divide that few get promoted over, thereby wasting the talents of many UN workers. Some say that Kofi Annan, who as a long-time UN staffer understood the G to P wall, should have been the one to break it down, but didn't. Will Ban come to understand and do it, as a reverse Nixon goes to China?

In fact, on the same day of this debate, the Secretariat's problems with the Staff Union became again apparent. To the new four-member internal justice advisory body, Ban appointed two consummate management insiders, the current and past directors of the General Legal Division of the UN Office of Legal Affairs, OLA. In terms of reform and transparency, the current head of OLA did not include in his public financial disclosure the fact that he was receiving at least $10,000 a month of his government, Switzerland, to pay for his housing. There have been no repercussions for this, but Ban's speech said that "accountability is not just a management word, it means taking responsibility."

Ban said that in the new system for the administration of justice, "if it is found that an improper decision has been made, the individual manager should be held accountable." Does this mean for example that UNDP's Kemal Dervis or Ad Melkert would be held accountable for Ban's Ethics Office's finding that UNDP committed prima facie retaliation against a whistleblower? Will there be accountability for the managers who left UNHCR workers in Algiers, at the time of the deadly December 11 bombing, outside of the coverage of the UN's Malicious Acts Insurance Policy?

Ban complained that "the way it stands now, some of my Special Representatives in the field earn less and serve under less favorable conditions that those coming from within the system, in particular from a Fund or Program" -- like the UN Development Program.

At Tuesday's noon briefing, Inner City Press asked Ban's spokesperson, "Can we get more information on what he meant, in terms of what Special Representatives of the Secretary-General are paid and who in UNDP or any program he’s comparing it to? Are all Special Representatives of the Secretary-General paid the same amount?"

The spokesperson responded, "we can get that information for you from the Management Office. I don’t have it with me now." But by the end of the day, a single unrelated link about "conditions of service" had been provided. Ah, responsiveness and transparency. But how much do the SRSGs get paid? And what about accountability for the SRSG now accused of having accepted favors and even land from Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe? Click here for that, and watch this space.

Footnote: at the highest levels, the problems even the internal justice advisory panel picks were known. Chief of Staff Vijay Nambiar wrote to the staff union, urging them, as the Department of Management's Alicia Barcena previously did, to buckle under to the Staff-Management Coordination Committee. The Staff Union insists that not the vehicle to be making these appointments. Ms. Barcena, who was on the Management Reform podium all day and nothing but polite in the hallway outside, is still widely said to be leaving; one of her rumored replacements, Joachim Ruecker, is reported to have told his interviewers that "we don't work at the UN for money." Tell that to Nicolas Michel...

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un1mgmtreform040808.html