Free Speech, UN Style, Extends to Press Bulletin Boards, Single Standard Urged by FUNCA

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, February 22 – For some weeks, alongside Mali, Syria and Sri Lanka, Sudan, UN corruption and the Congo, Inner City Press has been reporting on a free speech issue inside the UN itself.

  Flyers posted by the Free UN Coalition for Access calling for reforms of UN accreditation rules and Media Access Guidelines have repeatedly by torn down, counterfeited, defaced with slogans like “Looney Club" and worse.

  FUNCA held a number of meetings with officials of the Department of Public Information, mostly to push for its top ten reforms (including for example eliminating the requirement that a journalist must agree with the unspecified “principles of the UN” in order to be admitted to cover it) but also about free speech.

 After first on January 24, the UN itself threatened to tear down FUNCA's flyers. Then after advocacy, sometimes more heated that it might have been - those deserving an apology got one, in fine FUNCA fashion -- this tear-down was postponed.

  UNCA "leaders" continued with the campaign, expanding it.

  While the simplest solution would have been to open up the glassed-in bulletin board maintained by the UN Correspondents Association, on which without naming any UNCA officials a letter denouncing Inner City Press was displayed behind glass for five months in 2012, the UN has proposed another solution.

 Late on the afternoon of Friday, February 22 (four weeks after the ostensible postponement of tear-downs) the UN's Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit (MALU) announced:

A board will be installed at MALU square most likely next week. In the meantime, correspondents can start putting information up in the designated area (look for the press board sign across from the mailboxes). The board is for all correspondents who have a valid accreditation and want to share information about their activities or issues related to the media at the United Nations Headquarters.

RULES FOR POSTING FLYERS ON ALL BOARDS IN THE PRESS AREA

-Only correspondents with a valid accreditation can put up a flyer.

-All flyers must be related to press events or issues related to the press at the United Nations Headquarters.

-Insulting language, attacks on other correspondents or groups of correspondents or any information that violates UN principles will not be permitted.

-All flyers must include contact information (name, telephone and/or email) of the person who posts it.

-Only one copy of each flyer can be posted on the board.

The Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit will remove any flyers that are not complying with these rules.

  This last should, of course, apply to the glassed-in UNCA bulletin board, on which they displayed a five page letter attacking the investigative Press for five months in 2012. A problem remains with "separate but (un) equal," with the UNCA glassed-in board.

As we reported earlier this afternoon in connection with a UN Alliance of Civilizations press conference that turned into an advertisement for the German car company BMW,who partnered with the UN AoC, sponsoring and promoting their UN press conference on Friday? 

  Without mentioning the name of any officials, it was the UN Correspondents Association. To be diplomatic we'll will only for now note that there has been more serious controversy about UNCA sponsoring events in the Dag Hammarskjold Library Auditorium -- click here for one example -- and more recently, this week, demanding the first question from Bolivia's president Evo Morales, even when he repeatedly said no, he had recognized another (Latina) journalist first.

   There has been no mea culpa about this fiasco, even after the next day's doubling-down. What about this sponsorship of what became, in essence, an attempted advertisement for BMW? 

  Without naming the names of officials -- there seems to be some sensitivity about this -- the question is raised, like the question of documents obtained under the US Freedom of Information Act like this one. And the questions should be answered. Watch this site.

UN Censorship Alliance Leaders Fail on Vowed UNCA Presence at All UN Briefings, Tear Down Flyers

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, February 19 – The first item in an hour long February 15 meeting of UN Correspondents Association concerned the UNCA Executive Committee's vote to "be present at every noon briefing." Click here for audio of the meeting, Part 1.
  
  This was presumably to raise the profile or defend the place of the decaying organization, now called the UN's Censorship Alliance. Getting the first question at noon briefings, of course, involves invoking favoritism from Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson's office.

  At the very next UN noon briefing on February 19, none of the 15 members of UNCA's Executive Committee was present. Had the decay proceeded even further over the three day weekend?

  It's not that the UNCA "leaders" weren't present elsewhere in the UN on Tuesday morning. They ripped down substantive flyers of the Free UN Coalition for Access which critiqued by the UN's accreditation rules and UNCA's capture by the largest media.

  A flyer was torn down right next to the door of UNCA's president Pamela Falk of CBS. She has written that a non-UNCA "open" bulletin board will be permitted: but it has not been in the 12 days since. This is UN-itis.

  Financial opacity, too: though no written UNCA  financial statements were provided, total cash of $237,940 was alluded to at Friday's meeting, the vast majority of it collected at UNCA's $250 a plate annual dinner. A member asked for a written report; this was referred to “Other Matters” but was never addressed.

   It was said that the 15 members of the Security Council and their spouses are let in for free.  Members were urged to now lobby the Council members about the layout of the Security Council stakeout, an issue on which UNCA apparently fell asleep in 2012 while they focused on trying to expel the investigative Press, first from UNCA then from the UN as a whole.

   A “leader” of that drive, Reuters' Louis Charbonneau, bragged in Friday's meeting that French Ambassador Gerard Araud supports the tearing down of a wall near the so-called Turkish lounge; “we need more countries like that,” Charbonneau said.

   He also said, “we need a few people with sledgehammers - then problem solved.” This is the approach he and UNCA have taken to the FUNCA flyers. Charbonneau's twist is to also suggest to the UN that it charge money for “a new paint job” after the flyers are torn down. 

   This passive-aggressive approach was on display Friday when as soon as an UNCA member objected to a financial proposal, Charbonneau immediately called for a vote, like the last President of the General Assembly from Qatar used to it.

  On the question of UNCA presence at noon briefings, Charbonneau perhaps to make it easier on himself and his 14 peers said it didn't have to be an Executive Committee member. So anyone that pays the UNCA annual dues gets a question before those who choose not to be part of UNCA? Pay to play?

   One of those actually witnessed tearing flyers down has been Tim Witcher of Agence France Presse, who at Friday's meeting spoke only once, to urge members to send “e-mail and letters” to member states. 

  One wonder if the regurgitation of fawning coverage might be part of the plan to get the support of some member states? Watch this site.

At UN's Ceremony of Transparency, Ladsous Won't Disclose, Ban Points to March

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, February 17 – The UN administration of Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, trumpeting transparency, for two days in a row last week invited the media to come watch him sign his compacts with his senior staff.

   On the appointed morning, Friday at 8:30 am, Inner City Press arrived in the UN's checker board lobby. After being screened with an electronic wand for weapons, and with only one other member of the press corps, Inner City Press was taken 38 stories up in an elevator, to Ban's big conference room.

  Some of his Under Secretaries General sat across from him, some appeared by video and some didn't or couldn't attend at all. Inner City Press filmed; click here to view some footage, below:

  One USG in particular had come to the fore: Herve Ladsous, France's appointee to head UN Peacekeeping.

  While it is repeatedly said that Ban Ki-moon encourages his officials to make public financial disclosure -- a one page form that merely says, “I own an apartment in Paris” or “I have a mutual fund at JPMorgan Chase -- Ladsous had instead checked off a box that he chose not to make any disclosure. Click here to view.

This is a pattern, as Ladsous on camera on November 27,December 7 and December 18 refused to answer Inner City Press' questions about 126 rapes in Minova by the Congolese Army which the UN mission MONUSCO supports.

 This gave rise to the first video in this series,#LADSOUS2013.

  Since then, follow-up questions have been ignored.

  And so Inner City Press, as well as filming the signing of the compacts, kept an eye on Herve Ladsous. He coughed, he scribbled, he spoke to Ban in French.

  And after the ceremony, Ban came over to Inner City Press and genially said hello. So Inner City Press asked about the fact those some of the officials present had refused to make public disclosure.

  Ban's most senior communications official pointed out that they had disclosed, just not made it public.

  Ban said the next round of public disclosures will be in March.

  But will Ladsous disclose then? Will have have answered how he applied or didn't Ban's Human Rights Due Diligence Policy to the rapists of Minova? What safeguards he put in place, or didn't, to ensure that UN Peacekeeping does not spread cholera as is alleged in Haiti? Watch this video -- and this site.

Footnote: Ban Ki-moon's top communications official also said, the other thing will happen, referring to a request Inner City Press and others made weeks before.

The request was that either the glassed in bulletin board of the UN Correspondents Association be opened up for posting by members of the UN press corps who are, by choice, not UNCA members, or that another board be permitted for the new Free UN Coalition for Access.

FUNCA was launched on December 7, 2012 after UNCA's Executive Committee spent most of 2012 trying to get the investigative Press thrown out. But in January and the first half of February -- until this filming - the UNCA “leaders” and some UN officials tore down FUNCA flyers asking for reforms.

So on February 15 it was said “it will happened.” We are ready. Watch this - and that - space.