By Matthew Russell Lee, video
UN GATE, Sept 26 -- After covering the UN's failure on Sri Lanka, from the bloodbath on the beach through accepting Shavendra Silva as a UN Peacekeeping adviser, Inner City Press was roughed up and banned by Secretary General Antonio Guterres. FP said nothing.
In February 2019 when Silva became Army Chief of Staff, Inner City Press puts in among its written questions to Spokesman Stephane Dujarric a question on this. Despite Dujarric's on camera promise to answer Inner City Press' written questions, no answer.
In August when Silva was further promoted, Inner City Press asked again and again in writing, including to Guterres new chief of "Global Communications" Melissa Fleming. No answer; Fleming banned Inner City Press from the UNGA week.
Now Dujarric's office has handed a claim, quite possibly not true, to his teacher's pet FP, long time correspondent Colum Lynch and DC-based Robbie Gramer. Neither ever wrote a word about Guterres using UN Security to physically rough up Inner City Press and ban it 450 days since. They call this a scoop, when it is just spoon feeding for those who want to feel good about the UN.
On the morning of September 26, while simultaneous covering the SDNY Federal court where CEFC China Energy, financially linked to UNSG Guterres was convicted of UN bribery, Inner City Press asked Guterres, his spokesmen Stephane Dujarric and Farhan Haq and Melissa Fleming questions including "September 26-2: On Sri Lanka, please immediately explain why your Office refused to answer weeks of questions from Inner City Press about the impact of Shavendra Silva being made head of army (despite Dujarric on camera promise, and Smale's written promise, to answer ICP's questions) then handed the answer to FP and how that doesn't make FP the UN's teacher's pet? Is the belated decision even true?"
No answer. Now this: "What is known about the suspension suggests currently deployed Sri Lankan peacekeeping units will remain in place until their tour ends but then be replaced by soldiers from another country. However, the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations appears to be adding a proviso that it might override the suspension if it exposed UN operations to serious operational risk. “We will be looking for more clarity from the United Nations on what this means; the reputational risk to the Department of Peacekeeping Operations would be enormous if it tries to fudge this important human rights issue. If you are going to talk about a ‘zero tolerance policy’ it has to be zero and it has to be done with conviction,” said ITJP’s Executive Director, Yasmin Sooka."
So it might not even be true, as the government in Colombo is bragging. The UN is corrupt and censoring joke with its own sold-out chorus under Guterres. And what about the other compliant media that reported the UN's pseudo heroic lie? More on this to come.
The United Nations under Antonio Guterres is so corrupt that it not only accepts "peacekeepers" from the Sri Lanka army run by war criminal Shavendra Silva - it's had as as official of UN Security run by Gilles Michaud a man links to earlier crimes in Sri Lanka where Tamils were killed in the Madhu church: Parkrama Sriwardana. This while Guterres bloviates about protecting houses of worship. He is a hypocrite and a censor of the Press which asks him questions, including this one.
Guterres' head of UN Security in Jordan is a man who conducted assassinations, perhaps even of Rafic Hariri, for Michel Aoun of Lebanon.
The UN Security official's name is Antoine Abi Samra; he was a military officer under Aoun. He has been promoted and protected by one Igor Mitrokhin in the UN Department of Safety and Security, ostensibly run by Gilles Michaud. It is an outrage.
Inner City Press first asked Guterres and his spokesman Stephane Dujarric about Mitrokhin in connection with South Sudan, based on complaints it received from whistleblowers in the UN mission there, UNMISS.
With Dujarric and Guterres and his head of communications Melissa Fleming refusing to answer banned Inner City Press' written question, it nevertheless asked then reported why "Igor Mitrokhin of UNDSS from Russia is pushing David Shearer, SRSG of UNMISS and Principal Security Advisor, Graeme to take Nikolay Kovalev of Russia at all cost disregarding all rules."
Now as the first in a series about the decay and corruption of UN Security under Guterres and Michaud Inner City Press is today reporting that this same Mitrokhin as one of the many war criminals he has promoted in the UN got Abi Samra the job in Jordan.
Not only does this constitute Guterres' UN ghoulish providing safe haven for war criminals, as it has also done regarding Sri Lanka and Cameroon - in Jordan, Abi Samra using public money to pay a DSS employee to do nothing more than tutor his own son.
Sources working in Lebanon link "Tony" Abi Samra to the assassination of Rafic Harriri and more, and ask Inner City Press how the UN didn't even check its own records. These is the corruption of Guterres, who bans the Press which asks. We'll have more on this.
Past 4 pm on Friday, August 30 the UN issued a denial of accreditation with no reasoning other than that accreditation had previously been revoked:
"From: malu at un dot org
Date: Fri, Aug 30, 2019 at 4:23 PM
Subject: U.N. eAccreditation request for Matthew Lee Ref # M5413398 has been declined
To: Inner City Press:
Date: Fri, Aug 30, 2019 at 4:23 PM
Subject: U.N. eAccreditation request for Matthew Lee Ref # M5413398 has been declined
To: Inner City Press:
Greetings Matthew Lee from Inner City Press, Your media accreditation request, with reference no: M5413398, has been declined for the following reason: Media accreditation was withdrawn on 17 August 2018."
This is Kafka-esque, and corrupt. We will have more, much more, on this.
