UN in Congo Dodges on Sex Abuse, Bosco and Kashmir, Sudan Blindness, Silence from Lebanon and from Alan Doss

By Matthew Russell Lee
www.innercitypress.com/dpko2forcecomm080609.html

UNITED NATIONS, August 6 -- The UN's Mission in the Congo is apparently continuing its efforts to cover itself by self-exonerating on sexual abuse by its peacekeepers, and obtaining a sort of clearance letter from the Congolese government, that indicted war criminal Bosco Ntaganda is not technically part of the military operations that the UN mission, MONUC, works with.

Inner City Press on August 6 asked MONUC force commander Babacar Gaye about reports that Bosco walks freely around Goma in the Kivus, and about reports that the Pakistani battalion was South Kivu was unwilling to cross the administrative border into North Kivu, manned mostly by Indian peacekeepers. Video here, from Minute 45:56.

Once again, the UN covered itself: the Pakistanis were "never asked" to cross the demarcation, even though they were the closest UN peacekeepers. Rather, General Gaye said, he asked the Uruguayans to respond. Thus was the reported "Kashmir in the Kivus" avoided.

Asked about charges of sexual exploitation and abuse by UN peacekeepers, Gen. Gaye waved around what he said was a report finding not enough evidence for the charges.He said, "I have the results of the fact finding, this is the document that I received... there was nothing on the the ground as evidence that something took place." Video here, from Minute 41:46. Inner City Press requested a copy of the report from UN peacekeeping and has been told, "we won't be able to provide you with the actual document, but will be able to provide a general summary/read-out of it."

On August 5 in the Security Council, the Permanent Representative of India Hardeep Singh Puri complained that in UN peacekeeping, "Mission personnel are forced to ask national contingents to undertake tasks... in a manner which is inconsistent with the legal framework under which they are deployed." Video here, from Minute 48:35.

Inner City Press asked General Gaye to respond to this, and asked Darfur commander Martin Luther Agwai to respond to reports that the fighting between the Sudanese army and the rebels of the Justice and Equality Movement has spread east into Kordofan.

General Agwai said that the UN can't confirm what it doesn't see, and is not well enough resourced to speak to the fighting in Kordofan. Video here, from Minute 51. "They cannot influence anything there," he said. He spoke, as General Gaye did, about the difficulty of boundaries. With time running out, there was no time to ask General Agwai about a separate scandal reported in UN headquarters and its Medical Service, or to ask General Gaye the unanswered questions about MONUC chief Alan Doss, who emailed the UN Development asking to be shown contractual "leeway" and for his daughter to be hired.

General Agwai may be answering additional questions on August 7. With MONUC's Alan Doss, UNDP has still not answered, and the UN Secretariat pretends it doesn't even know what Doss converted to a DKPO contract. Watch this site.

Footnotes: All week, dozens of medal covered generals are in UN headquarters this week, but only Generals Agwai and Gaye were presented to the media for a press conference. Nearly all questions were directed to Darfur commander Martin Luther Agwai. While he spoke, Congo commander Babacar Gaye flipped through his note book, while master of ceremonies Michele Montas pointed from side to side of the briefing room yielding question after question about Darfur.

Then again, despite numerous requests, the commander of UNIFIL in Lebanon General Graziano refused to speak to the media, although on August 5 when the Security Council adjourned for lunch he was seen walking toward the UN Delegates' Dining Room with DPKO chief Alain Le Roy.

Earlier on August 5, Inner City Press asked Le Roy how his Department's "New Horizons" non-paper applied to sending a UN peacekeeping mission to Somalia. Le Roy said that a peacekeeping mission is an accompaniment to a political strategy, not a substitute for one. But what is the UN's strategy in the Congo -- beyond blind support of Joseph Kabila and the Congolese Army -- and, even more so, in Darfur? Watch this site.

Update of August 6, 6:40 p.m. -- in response to Inner City Press' request for a copy of the document General Gaye waved around on-camera, the following arrived:

Sent: 8/6/2009 6:32:01 P.M. Eastern Standard Time

Subj: in regard to General Gaye's comments in Room 226 today

Regarding your questions about General Gaye's comments in relation to the fact-finding mission sent to eastern DRC, we've double-checked the video recording and can confirm that General Gaye did not use the word "exonerated."

His exact words were: "Yes, we sent a fact-finding mission in the localities in South Kivu and North Kivu where allegedly there was SEA cases. I have the results of this fact-finding mission. This is the document that I received. Unfortunately, or [do] we say fortunately, most of the time the accusations, the allegations, are not precise enough to see soemthing on ther ground and that is why we have decided to send as soon as possible a fact-finding mission every time there is this kind of accusation. You know that it is up to OIOS to investigate this kind of things. But this fact-finding mission is the way for us to react as promptly as possible in order at least to send evidence and so on and so forth. In both cases, that probably your question is related to, there was nothing on the ground for being evidence that something took place."

In relation to that document which General Gaye referred to, please find below a summary of it:

"The United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC) dispatched on 23 July a fact-finding mission to eastern Congo to reinforce preventive measures against sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA) by peacekeepers. This initiative follows the appointment last year of 48 military officers to act as focal points within MONUC’s national troop contingents, to strengthen field training programs on SEA and the reporting of offenses.

"The fact-finding team interviewed internally displaced persons, local leaders and medical staff in the areas of Goma-Sake and Rutshuru but did not record any allegation of SEA committed by peacekeepers, nor did it bring to light new factual elements that would require the opening of a formal investigation.

"The fact-finding team was led by a senior MONUC military officer, supported by an independent military officer and two civilian staff from MONUC’s Conduct and Discipline Unit (CDU) one of them a female. A CDU staff remains based in Goma, the capital of North Kivu to liaise with and alert the UN’s investigative arm of possible offenses."

And see, www.innercitypress.com/dpko2forcecomm080609.html

At UN, Unlicensed Doctors Give and Take Valium, UN's Darfur General Agwai's Wife Moonlights for NGO

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un1medical042309.html

UNITED NATIONS, April 24 -- In midtown Manhattan a group of largely unlicensed doctors and nurses are dispensing and in some cases taking and self-medicating with Valium, Diazepam, Demerol, Ambien and other controlled narcotics.

While anywhere else in the U.S. this would be a straight forward felony case, since it is taking place within the United Nations' compound on 42nd Street east of First Avenue, technically international territory, American authorities have yet to take action. The UN's Ethics Office, Ombudsman and Office of Internal Oversight Services have been informed, and even provided with photographs, but have done nothing.

Sources inside the UN have painted for Inner City Press a detailed picture of the operations of the UN Medical Service, housed on the 5th floor of UN headquarters, just above the Press floor. Deputy Director Serguei Oleinikov, these sources say, is both unlicensed and outside of the law. He recently signed off on the “disposal” of dozens of Valium tablets which had yet to reach the expiration date. Click here for a photo of a sample sign-out sheet, and see below.

Tellingly, one of the unlicensed nurses is the wife of the Force Commander of the UN - African Union Hybrid Force in Darfur, Martin Luther Agwai, a Nigerian general. Ruth Martin Agwai, sources says, spends much of her time moonlighting for a non-governmental organization, the Nigerian Army Officers Wives Association (NAOWA). Click here for Mrs. Agwai's letter about NAOWA. Sources say she has used the diplomatic pouch and privileges of the Nigerian Mission to the UN in order to spirit out of the country Accutech medical equipment.

These irregularities were brought to Inner City Press' attention after its reporting on the death of UN staff member Jesmel Navoa last month. Mr. Navoa had a stroke while working at 6:45 p.m. in the UN's publishing shop in the third sub-basement. New York's emergency services 911 was not called in a timely manner, and it took an hour for a New York City ambulance to arrive. There was no doctor on duty in the UN medical service, and none of the staff present had been trained in appropriate Life Support technique. Click here for Inner City Press' exclusive story.

The director of the Medical Service, Brian Davey, held a staff meeting this week at which he referred to the Inner City Press story, and belatedly sought to train staff in how and when to call 911. Sources link the UN medical service to other deaths in the UN on which we will be reporting again in the future.

Mr. Davey's predecessor Sudershan Narula was Kofi Annan's private doctor, was kept on past retirement age and left when Annan did. Click here for a previous Inner City Press story about Dr. Narula. Mr. Oleinikov's predecessor, a Dr. Salam, was a relative of the previous Secretary-General, Boutros Boutros Ghali, and was alleged to have mis-treated UN staff members in Africa. Currently, talk at the UN is of a tourniquet mis-applied such that a staff member has faced losing a foot to amputation. Such are the dangers of nepotism combined with unlicensed and under-supervised practice.

The nepotism of the UN Medical Service is not limited to hiring, but extends to referral. Recently a relative, Dr. Ma, was belated taken off the UN's referral list. Previously, the husband of Kofi Annan's top aide Elizabeth Lindenmayer was said to be a doctor on the UN's referral list.

The UN Medical Service is not supposed to be anyone's primary care giver. But despite this, controlled substances are given out, sometimes by nurses without a UN "doctor's" orders. Additionally, these UN "doctors" receive and sometimes keep sample medicines and sexual aids from pharmaceutical companies. Recently, as the US Drug Enforcement Agency has been informed of these irregularities, some forms of inventory control have belated been implemented. But well placed sources describe this as a cover-up, not a reform.

The UN medical service is part of the Office of Human Resources Management, headed by Catherine Pollard, which in turn is part of the Department of Management, headed by Angela Kane. Inner City Press has previously covered a pattern in which the UN Pension Fund sent staff members who complained against management for mandatory mental check-ups in the medical service. There is a counter-trend in which staff members with supporters in high places are given Long Term Disability letters, to be paid without working, and these ruling are never put into a date base that can be audited.

These uses of the Medical Service would, of course, be contrary to the Hippocratic Oath. These issues, including the unlicensed practice of medicine and dispensing of controlled narcotics go further, and are crimes.

In some but not all cases, the UN medical staff at issue have kept up licensing in the countries they come from. Even this would not be acceptable anywhere else in New York or the United States. But sources tell Inner City Press that several have not even kept up their overseas licenses, may not even ever have had them. The medical service, they say, is shot through with nepotism, such as the hiring and lack of supervision of the wife of the UN's Darfur General, Martin Luther Agwai. The sources describe other questionable behavior by Agwai, in Darfur, that is beyond the current scope of this medical series.

For now the questions are not only how has the UN and its medical service gotten away with this for so long, but also why the Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS), headed by Inga-Britt Ahlenius, did nothing when told about this. OIOS investigator Florin Postica was told, in detail, and was even provided with photographs of the controlled narcotics. Yet no action was taken. Likewise, Susan John of the UN Ethics Office, headed by Robert Benson, was told part of this troubling story, and has apparently done nothing. Ms. Ahlenius has systematically refused Press questions and has not held a briefing in many months. Ban Ki-moon's Spokesperson's Office cancelled its Q&A on April 20, and resisted taking any range of questions in the days after that. Responses will be reported after they are received.

Even the UN's Capital Master Plan can be impacted, as unlicensed staff in the UN medical service are rebelling against a planned move to a rented office space on Second Avenue and 42nd Street, over Innovation Luggage and a liquor store. There, the lack of licenses and the dispensing of controlled narcotics could, they fear, subject them to arrest. Attempts are being made to keep them within the UN compound east of First Avenue, beyond the reach of the law. Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un1medical042309.html

UN's Darfur Mission Mis-Served by Lockheed and Donors, Agwai Says JEM's the Player

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un2unamid081208.html

UNITED NATIONS, August 12 -- The UN and African Union peacekeeping mission in Darfur was badly mis-planned from the beginning, comments by UNAMID force commander Martin Luther Agwai on Tuesday made clear. Inner City Press asked about the $250 million the UN gave on a no-bid basis to Lockheed Martin to build camps, work only 20% completed by the contract's expiration on July 15. Agwai first attempted to defend Lockheed's PAE subsidiary, saying they were only in charge of four "super camps" in Darfur. But he then said that the Nyala super camp has only moved forward once Chinese engineers arrived. Video here, from Minute 29:11.

Pressed on the issue, he noted both that Lockheed was trying to maximize profits and that, as an American company, Sudan's government was obviously not well-disposed toward granting Lockheed visas or fast access to equipment. Of course, this could and should have been foreseen. Instead, then logistics chief Jane Holl Lute, wife of U.S. President Bush's war czar for Iraq and Afghanistan, insisted that Lockheed must get the no-bid contract, that only Lockheed could do the job. In fact, Lockheed was uniquely unqualified for the job. The Lockheed question now is how much of the money they should have to return.

Inner City Press asked Agwai why UNAMID does not protect the World Food Program trucks bringing supplies into Darfur, as WFP staff in June in El Fasher told Inner City Press is needed. Agwai pointed out that UNAMID still has less than 10,000 of its approved 26,000 strength, and has not been given the legal mandate to protect trucks on their way to Darfur. Again, bad planning.

Agwai went further, saying the before the UN took over peacekeeping in Darfur from the African Union force AMIS on January 1, 2008, the AMIS force had its equipments and maintenance from donors. Agwai said that now the donors no longer pay for spares and repairs, and have taken away a maintenance workshop. Why the donors took his all away is not know.

Inner City Press asked Agwai why UNAMID had not noticed the build-up of Justice and Equality Movement rebel forces preparing their May 10 assault on Khartoum, which ended five kilometers outside in Omdurman. Agwai bemoaned the lack of even a single surveillance plane, then opined both that JEM is the only organized Darfur rebel groups, and that they must have infiltrated toward Khartoum in small "packets" of vehicles. He noted that the government must have known something was coming, because it started bombing in the area just before the attack. Agwai said UNAMID was so bound up in verifying the bombings, if they happened or not, that they missed the real target. Video here, from Minute 1:02:34.

Appearing alongside Agwai was his fellow Nigerian Lt.-General Obiakor, the new UN Military Advisor. Inner City Press asked Obiakor about the proposed UN logistics and computer base in Valencia, Spain, which sources say Nigeria wanted. I will have to look into that, Obiakor said, promising to get back with an answer.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un2unamid081208.html