As Afghanistan Tells UN It Wants to Coordinate Its Own Aid, LOFTA Echo, Haysom Talks to Taliban, Of ISIL

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, March 16 -- Before the UN Security Council voted to extended the mandate of its Afghanistan mission for a year on March 16, Afghan Ambassador Zahir Tanin stopped and told the Press that it's time for his government to be central to the coordination of aid in the country. 

  When Tanin spoke inside the Council before the 15-0 vote, he emphasized the penultimate paragraph of 17-page resolution, saying that 

“we welcome the Security Council's request 'that the Secretary-General initiate a process to conduct within six months of the renewal of this mandate, a full examination of the role, structure and activities of all United Nations entities in Afghanistan, in full consultation and engagement with the Government of Afghanistan and key stakeholders, including the donor community, in light of the completion of transition and the beginning of the Transformation Decade and in accordance with the principles of Afghan national sovereignty, national leadership and national ownership.'”

  Inevitably this recalled the UN system's own role in corruption in the country, for example the UN Development Program-run "Law and Order Trust Fund for Afghanistan," which its double payments to phantom police. This is still much to be reported on this, even as former UNAMA chief Jan Kubis takes up his new post atop the UN Mission in Iraq, UNAMI. Inner City Press was first to report this move, as credited in the media in Slovakia, here.

 While Tanin didn't get into it in his March 16 speech to the Security Council, UNAMA's Nicholas Haysom told the Council that “I can also confirm that UNAMA continues a frank dialogue with the Taliban on humanitarian access and on human rights, notably on the protection of civilians.”

  Haysom also told the Council on March 16 that “recent reports have indicated that the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant has established a foothold in Afghanistan. It is UNAMA's assessment that the group's presence is of concern but that ISIL's significance is not such much a function of its intrinsic capacities in the area but its potential to offer an alternative flagpole to which otherwise isolated insurgent splinter groups can rally.”

Back on December 18, 2014 after UNAMA's Haysom briefed the Security Council on December 18, he came to the Council's stakeout and took questions from the Press.

His predecessor Jan Kubis had previously answered about the scandal plagued UN Law and Order Trust Fund for Afghanistan, promising a “public accounting;” further back when he was Afghanistan envoy, Staffan de Mistura told Inner City Press he would get to the bottom of the killing of UN staff member Louis Maxwell there.

  Haysom on December 18 said that the Louis Maxwell case was being handled by the UN Department of Safety and Security. On December 19, when to his credit he held a sit-down press conference, he said that the LOTFA issues were more for the UN Development Program -- which has been far from responsive -- and that it is largely a matter of answering the questions from donors. That's certainly part of it. But what about the “public accounting”?

  Some of these issues go beyond Haysom as SRSG. It was up to Ban Ki-moon to push the Karzai government about the killing of Louis Maxwell, and he didn't. UNDP should be answering the questions about LOTFA, but isn't. Still, doesn't this make the UNAMA mission's job more difficult?

  Again to his credit, Haysom said that UNAMA formally reached out to the Taliban, on human rights issues, and meet with them in Doha. He emphasized there can be no (entirely) military solution.

  Inner City Press tried to ask UNAMA Human Rights Office chief Georgette Gagnon if her office works with the International Criminal Court's inquiry into Afghanistan. 

 But it was Haysom who answered, saying yes UNAMA participates constructively but that it is confidential. With the release, even redacted, of the summary of the US torture report, the ICC's Afghanistan inquiry has become all the more interesting. We'll have more on this.

Footnote: in terms of accessibility during his visit to UNHQ in New York, Haysom should be credited. Under Secretaries General like Herve Ladsous and even, less abusively, Jeffrey Feltman rarely speak to the media. Inner City Press for the new Free UN Coalition for Access on December 19 thanked Haysom -- and posits that willingness to answer questions from the media should be one of the criteria by which UN officials, including for example the next head of OCHA, are chosen.

   

Amid Diplomacy & Double Standards at UN, Fond Farewell to India's Deputy Permanent Representative Manjeev Singh Puri

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, December 13 -- Amid the chaotic whirl of the UN's diplomatic holiday party season, some farewells cannot be missed. Thursday night's for India's Deputy Permanent Representative Manjeev Singh Puri was one such event.

  There were hurdles to surmount: his goodbye meeting with Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, listed for 4:40 pm, was postponed for a photo op of Ban receiving Ake Sellstrom's second Syria chemical weapons report (Ban took no questions). Manjeev said bye to Ban at 5:40; Ban but not bloggers later appeared at the Bahrain national day.

  Then, crossing Second Avenue to the Indian mission on 43rd Street, an African Permanent Representative told Inner City Press he was supposed to "go to Francophonie first" -- but decided "Manjeev is more important." Despite other actual superpower events, this priority was shared.

  Inside the Indian mission, Under Secretaries General like from the Department of Political Affairs (recounting travels in Syria before his Lebanon posting for the US government made this no longer comfortable) and other African Permanent Representatives noshed on spicy meat rolls.

  Making an appearance was Hardeep Singh Puri, heading back to India, and his successor as Permanent Representative Asoke Mukerji. Manjeev's successor, who he's been showing around the UN, was there: B.S. Bishnoi.

  Afghanistan's Zahir Tanin told Inner City Press that from his perspective, the Inter Governmental Negotiation on Security Council reform held earlier in the day had gone better than expected. 

  As Inner City Press note, it began with less the forty countries signed up, down from a previous ninety, due to dissatisfaction with President of the General Assembly John Ashe's Advisory Group of six and their recent "non-paper" supplemented by a memo from San Marino's Permanent Representative Daniele Bodini, one of Ban Ki-moon's golf partners.

Recently another Permanent Representative went to ask how he, too, could golf with Ban and was told he'd have to find out which clubs to join. That too is how the UN goes, double standards everywhere -- but with Manjeev Singh Puri going, some laughter and sharp analysis will be lost. Watch this site.

   

Exclusive: On UNSC Reform, PGA John Ashe Names "EU-Heavy" Group, Moves Debate Up to Nov 7-8 Amid Complaints

By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive Must Credit

UNITED NATIONS, October 23 -- The possible reform of the UN Security Council, made higher profile this month by Saudi Arabia's rejection of a seat due to dysfunction, is the subject of a letter by President of the General Assembly John Ashe, not yet put on his PGA website.

  Inner City Press has obtained the letter, and multiple complaints from UN member states, and puts the exclusively puts the letter online here.

  In it, John Ashe who was and perhaps will again be the Permanent Representative to the UN of Antigua and Barbuda announces a new "Advisory Group" on Security Council report and the speed-up fo the GA debate from December up to November 7-8.

  Some UN member states tell Inner City Press that Ashe is "acting for his own country which bodes badly" - but is of course not without precedent.

  Ashe's advisory group will be composed of the Permanent Representative of Belgium, Liechtenstein, San Marino (Ban Ki-moon's golf partner), Sierra Leone, Papua New Guinea and Brazil, its former foreign minister.

  Several states complain that the list is "top heavy with Europeans -- three out of six -- and as one Latin country put it, is being "led by the G4."

  The perspective of Inner City Press and the new Free UN Coalition for Access focuses on transparency -- if the PGA website has a section of "Letters," why on the evening of October 23 is this letter not it. It is published here, exclusive must credit -- but this should not be necessary.

  Inner City Press and FUNCA have previously asked that Ashe's office disclose which staff members are seconded from which missions, and any and all non-UN budget funding to the office. Ashe is a genial diplomat, who quoted Justin Timberlake in his most recent press conference. But transparency is key. We will have more on this. Watch this site.