Dust-Up of UN Security With Turkish Delegation Leads to Hospitalization

By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, September 23, updated -- While Mahmoud Abbas and Benyamin Netanyahu traded speeches about Palestinian statehood on Friday, a diplomatic incident occurred on the fourth floor of the General Assembly Hall.

Sources tell Inner City Press that the Turkish delegation literally had a run-in with security in the UN, in which the Turkish prime minister Erdogan was touched. Then, a male security official was injured and taken to the hospital, another officer also assaulted and injured. Several sources spoke of a door broken in the UN earlier in the week, attributing it to Turkey.

Inner City Press observed Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's chief of staff Vijay Nambiar break in to a rare run, accompanied by UN Safety and Security chief Gregory Starr, out of the North Lawn building and on to First Avenue in the rain, crossing it toward Turkey's Mission to the UN.

Later a senior UN official told Inner City Press bitterly that "Turkey is throwing its weight around," linking the incident to Turkey's anger, including at the UN, about the Palmer (and Uribe) report about the Gaza flotilla incident in which eight Turkish citizens were killed.

The source asked, "A new muscular foreign policy -- even inside the UN building?"

By the same token, why lay hands even inadvertently on a country's prime minister?

After multiple Inner City Press sources told it about the incident early Friday afternoon, Inner City Press asked the Office of the Spokesperson for the Secretary General for its version and was told they were waiting for their "line" on it.

Update: Inner City Press, having Friday afternoon published far and away the first story about the incident, was told that it would be given the UN "line" as soon as it was available - but even sixty hours later has received nothing from the UN spokespeople or senior spinning officials. Watch this site.

Despite Jakarta Protests, Xinjiang Is An Internal Matter, Indonesia's UN Envoy Says

By Matthew Russell Lee
www.innercitypress.com/un3xinjiang071709.html

UNITED NATIONS, July 17 -- In Jakarta the day before the hotel bombings, the Chinese embassy was blockades by protesters about the deaths in Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region. Chinese Charge d’Affaires Yang Lingzhu was quoted, "This is just a brawl between several groups of people. There is no ethnic violence in the province."

But as in Turkey, where Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said his country would bring the matter before the UN Security Council -- it hasn't happened -- in Jakarta, "the Indonesian parliament urged the United Nations to immediately help overcome the conflict in Urumqi, the capital of Xianjing, Indonesia's Antara news agency reported."

Inner City Press on July 17 asked Indonesia's Permanent Representative to the UN Marty Natalegawa, after a question about the bombings, about calls for UN action on Xinjiang by parliamentarians in his country. "I'm not aware of it," Ambassador Natalegawa replied. Video here, from Minute 4:41.

Ambassador Natalegawa continued, "We have been following developments, as others have, I'm sure. It is essentially a matter to be addressed by the authorities in China, the Chinese government. We are seeing such efforts by the Chinese authorities. So we don't see anything beyond that."

Given the rumors of Natalegawa continuing to rise in the Indonesian government, this can be taken as an official statement of the country's foreign policy, despite for example the article entitled "Indonesian Parliament Urges UN To Handle Uprising In China." No one, it seems, including the Western powers, has actually asked for any discussion in the UN Security Council.

Still, Chinese diplomat Yang Lingzhu's quote that "there is no ethnic violence in the province" appears ludicrous. With separate mobs of Han Chinese and Uighurs have been filmed in the streets armed with sharpened sticks, to deny the ethnic dimension is to be in denial.

One candid Chinese diplomat described it to Inner City Press as similar to the situation of African Americans in the ghettos of cities in the U.S., saying that they have a right to protest, but not to burn the buildings down. Or physically attack those they view as their oppressors, or replacements.

If this happened in another country, it would probably be raised in the Security Council, and might be put on the agenda. But for now you have Turkey's double game, and the split between at least some Indonesian parliamentarians and that country's executive branches. Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un3xinjiang071709.html

At UN, Turkey Admits No Move to Put Xinjiang on Agenda, Ergodan Quote "Not Based on Realities"

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un2xinjiang070909.html

UNITED NATIONS, July 9 -- The day after Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan was quoted by that "We will put the events happening in the Xinjiang Uighur autonomous region onto the agenda of the United Nations' Security Council," Inner City Press asked the charge d'affaires of the Turkish Mission to the United Nations Fazli Corman about the quote and if Turkey had in fact made any moves to that effect. "We didn't make any moves on that," Ambassador Corman said. "That reports were not actually based on the realities."

Inner City Press asked if Prime Minister Erdogan had been misquoted. Yes, Ambassador Corman indicated.

This would not be the first time that a member of the UN Security Council said one thing in its country for popular consummation, but never acted on its within the UN in New York. But the Uighurs are a high profile political issue in Turkey, because they are not only Muslims but Turkic.

On July 8, Inner City Press asked two senior diplomats with China's mission to the UN about Prime Minister Erdogan's quote, and wrote about it. The first expressed surprise. It was noted that only on June 25 Turkish President Abdullah Gul met with Hu Jintao in Beijing. The second, higher placed, came to tell Inner City Press that his mission had "demarched" the Turkish Mission to the UN and that nothing would be raised. Other Security Council members, polled by Inner City Press on July 9 on the margins of a Council meeting about Somalia, expressed doubts that Turkey would even raise the issue.

In the hallway after the Council's Somalia meeting was over, Inner City Press approached Ambassador Corman as he finished speaking with U.S. Deputy Permanent Representative Alejandro Wolff and, after some questions about the North Korea sanctions committee that Turkey chairs, asked about Prime Minister Erdogan's quote.

As noted, Ambassador Corman replied that the "reports were not actually based on the realities." One might interpret this to mean, not based on the political and economic realities.

While China has a veto on any substantive decisions by the Council, as to the U.S., France, UK and Russia, there are no veto rights on procedural votes, such as whether to put a situation or conflict onto the Council's agenda. This is why, for example, Myanmar is on the agenda, despite opposition from China and Russia among others. Outgoing UK Permanent Representative John Sawers told the Press that Sri Lanka could have been put on the agenda of the Council earlier this year, the votes were there, but that the unity of the Council was deemed more important.

In this case, some doubt if it is a desire for Council unity that explains the silence in the Council, even of Turkey despite its Prime Minister's quoted comments. China's economic importance, these critics say, give it in effect a double veto, or two forms of veto. While the immediately conflict in Xinjiang may be calming down, the underlying issues remain. But despite what Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan was quoted as saying -- that Turkey would put the issue on the Security Council's agenda -- is remains doubtful this will happen.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un2xinjiang070909.html

Turkey's Erdogan Says Will Put Xinjiang on UN Council Agenda, Didn't on Sri Lanka, China's Reaction

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un1xinjiang070809.html

UNITED NATIONS, July 8, updated -- While the 150 deaths in Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region are covered, with China's consent if not control, in media worldwide, very little is being said at the UN, particularly in its Security Council. Following a July 6 meeting on North Korea, the issue did not arise. Nor July 7 as the Council met about West Africa.

But on July 8, Turkey's Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan told a meeting of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) in Istanbul,"We will put the events happening in the Xinjiang Uighur autonomous region onto the agenda of the United Nations' Security Council."

In May and June 2009, Inner City Press asked Turkey's Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and now-retired UN Ambassador Ilkin about putting the issue of over 10,000 dead civilians in Sri Lanka on the Council's agenda. Both demurred.

Turkish Foreign Minister Davutoglu on May 11 told Inner City Press that the UN should “cooperate with the government of Sri Lanka because we have to cooperate in all efforts against terrorism.”

On June 2, Ambassador Ilkin told Inner City Press emphatically that Sri Lanka is not on the Council's agenda. Video here, Minute 22.

Now, because of the involvement of Muslims in Xinjiang, Turkey's prime minister wants it on the Council's agenda. What standard is Turkey applying?

Inner City Press asked a senior Chinese diplomat at the UN about Erdogan's statement. It is an internal matter, the Chinese diplomat said. After Inner City Press' follow-up, he conceded that Chinese authorities should have handled the beating of Uighur factory workers in South China better: they "didn't do enough to disclose what they knew."

But he insisted, Muslims have rights, but not to kill. He likened it to African American in the United States, saying they have grievances but cannot break the law to express them and "burn down public buildings and kill innocent passersby."

Regarding the Turkish prime minister's vow to the GCC to put the issue on the Council's agenda, the Chinese diplomat smiled. He said, "So be it." Watch this site.

Update of 5:30 p.m., July 8 -- the Chinese Mission to the UN, working quickly, "demarched" the Turkish mission and reportedly the actual Turkish plan or desire to try to put Xinjiang on the Security Council agenda is no more. This is how it works. Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un1xinjiang070809.html