Inner City Press

Friday, January 10, 2025

In Corrupt UN of Guterres Sudan National Staff Stiffed on Civil War Damages as Press Banned

by Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon Book Substack

UN GATE, Dec 30 – The United Nations under Antonio Guterres makes its money off people in places in Sudan and Haiti, but treats its national staff members there like garbage, Inner City Press often hears and is sent evidence of. Guterres' spokespeople from Stephane Dujarric to Florencia Soto Nino refuse to answer any questions. Now on Sudan we publish this:

Dear Matthew, Based on the civil war in Sudan that started on April 2023 in the Capital city Khartoum, All the UN staff has been requested to evacuate immediately from Khartoum. Of course we lost everything, our house, cars and other belongings, the loss from this civil war is huge, especially on the National staff…

On 18 April 2023 UNDSS shared the SOPs of the Compensation for Loss & Damage.

On 21 September 2023 OHR and the Policy Unit in New York, approved the SOP related to Compensation for the lost/damage of personal effected by the War in Sudan. On 21 September 2023 and based on the above approval UNDP Sudan country office formed a Compensation Committee

On 22 January 2024 an administrative instruction for the compensation for loss & damage of $19,000 for staff member without recognized dependents residing with them at the duty station, and $32,000 for a staff member with recognized dependents residing with them at the duty station, regardless of their contract modalities.

Later in 2024 a decision was made on the amount of the compensation as follows: $16,000 for staff members with recognized dependents. $9,500 for staff members without recognized dependents.

On December 2024 UNDP Sudan compensated the National staff members a flat amount of ($2,250.00) regardless of their dependency status, while the International staff members has been compensated based on their dependency status either $9,500 or $16,000.

And so it goes, for now, in the UN of Antonio Guterres. Watch this site.

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Trump Loses Appeal of Carroll Trial as Access Hollywood Put As Confession Not Propensity

By Matthew Russell Lee Patreon Book Substack

SDNY COURTHOUSE, Dec 30 – After the verdict against Donald Trump for $83.3 million in mostly punitive damages to E. Jean Carroll, Trump's lawyer wrote to the judge that "defense counsel learned for the first time of allegations that Your Honor, while a partner at the Paul Weiss firm, had a “mentor” type relationship with Plaintiff’s lead counsel, Roberta Kaplan."

On September 6 when the appeal was heard - Inner City Press live tweeted it, below -- Roberta Kaplan told the three judges of the Second Circuit that Judge Kaplan was not her mentor. From the thread:

Trump's lawyer: The Access Hollywood tape should never had come in - Judge: In some cases, propensity evidence is allowed. Trump's lawyer: But not here. Judge: If defendant put his hand up her skirt, why wouldn't that qualify? Trump's lawyer: Look at Rogers case

Roberta Kaplan: Mr. Trump is here today. He could have taken the stand. He did not put on a single witness. So we put in the Access Hollywood tape, he said, I grab women by the p*ssy Judge: Thank you for your time.

Trump's lawyer (rebuttal): You have to find that it did not influence the jury. You can't, with a straight face. The outcry witnesses were prejudiced, calling Mr. Trump herpes you can't get rid of. Judge: Isn't the Access Hollywood tape a confession?

Trump's lawyer: That's not how they used it. Judge: Your time has expired. We'll take this under advisement

On December 30, in a 77 page per curiam decision, the Second Circuit upheld the verdicts: "we conclude that Mr. Trump has not demonstrated that the district court erred in any of the challenged rulings. Further, he has not carried his burden to show that any claimed error or combination of claimed errors affected his substantial rights as required to warrant a new trial. Accordingly, and for the reasons set forth more fully below, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court."

More on Substack here

Back on January 29 a very first book was published about the trial and what it might mean:

"Trump Trial II: Punitive Damages and Vow to Appeal: From the SDNY Trial to the 2024 Trail," by Matthew Russell Lee - Ebook here (with audiobook and paperback ).

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UN Censorship 2024-5 as Florencia Soto Nino Takes Public Money To Cover Up Corruption

By Matthew Russell Lee, Patreon

UN GATE, Dec 30 – The UN has been corrupted by Antonio Guterres as Secretary General. He arrived and immediately refused to answer, even pretended not to hear, questions by Inner City Press, about Cameroon and his own link to CEFC China Energy.

Then he had his spokesman Stephane Dujarric get Inner City Press roughed up by UN Security Ronald E. Dobbins and others as it covered one of Guterres' speeches, here, and the UN Budget Committee, video here.

Guterres' designated censor Melissa Fleming, who uses public money for a vanity podcast, has kept Inner City Press banned even from UN briefings on WebEx / Teams / Zoom of the kind it asks questions on at the IMF and attends at WHO. The UN is corrupt.

Dujarric promised on camera that Inner City Press' written questions would be answered, here - but then stopped, and blocked Inner City Press on X.

Associate Spokesperson Florencia Soto Nino Martinez has joined Dujarric in blocking Inner City Press on WhatsApp. But on Dec 30, 2024 she was the spokesperson in charge - she was again taking public money. Despite that, she neither answered nor even acknowledged receiving written Press questions about UN rapes.

No answers at all. So who is Florencia Soto Nino?

She has no problem trying to promote herself. On Medium she describes her bike ride from Brooklyn to the UN; she puts a photograph with Guterres on Tumblr.

On Twitter she calls herself a "Digital strategist & communicator at @UN" -- while having less then 600 followers.

One of her few public quotes is "to take the necessary precautions to ensure no sensitive content is public,” U.N. Spokesperson Florencia Soto Nino-Martinez said" -- apparently she thinks any answer about UN rapes and corruption, the UN in Western Sahara, or Burundi, or Cameroon, is "sensitive content."

How much more has she taken in public funds during this time, while refusing to answer a single question? Watch this site.

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Your support means a lot. As little as $5 a month helps keep us going and grants you access to exclusive bonus material on our Patreon page. Click here to become a patron.

Fair Finance Watching Hit HomeStreet FirstSun On Lending Disparities Now $900M to BofA

by Matthew Russell Lee

SOUTH BRONX, Dec 28 – As US bank regulators talk about working to increase the fairness of the financial system, and closely scrutinizing mergers and the spread of bad practices, banks continue to assume they can combine.

Before the Capital One - Discover proposal, and ABA lawsuit against the Community Reinvestment Act regulation, there was FirstSun Capital Bancorp of Denver and Dallas saying it will merge with Homestreet, Inc. and Homestreet Bank of Seattle, Washington.

On February 23 Fair Finance Watch with Inner City Press on the FOIA filed a protest: "FirstSun's flagship Sunflower Bank, in Texas in 2022, made 694 mortgage loans to whites, and only 41 to African Americans. Meanwhile it denied 12 applications from African Americans, and only 34 from whites. This is disparate, and more disparate both than the aggregate in Texas.

Nationwide in 2022, Sunflower Bank made 3059 mortgage loans to whites, and only 194 to African Americans. Meanwhile it denied 49 applications from African Americans, and only 259 from whites.

For the record, on managerial resources and otherwise, note that on September 27, 2023, FirstSun Capital Bancorp, the parent company of Sunflower Bank, Guardian Mortgage and First National 1870 (collectively, “Sunflower”), filed a notice of data breach with the Attorney General of California... an unauthorized party likely took advantage of the flaw in the MOVEit software and downloaded copies of files [containing] personally identifiable information."

Then FirstSun simply changed charters to try to get fast approval: FirstSun Capital Bancorp will switch to a Texas state charter rather than a national one as it continues to pursue its acquisition of HomeStreet, the bank announced last week: “In our discussions with the OCC in Washington, it became obvious that we would not gain near-term approval." What a scam.

And it still didn't work - in early November the deal died, with the Fed and Texas regulators saying they will not approve.

And in late December, with HomeStreet trying to rebound from their failure, they sold $900 million in mortgages to Bank of America. So, like Chase, they benefit. Watch this site.