By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, May 17 -- Friday night from the UNReuters ran a piece about Syria purporting to be news which was little more than a single sourced advocacy piece for the UN Security Council to pass a resolution that hasn't even been introduced yet.
The piece ends with a (blind) quote that it would be "quite difficult for the Russians to hold out against it." Really?
The Reuters piece says it is based on what "U.N. diplomats said" -- that is, plural. But there is only one diplomat quote, repeatedly.
Earlier in the week, independent journalists at the UN were summoned to a press stakeout by UN prime minister David Cameron, who after a short statement said he "understood" that Reuters UN had a question.
It is all too obvious; these fake-outs at the stakeout are being opposed by the new Free UN Coalition for Access, along with the selective spoon-feeding of news, even about the kidnapping of UN peacekeepers, by UN official Herve Ladsous, see Inner City Press May 17 story and video.
But at that fake-out at the "Scameron" stakeout, Reuters' UN bureau chief Louis Charbonneau tried to dress up the propaganda, like Kim Jong-un saying he "understood" that KCNA had a question, by claiming he was called on as the UN Correspondents Association.
If so, he sold out the decaying group's dues paying members in order to promote himself, Reuters, the UK and their identical positions on Syria, which are not shared by all members of UNCA by any means.
But the entity, now known as the UN's Censorship Alliance, is increasingly used by Gulf and Western big media to advance their own interests.
Because UNCA has continued, even on this weekend, its anti-Press campaign via anonymous social media accounts associated with Reuters, we note that this Reuters Friday night piece is bylined Michelle Nichols, who appears in a UK Mission to the UN video speaking ironically about World Press Freedom Day. We'll have more on this. For now, on the record media critique is quite different from big media using anonymous accounts against smaller competitors, which Reuters and others in UNCA are engaged in.
