SDNY / UN GATE, Oct 5 – Ambassador Jeffrey
Bartos, the U.S. Representative for UN Management and
Reform, opened the Fifth Committee's main session on
Monday by bragging that a year ago he declared the era of
business as usual at the UN over, and that member states
then agreed "historic reforms that no one thought was
possible," by consensus.
He entirely skipped ongoing UN
corruption, and ban of the Press which exposes it.
Bartos' list of specifics: UN professionals
in New York earn on average 17 percent more than U.S.
civil service counterparts, with D-2s at 24 percent above
and P-2s at 14 percent. The U.S. will therefore propose
cuts to the pay premium, a cap of three children on child
allowances and education grants, an end to the tertiary
education benefit and mobility incentive, a ban on
business-class travel across the Secretariat, and
restrictions on Resident Coordinator funding.
Nothing in the statement as delivered
addresses corruption inside the UN's own management,
protection for whistleblowers, oversight, or press access.
Bartos said last October that oversight bodies need "the
independence and tools they need," and in his Senate
testimony he promised "stringent accountability,
transparency, and reform at the UN." The test of that
promise is on his own docket.
The UN Dispute Tribunal ordered Vitaly
Vanshelboim, who ran UNOPS's S3i investment program, to
repay $58.8 million in losses, a figure the Appeals
Tribunal later partly modified. He was arrested in Spain
on a Southern District of New York warrant, and an SDNY
indictment has now been unsealed, as Inner City Press reported
Friday. At Monday's noon briefing, which Inner City Press
is barred from attending, no one asked about it; Inner
City Press' written
questions to UN Spox Haq and Dujarric weren't
answered.
Bartos closed by saying the U.S. expects
"outcomes, not intentions" from its investment as the UN's
largest funder, and by invoking the taxpayers who fund the
work. American taxpayers also fund the UN's press
operations.
Inner City Press was removed from UN
Headquarters on July 3, 2018, while covering this same
Fifth Committee, and the Media Accreditation and Liaison
Unit declined its latest accreditation request on
September 29, 2026, without giving a reason.
On September 20, Ambassador Mike Waltz said
on CNN that the President is "absolutely within his rights
to limit journalists to government facilities." Waltz was
speaking about the White House, not the UN. It still
raises a fair question about USUN's own posture.
Inner City Press asks three questions of USUN.
Has the U.S. raised press access in the
Fifth Committee talks over the budget of the Department of
Global Communications under Melissa Fleming? Does "reform"
include an independent appeal for banned journalists? Has
this USUN, of Bartos and Waltz and higher, done anything
about UN censorship - or benefited from and even
orchestrated it? Watch this site
