UN Confirms Layoff Letters Despite Libya Plan, Nothing on Aramark Layoffs, UMOJA, Staff Union Elections

By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, December 2 -- The UN has confirmed to Inner City Press that it has sent layoff notices (or "your post does not exist" letters, in UN-ese) to Department of Safety and Security staff members. In this month of December, can the jobs be saved?

  Earlier today, after receiving numerous complaints, Inner City Press made several inquiries and published a story about the layoffs, or ten officers who received letters, and asked why they couldn't for example be placed in the new security mission in Libya.

  After publishing that exclusive first story, at the day's noon briefing, Inner City Press put the question to Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson Martin Nesirky. He said his office was already looking into it. And later, this arrived, which we publish in full:

Subject: Your question on UN Security personnel
From: UN Spokesperson - Do Not Reply [at] un.org
Date: Mon, Dec 2, 2013 at 1:19 PM
To: Matthew.Lee [at] innercitypress.com

Regarding your question at noon about security posts, the Spokesperson has the following to say:

The security posts in question are posts that were temporarily created to support the Capital Master Plan (CMP). The “associated costs” for the CMP, which is the funding source for these temporary posts, ends on 31 December 2013.

However, over the last 18 months, the Organization has put a great deal of effort into saving as many jobs as possible for these affected staff members. This has included finding posts within the Security and Safety Service at the UN Headquarters, as well as other UN security services globally, General Service posts, and field assignments. Of the 68 officers considered in the temporary hiring associated with the Capital Master Plan, there are 10 officers remaining on the list for placement.

  Again we note this: a UN Security person working in New York on a G4 visa, if they took the post to protect the UN Mission in Libya, their family would have to leave the US in thirty days. This is also the UN's hammer over whistleblowers.

  Meanwhile, inside the UN itself, for weeks those working in the Delegates' Dining Room have been asking why their place of work, run by the contractor Aramark, will close on December and not re-open. Aramark had been reducing services, cutting the hours of the staff cafeteria for example, with the UN saying nothing.

  When Inner City Press has asked about the enforced layoffs by Aramark of workers in the UN, the UN has shifted from saying it cares about the principles preached by the International Labor Organization to saying this is entirely up to the contractor -- a defense used then rejected by apparel makers like Levis, the Gap and Nikes. But not the UN.

  On November 29, Inner City Press asked Ban Ki-moon's top two spokespeople:

"Please confirm or deny that Aramark will cease mid-day service (and cut back on workers) in the Delegates Dining Room from December 20 on, and explain the UN's role in reduction of service and employment by Aramark, and when their contract with the UN will expire."

  So far no answer, including to other questions including these two, on labor relations and UMOJA/ waste at the UN:

"With the UN Staff Union election upcoming and dispute ranging from term limits to how voters are grouped and accredited, please describe the role of the UN and OHRM, including in light of a statement by ASG Pollard that 'OHRM had been in contact with Mr. Auda, Chairman of the Polling Officers, continually between 7 October when the second list of staff (as vetted by EOs was transmitted to him) and 28 October, 2013; and

"With regard to UMOJA, please respond to the (whistleblowers') critique that the project now uses 'Nova to assign expenses retroactively, for many years; it costs in fact much more than $200,000 $ only to capture the data."

Watch this site.

  

Burundi Notes Belgium Had No Government For a Year, UN UNreformed

By Matthew Russell Lee

 UNITED NATIONS, July 22 -- The Security Council tables were turned on Monday morning, when the Ambassador of Burundi began his speech with the fact that former colonial powerhouse Belgium was without a government for more than a year.

  He then mocked those to whom "good government is so dear," citing a proverb from another colonialist, France: "An empty stomach has no ears."

  On the other end of the spectrum, after the chair of the UN Peacebuilding configuration Paul Seger of Switzerland spoke in the open meeting, he like Burundi was not allowed into the Security Council's consultation.

  These exclusions are one of the reforms proposed by the new ACT grouping, and the Small Five before it. Seger stopped and told Inner City Press that, along with lines of another saying about Mohamed and the mountain, he had invited Security Council members to consult with him on Friday, and they did. But at what level?

  Seger was in Burundi from June 24 to 28, and among other things as regards the International Monetary Fund said, "both the Burundian authorities and the donors consider the socio-economic situation to be difficult, although the two sides do not necessarily have the same interpretation of the causes of this fragility. The recent mission by the International Monetary Fund summed up the main challenges well. I strongly encourage the government to follow its recommendations."

  There were four then one then no media in front of the Security Council -- the Conference Building wi-fi seems not to work, beyond the lack of the media worktable that existed in front of the Security Council before and during the Capital Master Plan renovation. To return to Seger's speech, while the IMF tends to try to make things easier for journalists to cover it, the opposite may be the trend at the UN. The Free UN Coalition for Access has asked why. Watch this site.

   

UN Slammed for “No Inkling” on Disabilities, Italian Official & EU Case, FUNCA for Access

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, July 17, updated 8:30 pm -- The Convention of the Rights of People with Disabilities press conference on Wednesday started late, and when it went Kenya's Ambassador Macharia Kamau criticized the UN for not being accessible to the disabled, having “no inkling” how to serve their needs.

  Since the UN has spent $2 billion on a Capital Master Plan rehabilitation, Inner City Press asked Macharia Kamau if he thought member states had been consulted enough on this issue, and if anything can be done to make better accessibility plans for the General Assembly, recently closed for renovations.

  He replied that things can and must be done better. Minutes later, Inner City Press put the same question to UN spokesperson Martin Nesirky, who responded with a lengthy Note to Correspondents mass e-mailed to the UN press corps, which should be online here.

  Inner City Press still awaits an answer to its question about a pending disabilities Bulletin or instruction that would come from Secretary General Ban Ki-moon -- who recently rescinded such a Bulletin on workers rights and staff relations.

  Also on the panel was UN official Daniela Bas. Inner City Press asked her about a recent EU Court of Justice decision criticizing her native Italy for not living up to its responsibilities under the disabilities convention. 

  She said she couldn't answer that, since she has been working at the UN and not in the Italian foreign service for two years. So who will answer? The court decision is described here.

  The Free UN Coalition for Access has asked the UN in Geneva, via @FUNCA_Questions, to describe steps it has taken for accessibility, beyond the US Americans with Disabilities Act which the UN in New York now says it complies with (while also claiming immunity). We'll see.

Footnote: The Free UN Coalition for Access thanked all the panelists, including Maria Soledad Cisternas Reyes, chair of the Commission on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and Javed Abidi of Disabled Persons International, for the briefing. The word “Access” in FUNCA can and does mean many things. Watch this site.

Update of 8:30 pm -- after 8 pm, the following came in:

From: UN Spokesperson - Do Not Reply [at] un.org
Date: Wed, Jul 17, 2013 at 8:17 PM
Subject: Your question on accessibility
To: Matthew.Lee [at] innercitypress.com

Further to your questions on accessibility today, we can confirm a Secretary-General's bulletin on accessibility for persons with disabilities in the UN is being developed. 

  We'll have more on this.

   

May Day at UN Has Protest of Ban's "Forced Relocations," Free Speech Asserted

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, May 1 -- On May Day as workers worldwide rally and in some case strike, at UN Headquarters' entrance traffic circle a march will be held at 1:30 pm to protest Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's "broken promises" including on "forced relocations" of staff into a "substandard building."

  UN Translation staff have filed for and won a suspension of action blocking Ban's Secretariat from relocating them. Inner City Press has obtained the UN Dispute Tribunal order and puts it online, here. 

  By May 2, Ban's Secretariat has been directed to "address,inter alia, the following issues:

a. When were the Applicants notified for the first time of the proposed move? (Respondent is to include any supporting documentation.)

b. What is the legal status of the Capital Master Plan Guidelines, referred to in the applications? (Respondent is to provide the Tribunal with a copy of the Guidelines.)

c. What is the effective date of the proposed move to the Albano building? (Respondent is to include any supporting documentation.)

d. What are the official documents regulating the size of offices an cubicles in the United Nations? (Respondent is to provide the Tribunal with these documents.)"

  The protest organizers have said, and we agree, that there is, even at the UN, a "right to exercise free speech... At 13:30, we will proceed to the fountain that is located in the circle in front of the Secretariat Building to peacefully voice our disagreements with management on anything related to the Albano building, from the broken promises that brought us here in the first place to this ill-conceived move that has put staff of the different services in a situation where they have to confront each other for the privilege of working in a substandard building. 

"You are all encouraged to bring signs of the type that role up to voice your grievances. However, if they're attached to wooden holders being brought through the gates, that might be a problem. It's our right to exercise free speech."

  Free speech at the UN is much in dispute. Recently the supervisor of UN Media Accreditation Stephane Dujarric contacted Inner City Press "urgently" about a single tweet, saying he was giving Inner City Press a chance. A chance for what?

  The tweet concerned how high officials of the UN are selected, and its relation to the veto powers in the Security Council (including for selecting the Secretary General) of those who won World War II. Could this topic be taboo?

  The UN press corps, too, is being primed for a move back to the Secretariat Building on May 10. Why it was delayed was never sufficiently explained. The Free UN Coalition for Access asked for a written explanation but not was given. 

  Rather the reply involved a non-consensual raid on Inner City Press' office on March 18 by the Department of Public Information, which rifled through papers and took photographs, later leaked to BuzzFeed.com, including of Inner City Press' desk and bookshelf.

  The president of the old UN Correspondents Association, Pamela Falk of CBS, was present and took photographs; when Inner City Press wrote about that, she issued from her CBSNews.com e-mail account a legal threat to "cease and desist." Free speech indeed. We will cover the protest(s). Watch this site.

Exclusive: UN Budget Cuts 59 Publishing Jobs, Leaked Minutes Show, No X-Ray, Interpreters All Wet

By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive

UNITED NATIONS, February 7 – The budget squeeze in the UN under Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is reflected in minutes of a meeting of officials of the Department of General Assembly and Conference Management obtained and exclusively published by Inner City Press, here.

   DGACM intends, only in New York, to cut over $11 million in its 2014-15 budget. The largest cut is of 59 posts, or jobs, in its Publishing Section, overseen by Narendra Nandoe.

   Meanwhile, travel funds are being increased by at least $250,000. DGACM is spending $5 million on the “digitalization of meeting rooms signs.”

   There was talk of imposing a cap on the length of the Summary Records of meeting, and of outsourcing: “savings already achieved in processing Summary Records over the last 5-6 years by employing exclusively local free-lance precis-writers and translating them contractually.”

   The controversial “FlexTime” system was contrasted, by its proponent, to using “pencil and paper” -- which would require, he said, three more staff posts.

   The minutes also reflect that the Interpretation Section is currently and prospectively housed in a leaking office, even after the Capital Master Plan renovation. 

   In the CMP, Conference Rooms 3 and 10 will not be ready by April. Meanwhile, Interpreter coverage will be over-stretch between April 8 and 19. Lost in translation? Watch this site.

UN's Delayed Move, Favoritism in Responses & Space Raised by FUNCA, Some Reforms Won

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, January 17 -- Why has the UN delayed by two months the move-back of the press corps to its headquarters skyscraper? Inner City Press and other members of the Free UN Coalition for Access pursued the question Thursday afternoon with three officials of the UN Department of Public Information.

 Despite an initial diversion that construction workers at the UN are now focused on the Hurricane Sandy damage to the third sub-basement, it is confirmed that the UN can't or won't pay the now prevailing wage in New York for the workers need to meet the February deadline. 

  And so it will be April, they say. Does the UN not have the money? Or does it have other priorities? This will be pursued.

   Many other questions were asked, and some answered. While some wire services are slated to return to large private offices, others are not. 

   The issue was raised, and double standards identified including separate office spaces for three ostensibly independent outlets run by the same government's foreign service.

  

 In response, FUNCA was told that it is still a live issue. Here's hoping for the appropriate resolution.

   In terms of the lack of space for journalists, FUNCA pointed to the absurdity of the censoring and decaying UN Correspondents Association being slated to get an "UNCA Club" -- which should be renamed and be open to all -- an "UNCA Office" and even an "UNCA Pantry."

   This last is apparently only the designation in the blueprints. It was said the "Club" will be open to all. But it must be re-named; it cannot be a way for the UN to prop up the legitimacy of UNCA, which it was confirmed does not pay any rent to the UN for the space.

 Likewise, after complaints last fall and Thursday, the formal on the record response was that in the future, passes for resident correspondents to cover the General Assembly will no longer be distributed through UNCA, but through the Documents Center.

 Access to photo opportunities, argued for by a long time photographer who since being told only "wire services" could attend took to boycotting Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's events, was on Thursday guaranteed, even if it means two separate entries of photographers. Likewise, Ban's New York events will be disclosed in advance by the UN.

  Disclosure was the theme: FUNCA asked to be informed of all denials or revocations of accreditation. Cases of a television cameraman disaccredited for a single mistake were raised, as well as a critical journalist who was told the UN does not accredit freelancers. This will be tested, we predict by the National Writers Union.

  A complaint filed with the UN by the New York Civil Liberties Union, in response to a disaccreditation request filed by Voice of America which said that Reuters and Agence France-Presse supported it, was reportedly responded to, informally, the very day Inner City Press' accreditation was extended. (There may be a discrepancy on dates.)

   The actual response has not been provided but will be requested again by FUNCA. But such censorship, or non content neutral, dis-accrediation bids will be even more actively opposed by FUNCA in the future.

 More was said, but on other topics in an abundance of caution we will await DPI's promised written on the record answers.

 What FUNCA told the UN, on the record, is that UNCA went too far in not only not defending but actively seeking to expel and dis-accredit investigative press, and there is no going back. 

  At this week's Kofi Annan book event, the new president of UNCA Pamela Falk -- who ran without any competition, with the endorsement of the former four-year president, and issued no campaign statements -- told a newsy country's Permanent Representative, who in turn and amazed told Inner City Press about it, "I am the president of UNCA, not FUNCA."That's right - let's keep that straight.

   Going forward, the UN was told that FUNCA intends to be an ongoing mechanism to defend the rights of journalists to report from, and get answers from, the UN. 

   FUNCA commended the new leadership of DPI for organizing "brown bag" presentations for UN officials liketoday's on Syria, and earlier by the Under Secretaries General for Security and for the Prevention of Genocide.

   The refusal of the USG for Legal Affairs Patricia O'Brien to ever answer questions was bemoaned. But will her replacement do better? 

  And what will happen to the USG for Peacekeeping Operations Herve Ladsous, who had his spokesman physically seize the UN TV microphone to avoid a Press question about rapes in Minova by the Congolese Army, Ladsous partners?

  Ladsous' spokesman -- but apparently not Ladsous -- has it emerged been told that was inappropriate. But what of Ladsous and his refusal to answer? 

  What of a sense among many at the UN that there are double standards, favoritism in question granting and answering? FUNCA is on the case - watch this site.

In Ban's UN, Cafeteria Workers Face 6 Month Layoff, Catering Only to High Rollers

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, December 15, updated Dec 16 -- While UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon parties and takes photos with shadowy businessmen the daily life at what remains of the UN grows more barren, the condition of lower level workers more precarious.

Elevator operators were fired; audio engineers were fired then re-hired as weekly temporary workers with no benefits.

Now the staff in the UN cafeteria face a layoff of six months or more, Inner City Press has learned. After hearing from staff that the Capital Master Plan intended to shutter the cafeteria after Christmas, Inner City Press waited to speak to CMP chief Michael Adlerstein.

On December 14 Adlerstein confirmed it to Inner City Press, saying "there will be a six month gap" and that the Staff Cafe and Delegates Dining Room will re-open on the fourth floor of the Secretariat Building in December 2012.

Strangely, while the cafeteria is being closed, Adlerstein told Inner City Press that the temporary Delegates Dining Room in the back of the cafeteria space will remain open intermittently with a reduced kitchen.

(Ironically, Ban appeared Wednesday night in a satire video washing dishes. He at least still has a job, a wag snarked.)

Ban Ki-moon on film, layoffs not shown (c) MRLee

This seems to mean that the cafeteria space on the first floor is not being fully renovated, since part of it will stay open for events for member states and other high-rollers who rent the space.

So what is the reason for shutting the cafeteria, used these days by among others the construction workers and those remaining in the UN, and summarily laying off all of the staff? Watch this site.

Update of December 16 - after the story above and Inner City Press asking at the December 15 noon briefing, at 11 am on December 16 the UN issued the statement below. It had been said that when the cafeteria was renovated, service and the workers would move up to 4th floot of Secretariat. Now, that is not happening, and it is not explained in the below. Bad management.

Beginning 26 December 2011, the Secretariat Lobby will undergo renovation as part of the United Nations Secretariat Capital Master Plan. As a result of these renovations, the entrance to the Main Cafeteria will become inaccessible. Consequently, the operations of the Cafeteria will be suspended from 26 December 2011 until 30 June 2012.

During this time, basic and necessary repairs to the Cafeteria, the servery and kitchen will take place. The work carried out during this period will ensure the provision of a full food service to staff members on their return to the Secretariat building starting in July 2012.

Catering services will continue to be provided at 4 other locations: the DC1 and UNICEF cafeterias, the Viennese Café and the Coffee Shop.

The temporary Delegates Dining Room will be closed at least for the first six weeks of this project. It might be made available for events for the Diplomatic Community and other UN-approved entities from March through to the end of June 2012 subject to the status of the construction and renovation progress.

The management of staff resources assigned to the ARAMARK operations at the UN is the responsibility of the contractor. However, the company has indicated that, in line with its arrangements with the union, the employees affected by the closure of the cafeteria will be the first to be re-hired upon the re-opening of the facility scheduled for July 2012. The UN also understands that these employees will be called upon to service any catering events that will occur in the interim.