Palau Would Defend Marine Sanctuary With Italian Drones, Crashed in DR Congo

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, February 4 -- Palau's president Tommy Remengesau returned to the UN on February 4, promoting a stand-alone Sustainable Development Goal about the oceans and speaking of a marine sanctuary which would ban all commercial fishing in an area as large as France.

  Inner City Press asked President Remengesau how the ban on fishing would be enforced, given for example the illegal fishing that takes place off Somalia and, doubly illegal, off Western Sahara.

  Remengesau responded that drones could be part of the solution. Palau's Ambassador Stuart Beck added that drones could take photographs which could be evidence.

  Italy's Mission to the UN is promoting an event with its Ambassador Sebastiano Cardi and Palau featuring Italian firm Finmeccanica, which made the Selex Falco ES drone procured by UN Peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous which recently crashed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. A crash in the ocean would be less dangerous. Still.

  Remengesau explained that sharks are worth substantially more to Palau alive than dead, given its eco-tourism economy. Inner City Press asked about other countries joining the shark sanctuary movement that Palau started. Beck mentioned Mexico, and hoped that the broader marine sanctuary idea would also spread. The oceans being a Sustainable Development Goal would be a good step in that direction.

Background: With fifteen months to go until the “Sustainable Development Goals” are determined by the UN General Assembly, Palau's Ambassador Stuart Beck back on June 25 made the case for an oceans SDG. He recounted that only last night, Palau had its highest tide ever.

  The seas have become so acid, he continued, that mussels and clams are having a hard time forming their shells.

   Inner City Press asked Beck about Palau's shark sanctuary, which became with 600,000 square kilometers and is now up to 12.5 million square kilometers, with subsequent joiners like Mexico, Honduras and Costa Rica, Bahamas, Barbados, Micronesia and the Maldives. If sharks could say thanks, he concluded, they'd give thanks for the sanctuary. Video herefrom Minute 7:05.

  Accompanying Beck was Ghislaine Maxwell of the TerraMar Project, who said the oceans account for 16% of humanity's food and spoke of using social media in the campaign. It must target all 193 states, Beck pointed out. (Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, it is understood, doesn't know much about the idea.)

It seems Ban's UN doesn't know much about social media or new style network organizations either. The new Free UN Coalition for Access, formed after the old UN Correspondents Association showed itself willing to spy for the UN and seek to get new media thrown out, has been using the Internet and now Twitter to press for media access.

  There is no going back. Watch this site.

UN Brags of MDGs But Dodges Online Questions of Oceans & the Future, FUNCA: Innovate Whose Future?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, July 1 -- The UN is bragging about the Millennium Development Goals, even as what's to come after is being fought about. 

  Last week Inner City Press wrote about Palau's and others' push for a post-2015 “Sustainable Development Goal” about the oceans. 

  On June 28, Inner City Press attended the UN's press conference in New York about the MDGs and asked about it. But the UN insisted that the briefing was embargoed until now, July 1, and that the participants could not be named. Why?

  Hardly any other journalists at the UN cared about the MDGs press conference. While the UN Correspondents Association almost cravenly goes to any and all briefing in order to say their name, this one, they missed. (The Free UN Coalition for Access thanked the briefers - who must remain nameless, by choice.)

  On the question of the oceans, they agreed that when the MDGs were agreed there was less awareness: not even carbon and climate change were the focus yet. They agreed with Inner City Press' critique of the urban slums data, not taking into account the shift of population toward the cities. (MDGs Report at page 50.)

But here is something wrong with the UN system and its supposed interface with the public on these issues. The UN's “Greening the Blue” twitter account did not respond on the carbon impact of Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's travel, when asked back on June 21 by the Free UN Coalition for Access, @FUNCA_info.

  UNDP's Olav Kjorven didn't answer on his carbon footprint, nor on whether the UN system favors an Oceans SDG. (Inner City Press is told that Ban Ki-moon doesn't understand the concept and asked for a briefing.)

  UNDP is pitching the #Post2015 tumult in “194 countries,” because a video they paid for said it involved Rwanda and 193 countries. But when asked by FUNCA what the 194thcountry is -- Somaliland? -- they did not respond, but justdropped the 194 claim in favor of 750,000 people. It's a one way mirror, throughout the UN system.

 Palau by contrast and its partner the TerraMar project are reaching out and responding, ready to press for September 2014. Watch this site.  

As Palau Uses Social Media for Oceans SDG As for Sharks, UN Tries to Ban Free Speech, & FUNCA

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, June 25 -- With fifteen months to go until the “Sustainable Development Goals” are determined by the UN General Assembly, Palau's Ambassador Stuart Beck on Tuesday made the case for an oceans SDG. He recounted that only last night, Palau had its highest tide ever.

  The seas have become so acid, he continued, that mussels and clams are having a hard time forming their shells.

   Inner City Press asked Beck about Palau's shark sanctuary, which became with 600,000 square kilometers and is now up to 12.5 million square kilometers, with subsequent joiners like Mexico, Honduras and Costa Rica, Bahamas, Barbados, Micronesia and the Maldives. If sharks could say thanks, he concluded, they'd give thanks for the sanctuary. Video here from Minute 7:05.

  Accompanying Beck was Ghislaine Maxwell of the TerraMar Project, who said the oceans account for 16% of humanity's food and spoke of using social media in the campaign. It must target all 193 states, Beck pointed out. (Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, it is understood, doesn't know much about the idea.)

It seems Ban's UN doesn't know much about social media or new style network organizations either. The new Free UN Coalition for Access, formed after the old UN Correspondents Association showed itself willing to spy for the UN and seek to get new media thrown out, has been using the Internet and now Twitter to press for media access.

  Now the UN Department of Public Information has threatened to suspend or withdraw Inner City Press' UN accreditation, ostensibly for having a FUNCA sign on the door of its office. (Ironically, it was FUNCA that thanked Beck for his briefing; no UNCA Executive Committee member even came.) It was about this office that a DPI official demanded to speak to Inner City Press in the two minutes between Palau's presentation and the noon briefing.

  Inner City Press asked again for answers to questions it has put to DPI, about double standards for UNCA Executive Committee members with solo offices and two UNCA signs, and crackdowns on free speech. DPI is trying to dictate that FUNCA use old organizational forms. But there is no going back. Watch this site.