As UN Security Council Moves, UN Stonewalls on Rule Banning SC Media Workspace: When, & Who Favors?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, May 31 -- With the UN Security Council already moving from the basement back to the second floor, and the media table in front of it already gone, Inner City Press at Friday's noon briefing asked Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's deputy spokesman Eduardo Del Buey for the status of the draft rule which would for the first time ban media workspace in front of the Council. Video here, from Minute 10:04.

  Inner City Press for the Free UN Coalition for Access was shown, "for comment," a draft Media Access Guideline on May 20 which along other things would provide:

"f. The Security Council stakeout area, including the Turkish Lounge, is not to be used as a permanent workspace for the media. When the Council is not in session, correspondents should minimize the amount of time in the area, unless interviewing or conversing with a U.N. delegate or official."

  As FUNCA commented on May 21, and Inner City Press has reported in stories since, this proposed rule would reverse the media workspace -- a work table -- that existed in front of the Security Council before its temporary move to the basement, and that continued in the basement, until today.

  A week ago, Del Buey claimed that the rule would not reduce media access. Now he has been repeating to Inner City Press that it can only ask the Department of Public Information, whose Stephane Dujarric has not provided the date of implementation, nor acted on or even provided a substantive response to other complaints lodged with him.

(Beyond those complaints, including involving a UN Security camera about Inner City Press' and FUNCA's office door, other FUNCA members have raised their banning as non-resident correspondents from the Delegates' Lounge; the rules would also trample on free speech rights.)

  Del Buey on Friday again said, "Ask Stephane," saying that while Ban's Office of the Spokesperson is listed as a party to the Guidelines -- tellingly, so is the old UN Correspondents Association, although no membership meeting on these has been held -- it is DPI which "implements" the rules. 

 So it's DPI banning media workspace and access, using or being used by the Gulf & Western wires who run the UNCA board? UNCA's 2013 president Pamela Falk of CBS claimed to UNCA members who asked that she hadn't seen the Media Access Guidelines. More recently the spin is that it is up to Security Council members.

  Two anonymous social media accounts associated with UNCA / Reuters, and now analogized by one observer to "Mean Girls," have opposed the press for maintaining media workspace by the Security Council. And Ban's DPI?

  The incoming Security Council presidency has acknowledged that having a media table in front of the Council hurts no one, and helps coverage. So by what right would it be eliminated?

  The issue of the impending and unnecessary banning of media workspace in front of the Security Council has been raised above Dujarric, politely, with the offer of any additional information necessary. Watch this site.

As UN's Censorship Alliance Lashes Out from Anonymity, Ban Ki-moon's UN Does Nothing

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, May 24 -- UN scribes from Reuters, Bloomberg News, Voice of America, Agence France Presse and others on the board of the UN Correspondents Association tried to get Inner City Press thrown out of the UN in 2012.

   In 2013 they have started anonymous social media accounts to falsely accuse Inner City Press of being funded by terrorists.

  Inner City Press quit UNCA and co-founded the Free UN Coalition for Access. FUNCA presses the UN for more transparency, for example this week for access to report on the Security Council. FUNCA has also made the UN aware that its partners in UNCA are anonymous trolls.

  Most recently on May 23 Inner City Press showed UN official Stephane Dujarric that FUNCA flyers -- about reduction in press access to the Security Council -- were defaced by UNCA "leaders," right under a UN Security camera installed over the door to the office of Inner City Press and FUNCA. (Both have told the UN to take the camera down.)

Dujarric on May 23 wrote that, "someone reportedly defaced the fliers on your door. We will look into the issue in the morning."

  But nothing was heard from Dujarric by 4 pm on May 24. Inner City Press and FUNCA asked for an update. Dujarric replied at 5:01 pm, copying Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's three top spokespeople, "I have nothing to add to what I've already told you on record on all the issues you raise in your email."

  So: nothing was done, or will be done. By 8 pm, the UNCA trolls -- Dujarric's personal friends -- began again, celebrating their anonymity.

We will begin by naming the two people most in charge of UNCA. The president is Pamela Falk of CBS News, who took photographs as Inner City Press' office was raided by the UN on March 18 then threatened to sue about stories asking why she took photographs of the raid.

  Falk's first vice president and Rasputin is Louis Charbonneau of Reuters, who filed three stealth complaints (including at least one to Dujarric's personal, non-UN e-mail account) to try to get Inner City Press thrown out of the UN after he was challenged on stealing and mislabeling exclusives, for which Reuters offers extra compensation. This is UNCA, the UN's Censorship Alliance. This is the UNCA Executive Committee. Watch this site

FUNCA Flyer Criticizing Ban Ki-moon and Banning of Press Is Defaced, Right Under UN Security Camera: Now What?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, May 23 -- It's small, but telling. And it is a litmus test for the UN. As the UN press corps has moved back into the Secretariat building in the last two weeks, Inner City Press posted two flyers on the door of its office, both from the Free UN Coalition for Access.

  The first, dated May 14-15, concerned problems with the move and the exclusion of the media from the re-opening by Secretary General Ban Ki-moon of the UN's Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions.

  The second, dated May 21-22, criticized the UN's (and UN Correspondents' Association's) Media Access Guidelines which ban media workspace in front of the renovated Security Council, bar all but resident correspondents from the Delegates' Lounge, and purport to ban flyers from the doors of journalists offices.

  This last has been explained because this year's president of the UNCA Pamela Falk of CBS does not like her name used, though she chose to head a group which in 2012 sought to get Inner City Press thrown out of the UN. Niether flyer, however, named Falk or any other UNCA member: only Ban Ki-moon.

  On May 22, after this protest, a UN Security camera emerged above the office door on which the flyers were posted. Click here for 2-minute video Q&A of May 23 at noon.

  And later on May 23 it was seen: someone stopped and scrawled graffiti defacing the flyers, naming Inner City Press as "vicious" and "a fraud." Tweeted photos here, and here (showing UN Security camera).

  The question arises: should flyers be banned because the UN can't or won't stop its partners in UNCA from defacing them?

  After Inner City Press and FUNCA complained about the surveillance camera, this was the reply:

Subject: Request for suspension of Media Access Guidelines and information about them
From: Stephane Dujarric [at] un.org
Date: Wed, May 22, 2013 at 8:16 PM
To: funca [at] funca.info
Cc: Matthew Lee [at] innercitypress.com

Matthew, On the camera I went by your office this evening and saw it for myself. We will look into it.

  So now, will the surveillance camera - still up - reveal defacement by one of Dujarric's UNCA partners?

  While Inner City Press and FUNCA are pushing for the removal of this and any other UN Security camera in the press area, this particular camera must have filmed the defacement and defacer of the flyers. So what will the UN do? Watch this site.

Note the UN Security camera directly above the defaced flyers. And watch this site.

At UN, Surveillance Camera Still Up Over Inner City Press, Palestine Video Still Down, Banning Press by Dujarric, Silent for 24 Hours

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, May 23 -- Basic principles of press freedom that the UN abided by in the past are now being violated without so much as an explanation. 

   In 2009 when the UN "inadvertently" installed security cameras over the press offices in its Library building, after Inner City Press exposed it, the cameras were removed. But in 2013?

The day after Inner City Press complained about a plan to ban even a small work table permitted in the past by the renovated Security Council (2-minute Q&A video here and embedded below), on May 22 a UN surveillance camera was spotted above the office door of Inner City Press and the Free UN Coalition for Access.

  Inner City Press asked it at the UN's May 23 noon briefing, video herefrom Minute 12:

Inner City Press: the UN has installed a security camera on the third floor, right in front of the door of Inner City Press and the Free UN Coalition for Access, that’s why I am raising it. This issue arose when there was a temporary move to above the library here. What I am wondering is whether the UN thinks it is appropriate to install security or surveillance cameras in an area used by the press to meet with sources. Is it going to be removed?

Deputy Spoksperson Del Buey: Well, Matthew, I have seen your exchange of e-mails with Stéphane Dujarric, and I believe that Stéphane Dujarric is addressing this issue, so I…

Inner City Press: Is it coming down or is it staying up?

Deputy Spokesperson: Well, I’ll leave it to Stéphane to explain it to you. Okay, thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. Have a good afternoon.

  In an e-mail on the evening of May 22, after Inner City Press and FUNCA complained, Dujarric replied that he had gone to see the camera and would look into it. 

 He also repeated what he has said on May 20, that a UN video of the speech of Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat that was erroneously cut off from broadcast by UNTV, which Dujarric supervised, would be put online.

  A full twenty four hour later, the surveillance camera was still up, and the video still not. And no explanation or update at all from Dujarric, despite Del Buey's statement at the noon briefing that "I’ll leave it to Stéphane to explain it to you." This is unacceptable. We will have more on this.

Video of May 22, 2013 UN Noon Briefing: ICP told to deal with Dujarric: nothing for 24 hours

Footnote: Dujarric, as we have previously noted, is close, too close, with the old UNCA including its anonymous social media trolls. In this case, UNCA's president is claiming she didn't know about and hadn't seen the Media Access Guidelines which name UNCA as a party. She does not want her name used; thus she supports the attempted curtailment of free speech, even on substantive flyers on journalists' office doors. Her name is Pamela S. Falk, of CBS News.

 No word on surveillance cameras or other restrictions agreed to. These are Dujarric's partners: the A in the Alliance.

Uganda Media Closures Brought to Ban Ki-moon's Attention, Free Press Begins at Home - in UNHQ?

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, May 23, updated -- Calling in from Kigali, Rwanda to the UN noon briefing in New York, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson Martin Nesirky described a visit to the genocide memorial in the rain; somber.

  Inner City Press asked if Ban had met with Congolese -- not Congolian -- opposition and if he was aware of the letter directed at him from the wife of opposition deputy Eugene Diomi Ndongala.

  While still awaiting an answer to that question [see below] and another, Nesirky's office did answer another of Inner City Press' questions, asked recently at the noon briefing and again Thursday in writing: "On Uganda, I'd like to ask again if any Secretary General or Secretariat views on actions against the media -- Daily Monitor, Red Pepper, Dembe FM and KFM -- in the run up to the S-G's arrival."

Well less than an hour later, this response was provided, which we publish in full:

Subject: Your question on Uganda
From: UN Spokesperson - Do Not Reply [at] un.org
Date: Thu, May 23, 2013 at 12:40 PM
To: Matthew.Lee [at] innercitypress.com

Regarding your question on media in Uganda, the Spokesperson has the following to say:

The issue involving the closure of certain media in Uganda has been brought to the Secretary-General’s attention.

The Secretary-General is not in a position to make judgments about the specific circumstances of this case; however, it goes without saying that for the United Nations, as a matter of principle, freedom of speech and expression are fundamental and universal rights.

The Secretary-General believes that, in any democracy, it is essential for there to be freedom of expression and for the media to be able to carry out its functions freely and independently.

  We'd like to know more about this bringing to the attention of the S-G, but the answer's appreciated. 

  Inner City Press and the Free UN Coalition for Access are still waiting for denouement on the attempted ban on flyers and on media workspace in front of the renovated Security Council, and on the installation of a UN Security camera directly above the entrance to the office of Inner City Press and FUNCA, asked at the noon briefing on May 23. 

 Have these, particularly the former, been brought to Ban Ki-moon's attention? Watch this site.

Update: later on Thursday, the UN told Inner City Press: "Regarding your question at noon on whether the UN has received a letter concerning Eugene Diomi Ndongala, of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, that letter has not been received so far."  Then again, it was a lettre ouverte -- an open letter....

As UN Bans Press Work from UNSC, Camera Installed Over FUNCA Door: Whistleblower Free Zone II

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, May 22 -- "Is that a camera they put over your office door?" The question was put to Inner City Press at the UN at the end of the work day on Wednesday. 

  Back on the third floor of the UN Secretariat Building, lo and behold there was a black security camera over the door of Inner City Press and the Free UN Coalition for Access.See tweeted photo here.

  A quick survey of the rest of the third floor found no other security camera in the press area.

  Not in front of the door of Pam Falk of CBS, president of the UN Correspondents Association which is a party to Media Access Guidelines which would ban media workspace in front of the Security Council, as Inner City Press reported and FUNCA protested on May 21.

  Not in front of the studio of Voice of America, which on June 20, 2012 wrote to UN official Stephane Dujarric asking the Inner City Press' accreditation to cover the UN be "reviewed."

  Not in front of the large office of Reuters, whose Louis Charbonneau has thrice stealthy complained to the UN, once threatening to leave the UN where he is a convenient pass-through unless Inner City Press was thrown out.

  Back in December 2009, when the press corps was moved temporarily to space above the Dag Hammarskjold Library, Inner City Press exposed security camera there, calling it the "whistleblower free zone." The camera were removed

  Now in 2013 there is a single security camera on the third floor press area: over the door of Inner City Press and the new Free UN Coalition for Access. Both have complained: watch this site.