In 16 Hours in Sri Lanka, UN's Ban To Overfly Zone of Carnage, Dine with President

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may9srilanka052309.html

COLOMBO, May 23 -- In the wake of what UN officials called a bloodbath on the beach, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and the Press are set for a sixteen hour jaunt around Sri Lanka on Saturday, which some call the victory tour. On military helicopters the entourage will travel to Manik Farm, which the UN's John Holmes has repeatedly called the largest camp for Internally Displaced People in the world. Only Zones 1 and 4 will be toured.

Currently, neither the UN nor non-governmental organizations are allowed to enter the camps with vehicles. A briefing will be given by, among others, Major General G A Chandrasiri and a hospital will be visited.

Next from Manik Farm's helipad, the group will "over fly [the] No Fire Zone," the scene of much firing and dying, including in the days after the government declared victory but neither the Red Cross nor UN were allowed into the zone to search for or help the wounded.

Ban's chief and staff and envoy Vijay Nambiar received a similar fly-over on May 22 and concluded from the air, according to UN officials, that no civilians remain in the Zone. Inner City Press has a camera with a zoom, but there's talk of bodies in bunkers, bodies buried, evidence destroyed.

The group will lunch at the government Air Base in Anuradhapura, the site of a prison in which as Inner City Press has reported UNHCR staff member Mr. Ragushankar Kulathaivelu has been imprisoned since last Fall. He and his mother were arrested on October 5, 2008.

From where he worked for UNHCR, in Mannar, he was visiting his mother in Vavuniya, when the authorities came to arrest his mother for renting a room to an alleged LTTE supporter, who had identified himself as a student.

The mother died in December, in jail. Ragushankar Kulathaivelu nevertheless remains in prison in Anuradhapura. Reportedly, even after the wipe out of the No Fire zone, conditions for such prisoners have grown worse, with verbal and other abuse.

This is a UN system staff member, arrested along with his mother for no reason, and still in custody. UNHCR's country representative has said nothing publicly about it, and has not responded to written questions on the matter. Inner City Press on the plane to Sri Lanka asked the UN's Holmes about the case. What will be done? Perhaps it will be a working lunch.

Ban's entourage includes not only Holmes and Nambiar but also the head of the UN Department of Political Affairs Lynn Pascoe, Ban's spokesperson Choi Soung-ah and Director of Communications Michael Meyer, as well as Department of Public Information staff. Much administrative work has gone into the trip, but its outcome is far from certain, in fact is heavily maligned from many quarters.

The group then flies en masse to Kandy, where Ban will meet with President Mahinda Rajapaksa then hold a half-hour press conference in the Queen's Hotel. Then Ban will dine with President Rajapaksa, as Ban told Inner City Press the two did in Seoul, before that sharing a helicopter ride over a port since re-development by the Chinese.

At the Sri Lankan Mission to the UN in New York, an official who restricted this reporter's passport to two days and said for any longer, a background check would be performed in Colombo told Inner City Press of the mixing of Sinhanese hoppers with Tamil those, "in food you see we fix," she said. What or who is on the menu and agenda at Ban's and Rajapaksa's dinner is not known.

Will Mr. Ban raise the incarceration of the doctors who remained in the No Fire zone offering treatment and casualty figures? Will he ask about Tissainayagam, a journalist held without charges for more than a year? Will the two discuss Amendment 13 to the Sri Lankan constitution, which promised too-limited devolution or powers but nevertheless was never implemented, and reportedly might now be further undermined?

What about the long-promised investigation into the killings of newspaper editors and aid workers, from Action Contre la Faim and elsewhere? What about what's called the government's blacklist of 837 internationals?

What about the Memorandum of Understanding now being demanded from NGOs by the government of Sri Lanka, which requires them to provide "all information" to the government? (See Inner City Press' exclusive report. here.)

What about Bousa prison, where witnesses tell of routine torture of those detained?

Unless something changes, the whole group will be packed back on the UN plane, at Katunayake International Airport, and will leave the country before Saturday at midnight. Watch this site for updates, whenever and wherever the Internet can be found.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may9srilanka052309.html

At Colombo Airport, UN's Ban Declares Reconciliation Begun, Omits Joyous Reference

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may8srilanka052209.html

COLOMBO AIRPORT, May 22 -- As UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon arrived in Colombo, he delivered prepared remarks to a crowd assembled at midnight. Soldiers with machine guns lined a rain-drenched red carpet. Inside a VIP terminal, Mr. Ban signed a guest book the message of which was pre-written. Flanked by Sri Lanka's foreign minister and UN envoy Vijay Nambiar, before a jostling crowd of photographing media including Inner City Press, Ban recited from his speech.

At the last minute, a line was removed from his remarks: "A great many Sri Lankans are understandably joyous that a long conflict is over." This was distributed to the Press accompanying Mr. Ban and his officials on the UN plane, and then crossed out in ball point pen. What to make of the deletion?

Left in, however, was the line "I hope my visit today can help begin a process of national recovery, renewal and reconciliation for all Sri Lankans." One wag on the plane joked, "No, Mister Nambiar has started that process."

No questions were taken after the foreign minister spoke. The Press was hustled out to a waiting mini-bus and sped out of the airport, into the darkness of a neighborhood full of textile plants.

Ban's schedule for Saturday begins at 8 am with a meeting with the Sri Lankan foreign minister. From there, the group will be taken, seriatim, to a hospital, then to the Manik Farms camp for internally displaced people. The visit, Inner City Press is told, will be to Zones Two and Four.

The UN's top humanitarian John Holmes told the Press that Zone One, the first built, has semi-permanent houses with roofs of tin or some local equivalent. The plane-wag asked, what are they hiding in Zone Three? Much more seriously, there is talk of a post mortem of a woman who died in the camps, reportedly of starvation.

Then Ban and the Press will be taken for a fly-over of the conflict zone. Somehow from these heights, Ban's chief of staff Vijay Nambiar was able to conclusively determine that no more civilians remain in the Zone.

Ban's day, and trip to Sri Lanka, will end with a private dinner in Kandy with President Mahinda Rajapaksa, followed it is said by a press availability. Then Ban will fly onward to Copenhagen. Can these 24 hours "begin a process of national recovery, renewal and reconciliation for all Sri Lankans"? Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may8srilanka052209.html

UN's Holmes Speaks of Tamils and then Stops, On Satish Nambiar, No Comment

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may7srilanka052209.html

UN PLANE, May 22, modified May 23 -- Taking off toward Sri Lanka on Friday after a refueling stop in Bahrain, UN humanitarian chief John Holmes said that he has been besieged by e-mails from the Tamil diaspora. His subsequent comments, he clarified on Saturday morning, were meant to be "on background."

Holmes and other UN officials, from Secretary General Ban Ki-moon through his chief of staff and envoy Vijay Nambiar to High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay all receive emails beseeching action on Sri Lanka, many of which are copied to Inner City Press. As the shelling of the No Fire zone increased, the tone of the emails grew more shrill, including one which said Ban Ki-moon should be sent to the International Criminal Court for complicity in genocide. That a UN official might delete such a message and subsequent ones perceived to be of that nature is, one supposes, understandable.

Inner City Press asked about the op-ed written by the brother of Ban's chief of staff Vijay Nambiar, praising Sri Lankan General Fonseka and his campaign in the North. Holmes declined to comment.

When Holmes was in Sri Lanka in mid 2007, he called it a very dangerous country, in the aftermath of the shooting of a group of Action Contre la Faim aid workers. A government minister called Holmes a terrorist for his comment. This minister was later blown up. He was running a marathon or race and got blown up. What more can we say? Apparently, nothing.

Click here for NGOs' summary of Holmes comments in New York just prior to the trip.

On other matter, Holmes predicted that Ban will go to Myanmar in July, that he'd told that to CNN. Holmes admitted that while in Myanmar, he had been taken to a "model village." Not so in Sri Lanka he said, admitting again that in his first trip he has used government supplied translation. He said that wasn't a problem. But wasn't it?

And see, www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may7srilanka052209.html

UN's Ban Remembers Flying and Dining with Rajapaksa, Roots in NAM and Tsunami

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may6srilanka052209.html

UN PLANE, BAHRAIN, May 22 -- Parked on a runway in Bahrain refueling on his way to Sri Lanka, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon told the Press he had been to Sri Lanka only once before, in the early 1980s as part of South Korea's diplomatic unit on the UN. He said that North Korea was making inroads with the Non-Aligned Movement, which he tried to counter on behalf of Seoul. Inner City Press asked, weren't you also in Sri Lanka after the tsunami?

You're right, Mr. Ban said sheepishly. I had forgotten. He recounted how he and now-President Mahinda Rajapaksa flew in a helicopter over the then-destroyed port of Hambantota, where now the Chinese are constructive a massive port as part of their String of Pearls strategy. He described another dinner, this time in Seoul, with Mahinda Rajapaksa. Ban said he gets along well with President Rajapaksa. More on this shortly.

Ban said that in April he was only in New York three times, for a total of five days. Inner City Press asked where he does his laundry, and if he'd seen the previous day's Wall Street Journal expose of the UN's questionable handling of sexual harassment cases. Ban nodded and acknowledged that the topic had come up in his visit to Washington just prior to the Sri Lanka trip. We have a zero tolerance policy, he said.

Inner City Press asked what he would do about making public what Troop Contributing Countries do when their soldiers are repatriated from UN Peacekeeping missions charged with sexual abuse or exploitation. Ban said that whole groups of soldiers are sent home. Like to Sri Lanka, Inner City Press said, referring to the charges against more than 100 Sri Lankan soldiers while in Haiti with the UN.

Ban indicated that this particular repatriation shouldn't be asked about at this time. He mentioned the Moroccans, who were repatriated from the UN Mission in Cote d'Ivoire.

Ban looked around the plane and said this is the second largest group of journalists to accompany him. There would have been more, Inner City Press told him, if he had come before the No Fire Zone was over-run. Concluding the conversation on a high note, Ban said he had read in the Press the story of the Security Council ambassadors who had to travel by bus from Congo to Rwanda after a UN staffer shot his pistol in this same white UN plane while trying to show that his weapon was empty. I read about that, Ban said. And then he returned to the front of the patched-up plane.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may6srilanka052209.html

In Sri Lanka, Will Ban Address Blacklisting, Boosa Prison, Detentions and Right to Return?

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may5srilanka052209.html

UN PLANE, BAHRAIN, May 22 -- While for his trip to Sri Lanka UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon speak of listening to the "plans and visions" of President Mahinda Rajapaksa, local sources tell Inner City Press there are a number of more concrete places and abuses he should check into.

Why for example are UN vehicles not being allowed into camps the UN paid to build? Where are young men who left the conflict zone being taken, and for what? What are the Rajapaksa's commitments in terms of granting displaced Tamils a right to return in a reasonable period of time and full granting full access both to the camps and former conflict zone?

Even more specifically, what about Tissainayagam, a journalist held without charges for more than a year? What about the long-promised investigation into the killings of newspaper editors and aid workers, from ACF and elsewhere? What about the doctors who stayed in the conflict zone to offer treatment and casualty firgures, and are now in government detention?

What about Bousa prison, where witnesses tell of routine torture of those detained?

What about what's called the government's blacklist of 837 internationals? What about the Memorandum of Understanding now being demanded from NGOs by the government of Sri Lanka, which requires them to provide "all information" to the government?

We could go on and on. But Ban Ki-moon could start with these. But will he start at all? Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may5srilanka052209.html

Headed to Sri Lanka, UN's Ban Hungry for Visions, Nambiar's and Pascoe's Helping Hands

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may4srilanka052209.html

UN PLANE, BAHRAIN, May 22 – Speeding toward Sri Lanka in the UN's Sudan plane, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon described to the Press his mission as listening to President Mahinda Rajapaksa's “plans and visions.” Asked if he would “meet with the Tamil minority,” Mr. Ban said, “I am discussing with the Sri Lankan government.

"As you know, I am visiting only twenty four hours. I have to spend a lot of time on the road, traveling. Therefore as for detailed programs, [chief of staff Vijay] Nambiar is discussing with the Sri Lankan authorities.” With that, Ban referred the Press to his “very senior advisors” John Holmes and Lynn Pascoe, directors of the UN's humanitarian and political operations respectively.

Holmes, speaking on the record, chided a report who said the UN “hasn't had access for ten days.” He said, “we have had, all the way through, access to the camps.” He said that a few days ago, the government stopped letting the vehicles of the UN as well as non-governmental organizations go into the camps.

Is access on foot the “unimpeded” access that Ban says is the key “deliverable” he expects from this whirlwind trip? Well, said one wag, the meme “ped,” meaning foot, is in the word “unimpeded.”

Inner City Press asked Holmes what the UN has done in light of the expose on UK Channel 4 in which people detained in the government camps spoke of women being disappeared and then their bodies dumped. “We don't have hard evidence of that,” Holmes said, adding wisely that it doesn't mean it isn't true. He said that disappearances are not as much of a problem as they were before.

Holmes said that there are no more civilians in what was the conflict zone. Lynn Pascoe jumped in and specified that this UN position is based on the visual observation of Vijay Nambiar, who was taken by the government on a fly-over of the conflict zone. Then Holmes qualified that no large groups of civilians remain. He might have added: over-ground.

Inner City Press asked if the UN would provide aid to Sri Lanka without conditions. Holmes first said that “the political situations has to be right,” and the camps in compliance with international law. Then he spoke of raising more money from donors. It was, inevitably, a mixed message. Or as several close Sri Lanka observers have told Inner City Press, the Rajapaksas know that the UN will never stop funding, will never stand up, and so they ignore what the UN says.

The government has confirmed that it has arrested doctors who stayed in the conflict zone offering treatment and casualty figures. Inner City Press asked Holmes if Ban would raise the issue of these arrests to President Rajapaksa. I'm sure he will, Holmes said. We'll see. Ban told the Press that, in the run-up to the trip, he spoke with Golden Brown, Hillary Clinton and Bernard Kouchner. None now seems able to block or even delay the $1.9 billion loan the International Monetary Fund wants to give to Sri Lanka. So why should the Rajapaksa's listen?

As Holmes and Pascoe left, going back up to the first class section in front of the UN plane behind the Velcro-ed curtain, Inner City Press asked Pascoe for the UN's view of the Sri Lankan Constitution's 13th Amendment. It was enacted in 1987 as part of the Indo-Lankan Accords, and provides for some devolution of powers to local, Tamil areas.

A senior Ban adviser, not present on the trip, told Inner City Press that while Amendment 13 “does not go far enough,” the Rajapaksa are thinking of going back on it. Inner City Press asked Pascoe to comment on this and Pascoe agreed that some say Amendment 13 doesn't go far enough. But are the Rajapaksa's trying to back away even from it? Are these the “plans and visions” that Ban has come to listen to? Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may4srilanka052209.html

In Sri Lanka, UN Staff Languish in Jail, Abused, While UN Stays Silent

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may3srilanka052209.html

FRANKFURT, May 22 – The UN's silence about the Sri Lankan government's abuse of UN staff continues still, even as Secretary General Ban Ki-moon prepares for a whirlwind visit to the country. Last month Inner City Press in reporting on the UN's silence about its staff being interred in camps mentioned an even worse case, of a UNHCR protection officer whose mother inadvertently rented a room in Vavuniya to an alleged LTTE supporter.

The mother was jailed, as was her entirely uninvolved UN staffer son. The mother died in jail and the son remains imprisoned.

Inner City Press has asked UNHCR's country representative Amin Awar to comment on the case, on what UNHCR has done. There has been no response.

The staffer's name is Mr. Ragushankar Kulathaivelu. He and his mother were arrested on October 5, 2008. From where he worked for UNHCR, in Mannar, he was visiting his mother in Vavuniya, when the authorities came to arrest his mother for renting a room to an alleged LTTE supporter, who had identified himself as a student.

The mother died in December, in jail. Ragushankar Kulathaivelu nevertheless remains in prison in Anuradhapura. Reportedly, even after the wipe out of the conflict zone, conditions for such prisoners have grown worse, with verbal and other abuse.

This is a UN system staff member, arrested along with his mother for no reason, and still in custody. UNHCR's country representative has said nothing publicly about it, and has not responded to written questions on the matter. Will Ban Ki-moon raise this and similar cases, how ever belatedly? Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may3srilanka052209.html

In Sri Lanka, NGOs Asked for All Information, Frustrated with UN's Quiet Diplomacy

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may2srilanka052209.html

FRANKFURT, May 22 – In the last of the UN Security Council's closed door basement meetings on Sri Lanka, the UN's top humanitarian John Holmes told Council members about a proposed Memorandum of Understanding the Rajapaksa Administration wants non-governmental organizations to sign. When Inner City Press asked Holmes to explain on camera the problems with the agreement, he declined.

NGOs contacted Inner City Press and complained that they were ill-positioned in Sri Lanka to stand up for changes to the proposed MOU. They expected the UN, specifically Holmes' OCHA, to do so. It has yet to happen.

Inner City Press has obtained a copy of the Memorandum of Understanding and is putting it online, here. Among other things, it would require NGOs to allow the government access to all information, as summarized by a senior UN official who spoke to the press on condition he not be named. Why isn't the UN fighting this precedent?

And see, www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may2srilanka052209.html

Risk of UN's Ban Being Manipulated by Sri Lanka Admitted by UN Official

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may1srilanka052209.html

FRANKFURT, May 22 – In the wake of weeks of killing in northern Sri Lanka, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and senior UN officials are headed to the island. On the first leg of the trip, a commercial flight from New York to Frankfurt to meet up with Ban and his UN plane, a senior UN official spoke to the Press on background. He acknowledged that Ban must avoid “being manipulated or part of triumphalism... by what he says, by how he behaves.” That, then, will be among the tests of the whirlwind visit.

The official, who requested anonymity apparently to not outshine Ban, initially said the the internally displaced people are being cared for reasonably well. When Pressed, he acknowledged that not only non-governmental organizations but also the UN are now barred from entering the IDP camps with vehicles. “Manik Farms is large, you can't just walk around it,” he said, adding that he hopes this access problem is solved “before we get there,” or during Ban's visit. Thus, another test.

Inner City Press asked if the UN has paid for the camps it is now barred from. Yes, the official acknowledged, the UN has paid for much of it, “that's why we need unfettered access.” Inner City Press asked if the official was aware of any other situation in which the UN was constructively barred from camps that it had paid for. “Not off hand,” the official said, “but I'm not an expert.”

The UN official mused about how Tamils should feel like equal citizens so things don't revert “to guerrilla war, a danger that's obvious to everyone.” Because he wanted to not be named, other relevant questions that would have identified him would not be asked. Yet. Watch this space.

Footnote / full disclosure: this reporter has been granted a visa, albeit for only two days, gratis by the Sri Lankan mission. A request for more than two days resulted in instructions to write a letter, which will be considered by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs “after a background check.” Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/untrip1may1srilanka052209.html

UN Says Porno Is Behind It, Dodges on No Bid Lockheed Contract, Valium

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/dm1kane052109.html

JFK Airport, May 21, updated May 26 – The range of questionable management practices at the UN were on display Thursday, as Department of Management chief Angela Kane belated came to field questions from the Press. Inner City Press asked her around millions of dollars the UN mis-payed to military contractor Lockheed Martin in Darfur, about a pornography scandal that continues to reverberate in the UN, and about her Department's retaliation against staff member they quick provided information about unlicensed distribution of Valium and controlled substances by the UN Medical Service.

On the pornography scandal, she claimed that all of those implicated have been disciplined, noting that five views are different than five hundred. This was just after she was asked about the Wall Street Journal's expose of the UN's mishandling of sexual harassment cases.

Two of these three questions, Ms. Kane referred to others. On the report that the UN paid $4.3 to Lockheed's PA&E subsidiary for construction services, at a time no construction took place, she said to “ask Susana Malcorra,” the head of the Department of Field Services. She said that the Secretariat disagrees with the findings of the UN's own Office of Internal Oversight Services.

Then, she said to ask the head of OIOS, Inga Britt Ahlenius, about a non-public report she says cleared the Medical Service of wrongdoing. Ahlenius hasn't answered Press questions for months, and Kane could not commit to making the report purportedly clearing the “doctors” public, despite chiding the Press for not reporting on it. (Kane is known to be asking the Office of Legal Affairs to make publications print the UN's position, even if based on reports the UN withholds.)

She said of course US licenses are required by those in the Medical Service, and some countries only require a single lifetime license, never renewed. She denied that US authorities are looking into the matter. We'll see.

Update: On May 26, Inner City Press received the following

From: unspokesperson-donotreply@un.org
To: matthew.lee@innercitypress.com
Sent: 5/26/2009 1:45:29 P.M. Eastern Standard Time

In response to your recent news story on the Medical Service, we are transmitting the following information provided by OIOS:

In response to media reports claiming that ga group of largely unlicensed doctors and nurses are dispensing and in some cases taking and self-medicating with Valium, Diazepam, Demerol, Ambien and other controlled narcoticsh at the UN, the Office for Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) informed us that the facts need to be correctly stated.

The Office informed us that a complainant had reported to OIOS about possible abuse in the management and dispensation of controlled substances in the Medical Services Division (MSD) of the United Nations. OIOS immediately assigned two investigators to conduct preliminary inquiries into this report.

Based upon the information obtained, OIOS confirmed that the Medical Services Division does have a process in place to ensure safe custody and dispensation of controlled substances.

OIOS concluded its preliminary inquiries and determined that the complainant's claims about the abuse of the dispensation of controlled substances in the MSD could not be verified. It adds that a fully conclusive verification can only be obtained upon a full investigation. This would require review of confidential medical records, to which OIOS does not have access.

Is this what the UN means by exonerated -- that it creates "rules" that preclude its supposedly independent investigative unit from verifying a whistleblower's allegations which are backed up by photographic and other evidence?

And see, www.innercitypress.com/dm1kane052109.html

On Sri Lanka, IMF Said Ready to Lend, Dodges Ethnic Cleansing, Where Are Obama, UK?

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/imf4srilanka052109.html

UNITED NATIONS, May 20 – With the Red Cross blocked from access in Sri Lanka to the wounded and dying, with NGOs increasingly barred from the UN-financed camps for IDPs, in Washington the International Monetary Fund said Thursday that it looks forward to presenting for approval to its Board Sri Lanka's request for a $1.9 billion loan.

The statement was made by the IMF's director of external relations Caroline Atkinson. Inner City Press online asked a follow-up during the Fund's biweekly press briefing, which Ms. Atkinson re-stated: please state whether as the Sri Lankan government says the proceeds of any IMF loan would support re-housing in the north, which some would described as ethnic cleansing?

The IMF's Ms. Atkinson responded, “Perhaps it's just helpful to clarify that when the IMF lends, it is not for specific projects. We lend to support a country's finances. We make a loan to the Central Bank to support reserves. Any other question?”

On March 12, Inner City Press went to the IMF in Washington and asked Ms. Atkinson's colleague David Hawley what safeguards were being considered to ensure that the proceeds of any IMF loan to Sri Lanka wouldn't be enable war or ethnic relocation. Mr. Hawley said that things were at an early stage. Later, French Ambassador to the UN Jean-Maurice Ripert told Inner City Press that “the Americans are trying to play with the loan.”

The U.S. subsequently confirmed this, receiving human rights credit for raising the issue. The UK has as well. After a contrary statement by the UK Ambassador to the UN, in response to Inner City Press' question at the UN Security Council stakeout, UK Foreign Minister David Miliband said he didn't think conditions for an IMF loan to Sri Lanka were right. Are they now?

Now, after two weeks ago refusing to take the question at their briefing, the IMF says that while there is still no access to the killing zone in the North, while doctors who reported on the war as well as offering treatment are detained and interrogated, it wants to present the loan for approval by its Board within weeks.

What happened, some ask, to the ostensibly US and UK opposition? At the US State Department this week, the Obama Administration appeared to waiver or move on from it previous position, both on the loan and as stated by the President following Time magazine's diagnosis that Barack Obama was failing the Sri Lanka test.

The IMF's implicit argument that it is not supporting what a government does on the ground by lending to its Central Bank is specious. In fact, many experts on Sri Lanka note that the government's military offensive in the North was assisted not only by aid after the tsunami, but even more by the proceeds, to the Central Bank, of debt forgiveness. Now during the current crisis the IMF wants to make a loan to the Sri Lankan Central Bank. Ms. Atkinson alluded to, but did not give an explanation as requested by Inner City Press, of a “larger facility” being discussed.

Victor's justice, victor's loans, some call it, as they call the UN's Ban Ki-moon's impending visit to Sri Lanka a sort of victory tour. Inner City Press leaves today on the UN trip. Watch this site.

In Geneva on Monday, the UN Human Rights Council has scheduled a session on Sri Lanka. There is talk of satellite photos being used, to show deep mortar craters in the “No Fire” Zone. There are stories of senior LTTE leaders trying to surrender, carrying white flags, shot to death.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/imf4srilanka052109.html

UN Ignores War Criminal, Mulls Disclosing Sex Abuse Outcomes, Tries Replacing Fijians

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/dpko1leroy052009.html

UNITED NATIONS, May 20 – Despite written evidence that indicted war criminal Jean-Bosco Ntaganda serves as Deputy Coordinator of the Congolese Army's operation Kimia II in the Kivus, chief UN peacekeeper Alain Le Roy on Wednesday said he hasn't seen this evidence, while acknowledging that Bosco is “in the area.” Inner City Press, which on May 11 sent the evidence to Alan Doss, the head of the UN's Mission in the Congo (MONUC), later on May 20 sent it to Mr. Le Roy and his spokesmen, asking on deadline for a response on this, if Nepali APCs finally reached Darfur, and about Irish soldiers serving the UN in Chad. As of midnight, none had been received.

Le Roy acknowledged that there are in the Congolese Army, which with MONUC works, “some elements behave in a very terrible way.” What does the UN do? It raises to issue to the government in Kinshasa, led by Joseph Kabila. So far without effect, it must be said.

Similarly, when asked by Inner City Press if he will made public what Troop Contributing Countries actually do with peacekeepers sent home charged with sexual abuse, Le Roy said that his unit, DPKO, doesn't get enough information, but that he'll push for more. Will the information be made public? “I will discuss it with the home countries,” Le Roy said. “I think it is a good idea.” We'll see. Video here from Minute 13:05.

Le Roy argued that the number of complaints of sexual abuse and exploitation by peacekeepers has decreased from 357 in 2006 to 83 in 2008. But as pointed out by Colum Lynch of the Washington Post, soon to close its UN bureau, the UN's numbers are cooked because in 2006 it counted individuals, while in 2007 and 2008 it counted incidents. Is the decrease due to gang rapes? Le Roy promised a more substantial study, of which Inner City Press has requested a copy.

Inner City Press asked about the follow-through on then Secretary General (and former DPKO chief) Kofi Annan's 2006 pledge to not use Fijian peacekeepers unless democracy was restored there. Le Roy said that the Fijians are needed in Iraq. Inner City Press asked, are you trying to replace them? Yes, Le Roy said, but so far there are no pledges. Video here, from Minute 40.

In Nigeria 27 soldiers who served as UN peacekeepers were not paid, mutinied and have been given life sentences. Inner City Press asked Le Roy what he does to make sure peacekeepers get paid. I am going to Nigeria, Le Roy said, adding that troop contributing counties are sovereign and are free to pay or not pay to soldiers the money the UN gives them. But does the UN have to keep paying countries like Fiji, or now, Nigeria? Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/dpko1leroy052009.html

On Sri Lanka, of Human Rights, Victors and Doctors Still Detained, Ban to the Zone

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un3may8srilanka052009.html

UNITED NATIONS, May 20 – In Sri Lanka, access to the interment camps has been further reduced, the conflict zone still unvisited, doctors who worked there still detained. The day before the UN's Secretary General Ban Ki-moon gets on a series of plane with the Press to Colombo, his Deputy Spokesperson acknowledged the reports of the doctors' detentions, and that she had no update on the Red Cross getting access.

Inner City Press asked, to be sure, that Ban will be going to what was called the conflict zone. “He said he expected to go to the conflict zone,” she answered. Video here, from Minute 56:03.

With this understanding, the circus will leave the UN's host country on Thursday afternoon. Early Friday morning, a UN plane will continue on from Frankfurt. It will arrive, near midnight, in Colombo. The following day, Saturday, Ban and the Press will apparently be whisked north in government helicopters, to IDP camps in Vavuniya, and then expectedly to the conflict zone. Who is still alive there? What has been done to clear or cover up?

Wednesday in the UN, the main political adviser of a Security Council Permanent Member which supports Colombo's moves told Inner City Press, “Why are you going? The government has already won.”

When Inner City Press countered that the UN should be concerned about hundreds of thousands of IDP, now being denied basic aid, he replied that of course the government must screen for the LTTE. But are the NGOs whose vehicles are now barred from the camps accused of being LTTE? To this, he had no answer.

Nor did the spokesman for the President of the UN General Assembly answer, when Inner City Press asked for a read-out of his meeting Wednesday morning with India's new Abmbasssador to the UN. It seemed fair to ask what they dicussed, for example Sri Lanka. But the PGA's spokesman said, we don't provide read-outs of such meetings. Video here, from Minute 58:35.

In Geneva on Monday, the UN Human Rights Council has scheduled a session on Sri Lanka. There is talk of satellite photos being used, to show deep mortar craters in the “No Fire” Zone. There are stories of senior LTTE leaders trying to surrender, carrying white flags, shot to death.

The government's assumption, sources say, is that any civilians that remained last weekend in the conflict zone were “Tiger through and through,” and hence the action and blocked access. An evidentiary hearing or investigation would get to the bottom of these points. But where would one be possible? Colombo in Colombo, we'll call it, referring to the rumbled detective show in re-runs on American television. Watch this site.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un3may8srilanka052009.html

UN Ambassador On Lack of Venezuela Freedom, Russell Simmons On Slavery, Yes UN Passport

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un1defven052009.html

UNITED NATIONS, May 20 – On a day at the UN when the slaughter in Sri Lanka was discussed, and the impending re-imprisonment of Aung San Suu Kyi in Myanmar, two celebrities spoke at the UN and were, some thought, a study in contrasts. Venezuelan actress Patricia Velasquez, who is already an Ambassador for UNESCO, was given a “Women Together” award for her work with indigenous people. Inner City Press asked her, as UNESCO Ambassador, if she thinks the Organization does enough about press freedom in Latin America, particularly in Venezuela. Video here, from Minute 16:57.

She replied that Venezuela right now has many problems and discussions about freedom of the press, but that to wait for a bureaucracy to act was not the right approach, both journalists and civil society should say, “This cannot be.” That is, she did not duck the question.

Russell Simmons appeared, newly named a UN Ambassador on issues surrounding the trans Atlantic slave trade. With him with the Permanent Representative of Jamaica, Raymond Wolfe. Inner City Press asked Simmons to describe what he would do as Ambassador, and would he get a UN passport? Simmons and his entourage laughed; Simmons said, “I already have a passport.” Video here, from Minute 1:09.

Jamaica's Ambassador Wolfe then came to the microphone, arguing that Simmons' appointment has nothing to do with getting a UN passport. Simmons whispered, “No passport?” Wolfe answered, “It comes, later.” Video here, from Minute 2:39.

Since Simmons made reference to modern day slavery and other “atrocities committed today,” Inner City Press asked him to given an example of the former, and on the later something about Sri Lanka. “I won't want to muddy the waters,” Simmons said rather than answer. “Today is about the slave trade.”

Simmons then retired to the Indonesian Lounge to shake the hands of waiting Ambassadors. Meanwhile the Ambassador of Indonesia sat, serious faced, in the hallways talking on his cell phone. It emerges that there is a draft Presidential Statement for the Security Council about Aung San Suu Kyi, for now “deploring” the government's trail of her, which the UN Country Representative is now allowed to attend (but apparently not speak publicly about).

She is charged with violating the terms of her house arrest for allowing an American swimmer to stay in her compound. Since the timing helps the government, led by General Than Shwe, Inner City Press is calling ASSK's uninvited guest “Than Schwim.” The prediction is that it will be watered down to the ASEAN position, “gravely concerned.” Only at the UN.

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un1defven052009.html

In Sri Lanka, UN's Ban Says He'll Visit Conflict Zone, Doctors Still in Custody

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un3may7srilanka051909.html

UNITED NATIONS, May 19, updated – Sri Lanka's conflict zone, off limits to aid workers and journalists as civilians were being killed, will be visited by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and the accompanying Press on May 23, it was announced on Tuesday. Speaking in Geneva, Mr. Ban told reporters that “I expect that I will be able to visit the conflict zone, which the Sri Lankan Government officials told me had been liberated. I would like to have my first hand, on the spot, assessment of the situation myself. I am going to discuss this matter with President Rajapaksa.”

His schedule, released later, confirmed “SG meeting with Sri Lankan President, visit to IDP camps in Vavuniya, visit to conflict zone.” Some wonder, what is happening to the bodies, and the wounded, there?

The issue of the doctors from the conflict zone, whom the government now acknowledges detaining, has been raised by the UN's outgoing spokesman in Colombo, Gordon Weiss (whose visa will not be renewed, the government has said), but apparently not by anyone higher in the UN, and has not been resolved.

Local sources first told Inner City Press that Doctor Thangamuttu Sathiyamoorthy, who we quoted on May 15, may be detained in an Army camp in Vavuniya, on information and belief known as “Joseph.” Later, they say, he was transferred to Colombo, and may face criminal charges.

Also detained are Doctors Thurairajah Varatharajah and V Shanmugarajah. It was said that the International Committee of the Red Cross may be able to visit them on Wednesday -- until declared a national holiday -- and their families on Friday. There is worry that even if they are released, they might be abducted by para-militaries. There is a desire that the UN or ICRC guarantee or at least work for their safety.

Footnote / full disclosure: this reporter has been granted a visa, albeit for only two days, gratis by the Sri Lankan mission. A request for more than two days resulted in instructions to write a letter, which will be considered by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs “after a background check.” Watch this site.

see, a May 13 Inner City Press debate on Sri Lanka, here

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un3may7srilanka051909.html