For years, the United Nations seems to have been embroiled in an endless string of scandals and cover-ups, and yet rarely, if ever, has anyone ever actually been held to account. This has led a number of pundits to accuse the institution of being ‘above the law’ and riddled with institutional corruption.
This latest story only reaffirms these accusations…
Independent journalist Matthew Russell Lee (photo, left) founded Bronx-based Inner City Press in 2005 and received official press accreditation to cover the United Nations in New York City. He was the first-ever independent, non-affiliated blogger to be given access to the UN’s inner sanctum. Since then Inner City Press has broken stories on a number of controversial stories: peacekeeper rapes in Africa, UN cholera in Haiti, war crimes in Sri Lanka and Burundi, the Sudans, SEMG and Yemen (see a leaked letter here), as well as corruption within UN Headquarters (cocaine shipments through its mail room and the current bribery scandals).
Apparently, it was all too much for diplomatic luminaries at the UN. Last month, Lee was forcibly ejected from the UN headquarters.
The DC-based Government Accountability Project, which defends UN and other whistleblowers, believes that the ouster of Inner City Press from the UN’s press office is ‘retaliatory in response to independent, critical journalism.’
This post was published at 21st Century Wire on MARCH 6, 2016.
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