UNITED NATIONS: U.N. Diplomats Viewed as Potential Terrorists

By Thalif Deen Reprint | | Print |

Thalif Deen

UNITED NATIONS, Dec 5 1996 (IPS) - The Cold War may be over, but the United States still views U.N. diplomats as potential spies and terrorists, Russia and other countries complain.

“The situation is quite funny, because as long as you’re a businessman, a tourist, or even a public worker, you pose no threat to U.S. security and can, therefore, move in its territory rather freely,” says Ambassador Sergey Lavrov of Russia.

But as a staff member of a U.N. mission, or a family member, “one becomes a potential spy or terrorist,” he told U.N. delegates this week.

During the 1960s and 1970s at the height of the Cold War, the United Nations was a virtual battleground where Moscow and Washington spied on each other.

A U.S. Congressional Committee investigating the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the 1970s revealed that the CIA had planted one of its lip-reading experts in a press booth overlooking the Security Council chamber to monitor the whisperings of the Russians during the emotionally charged Cold War debates.

In April 1978, U.N. Under-Secretary-General Arkady Shevchenko of the then Soviet Union had the dubious honour of being the highest ranking U.N. official from the Soviet Union to defect to the United States. Shevchenko, who was head of the United Nations’ Political and Security Council Affairs, was accused of being a double agent, working for U.S. intelligence while spying for the Soviets.

Currently, Washington not only restricts the movements of U.N. diplomats of so-called “terrorist states” such as Cuba, North Korea, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, and Iran, but it also limits the movements of officials from Russia and China — permanent members of the Security Council.

Lavrov criticised Washington for continuing the restrictions.

“Such discriminatory measures contradict basic international legal instruments,” he pointed out. “Over the years, all questions about that discriminatory approach have been met with the same response — that it was a matter of the host country’s national security.”

In April last year, Washington demanded that the Second Secretary in the Sudanese Mission leave the United States within 48 hours, alleging that he had engaged in terrorist and espionage activities.

In a letter to the United Nations, Sudan said that “the said action by the U.S. is arbitrary and groundless and constitutes a flagrant violation by the U.S. of its obligations it undertook, as the host country of the U.N. headquarters, to ensure the necessary conditions for the normal functioning of the U.N. and the unhampered participation of its work by member-states.”

In its reply, Washington said it had evidence that two diplomats from the Sudanese Mission were involved in a plot to bomb the United Nations and to assassinate Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

That evidence, the letter said, indicated that they provided information on President Mubarak’s itinerary and were to provide information and access to the United Nations in connection with the plot to bomb it.

The United States says that as host country, it carries out its responsibilities with respect to the safety of the organisation, its diplomats, and the citizens of the United States. “This country cannot be used as a safe haven or a base for terrorism,” the letter concluded.

The strongest criticism of the host country has come from Cuba whose Mission is the constant target of U.S.-based groups opposed to President Fidel Castro.

Caridad Yamira Cueto Milian of the Cuban delegation said her Mission had on several occasions been the victim of “unfortunate incidents and violations.”

“On many occasions, the physical and moral integrity of (the Mission’s) personnel have been violated,” she said.

Despite Cuba’s complaints, she pointed out, the United Nations had been unable to assume its obligations regarding her country’s mission.

She accused the U.N. Host Country Committee — which is mandated to look after the interests of member-states — of being “a select club where arbitrariness prevailed.”

The United Nations’ Legal Committee adopted a resolution last week, urging the Washington to take all measures necessary to prevent “any interference with the functioning of Missions accredited to the United Nations.”

Speaking on behalf of the U.S. delegation, Carolyn Willson said that travel restrictions had been established on the basis of national security, and that they in no way interfered with diplomats’ actions. “That tight control would change in the light of changing circumstances,” she added.