Iran, Voice of the UN’s ‘Committee on Information’

by Claudia Rosett:

It’s quite perverse enough that the United Nations would have a so-called Committee on Information whose members include such censorship-loving regimes as those of Belarus, China, Cuba, North Korea, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, Zimbabwe and Syria.

That alone would suggest it’s time to disband this committee, which is charged with steering UN “public information policies and activities” – a task that according to the committee’s web site includes being “responsible for overseeing the work of the Department of Public Information and for providing it guidance on policies, programmes and activities of the Department.” The question is not only what kind of policy guidance such despotisms as North Korea, Syria or China might contribute to UN information programs and activities. The further question for the UN is what kind of insane farce of an “information” committee would stoop to dignify the likes of the governments of North Korea, Syria, China, or the rest of this caboodle of despotisms, with membership?

But then comes the cherry on top of this particular UN confection, the icing on this slice of multilateral cake. The current rapporteur chosen by this UN Committee on Information is none other than Iran.
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Here it is folks, the web site for the committee, listing the officers for 2011-2012, including, as “rapporteur,” Mohammad Reza Sahraei, of Iran’s Mission to the UN in New York. Yes, this is the same Iranian tyranny that jails and murders its own people for speaking out in dissent.

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