AIDS_ASIA e FORUM Subcribers,

Gregg Gonsalves's message to Peter Piot on some of the UNAIDS's
staff's apparent role in the selection of civil society member's
Meeting with Koffi Annan raises issues of public accountability and transparency
of UNAIDS staff. The following message is from "Richard Stern"
<rastern@...> [Moderator]
___________________
Dear Peter,

I just want to drop you a note to express my concern about the way
UNAIDS handled the "invitations" to the meeting with the Secretary
General today.

The Treatment Action Campaign had called for this meeting along with
a list of co-signatories on a letter to Mr. Annan's office. Last
night, Bai Bagasao informed us that the Secretary General's office
had made its own list of participants based on "security concerns"
and other factors.

In fact, I suspect that the SG's office has little idea of who is
who in the AIDS community and UNAIDS did this vetting for him. 11
people were selected to go to the meeting today, but only Zackie,
Alice Welbourn and Stu Flavell were on the list that TAC discussed
with UNAIDS/SG. Several women, including Violeta Ross from Bolivia,
Lobna El-Tabei from Egypt, Frika Chia from Indonesia and several
other people from the developing world were dropped from your list
in favor of either Northern NGOs or Southern NGOs who
have not been vigorous actors in the fight for access to treatment.

I fear that UNAIDS wanted to put the "civil" back in civil society
and only have the SG meet with "respectable" and "civil" community
members, not noisy activist leaders from around the world in the
fight for treatment access.

Most disturbingly, there was NO Thai activist on the list for the
meeting with the SG, which is inexcusable (as was the SG's departure
before Paisan Suwannawong's talk last night). In any case, it is
going to be important for the UN agencies including the SG's office
to establish better and more regular communication with activists
on the ground, in-country, not hand-picked representatives who will
shield the SG from the more critical voices out beyond New York and
Geneva.

Gregg
E-mail:<Greggg@...>
_______________

Unfortunately such actions by UNAIDS as described (above) are
probably counterproductive for the image of UNAIDS itself, as I
expressed in my conversation with Luiz Loures in Bangkok , because
these actions give the impression (however incorrect) that the
UNAIDS secretariat does not welcome criticism and also has its
own "hand picked" list of Civil Society leaders, who often seem to
be the same ones as always, which Gregg has expressed very
eloquently below.

(I don't know if the decision to alter the representation of this
meeting with the Secretary General was a decision of Dr. Piot
himself or of other individuals who represent him in the
Secretariat.)

Some of us who were "deselected" by UNAIDS from the meeting might
perhaps have spoken more forcefully about our criticisms and
observations about the implementation of 3 x 5 in relation to WHO
and UNAIDS itself, at least such seemed to be the case in the
meeting we had (in which two UNAIDS staff members were also
present) the evening before the meeting. Which is not to belittle
the efforts of those who finally did attend the meeting, but these
were not the same people who had been initially selected.

As an additional point, I would like to personally suggest that
UNAIDS make public those individuals, networks and organizations in
Civil Society that it financially supports and with how much
money. This information should be public and is of interest to
Civil Society in general. This is not to say that such support
should be questioned, its just that Civil Society, however one
defines it, has a right to know this.

In any case, Gregg's letter speaks for itself.

Sincerely,
Richard Stern
E-mail: <rastern@...>