UNITED NATIONS — Were those Ukrainians killed by snipers in Kiev last month victims of then-President Viktor Yanukovych? Hopes of finding an answer to this question were complicated today when leaked audio of a 10-minute conversation between the European Union's High Representative for Foreign Affairs Catherine Ashton and Estonian Foreign Minister Urmas Paet was put on YouTube.
In the conversation, Paet recounts that while in Kiev he was told by prospective new Health Minister Olga Bogomolets that "all evidence shows the people [were] killed by snipers, among police and people from the streets, that they were the same snipers killing people from both sides."
(Bogomolets, described as the "Mother Theresa of the Maidan," also appeared on BBC.)
In the audio, the EU's Ashton claimed, "We do want to investigate."
See also: 9 Essential Questions About Ukraine, Answered
So what do the UN's Deputy Secretary General Jan Eliasson, UN envoy Robert Serry who was forced out of Crimea today after threats, and UN human rights official Ivan Simonovic, all have to say about this? Will Simonovic, dispatched to Ukraine by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, actually investigate who was calling the snipers' shots?
Ban Ki-moon's outgoing spokesperson Martin Nesirky said the details of Mr. Simonovic’s planned mission were still being worked out. "But," he added, "the remit is to look into a broad range of allegations and to simply take stock, to try to understand across the entire spectrum, from the west of the country to the east of the country and to the southeast. So, this is going to be a broad-ranging mission. I would not say it is an investigation. It’s a fact-finding mission."
Simonovic is the New York representative of outgoing UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, and is widely viewed as campaigning to take over Pillay's post. Could this fact finding mission to Ukraine be Simonovic's try out, to see if he can deliver the report the majority of UN Security Council members want? Might absolving Yanukovych of the snipers hurt Simonovic's chances of promotion?
When Mashable on Wednesday asked Nesirky if Simonovic will investigate these claims, Nesirky insisted that the UN does not comment on leaked audio. "There is no reference to the United Nations in what you have mentioned, and so that’s the reason I am not going to comment on it. But, where there are allegations made within Kiev, when Mr. Simonovic arrives there, I am sure that this is something that would be part of what he is looking at," he said.
But the UN did comment on a previously leaked conversation, also about Ukraine, in which US Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland bragged how former U.S. now UN official Jeffrey Feltman "got" UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to send envoy Robert Serry to Ukraine.
If only to deny that Ban's UN is dominated by the U.S., the UN commented and claimed it was unclear if the "Jeff" referred to by Nuland was in fact Jeff Feltman, or US Ambassador to Ukraine Geoff Pyatt, or even some other Jeff. The strange case of the two — or three — Jeffs was left unresolved.
But isn't who killed whom a key human rights question of the type the UN should investigate, if it investigates anything at all?
Estonia, for its part, is investigating how the conversation was intercepted and put on YouTube — a technology and cyber-security question. While US Secretary of State John Kerry accuses Russia of reviving or retreating into the Cold War in Ukraine, and State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki has called the leaks "a new low in Russian tradecraft," the speed and venue of leaks has been decidedly 21st century.
A key question going forward is whether this near real-time audio leaks will spread beyond Ukraine to other conflicts, from Syria or the Middle East Peace Process to Congo, Mali and the Central African Republic. The rhetoric may be old — but the technology and tactics are new.
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