Tuesday, July 31, 2012

UNDP sets record straight on WIPO transaction - Fox News updates its story

UNDP Version on For-The-Record

27 July 2012
Click here to read this on For-the-record

UNDP has not ``financed’’ the shipment of computers to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea or Iran on behalf of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), as has been erroneously reported in a few media outlets recently.  As a service, UNDP occasionally makes payments on behalf of other UN agencies.

In November 2011, WIPO requested UNDP China to place an order to a computer supplier and to make a payment on its behalf. This transaction was blocked by the US Office of Foreign Assets Control due to possible concerns over sanctions. UNDP refunded the money to WIPO and has had no further involvement in this matter. 
 

Fox News Update

UPDATE: A day after this story was published, the United Nations Development Program contacted Fox News to  declare that  the computer shipments to North Korea were not “financed through the Beijing offices of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP),” as the story stated. UNDP noted, correctly,  that “this transaction was blocked by the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control due to possible concerns over sanctions”—as also noted in Fox News’ original story on the affair.

In fact, as a document attached to that April 3, 2012, story shows, in addition to attempting to finance the transaction, UNDP was responsible for shipping the controversial computers to Pyongyang from the U.N.’s Beijing offices, a procedure which Fox News noted was “apparently designed to bypass safeguards specifically created by U.N. authorities to prevent a repeat of previous U.N. scandals involving shipments to North Korea.”

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/07/26/legal-proliferation-experts-charge-un-high-tech-shipment-to-north-korea/#ixzz229ALUncH
 

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