UN finally says it paid for Albanese’s anti-Israel lobbying trip
After months of refusing to state publicly who paid for an anti-Israel United Nations official’s politically-centred visit to Australia and New Zealand, the U.N. Human Rights Office told JNS on Friday that the global body paid for the trip in November.
Francesca Albanese, U.N. special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, speaks at the National Press Club of Australia on Nov. 13, 2023. Source: YouTube/ABC News (Australia)
Francesca Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur for Palestinian rights, has become the focus of an internal U.N. investigation into allegations launched by U.N. Watch, a watchdog that alleges that pro-Hamas lobbying groups funded the trip.
The Australian Friends of Palestine Association claimed publicly that it had “sponsored” Albanese’s visit, and Free Palestine Melbourne, the Australian Palestinian Advocacy Network and Palestinian Christians in Australia stated that they “supported” the trip. All four are lobbying groups.
During the visit to Australia, Albanese participated in media and fundraising events, as well as meetings with pro-Palestinian politicians and civil society members.
A connected trip to New Zealand included what U.N. Watch calls a meeting “to lobby a major New Zealand sovereign wealth fund to divest from Israel-related companies.”
JNS sought a copy from the United Nations of its payment for Albanese’s travel and correspondence between her office and the global body that would confirm the timeline of when the United Nations agreed to pay for the travel.
Albanese’s special rapporteur position is a volunteer role that is technically independent of the United Nations. The global body pays her expenses out of a designated budget.
Her trips to Australia and New Zealand did not appear in the mandated U.N. special procedures annual report. The U.N. Human Rights Office told JNS that the trip was not included, because “it was not a designated ‘country visit’ per se.”
“Only official country visits aimed at assessing the human-rights situation in that country itself, and that are followed by a country visit report to the Human Rights Council, are included in this list,” it added.
JNS asked how the U.N. Human Rights Office, which has said it is in a dire financial state, justified spending an estimated $22,000 for Albanese’s politically-motivated trip.
Stephane Dujarric, a spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, told JNS that the work of special rapporteurs is outside Guterres’s purview.
“He does not appoint them. He has no authority over them,” Dujarric told JNS on Friday. “It is part of a mechanism, of a human rights mechanism.”
“They have access to a budget through Geneva. It is not for me to condone whatever the special rapporteurs do or say,” Dujarric added.
