THE WHISTLEBLOWERS: INSIDE THE UN
BBC Two, 9pm
Recent years have seen the exposure of scandals at institutions from Amnesty International to Oxfam, where admirable goals have been used as cover for gross malpractice. Ben Steele’s superb and shocking This World documentary reveals a litany of abuse, widespread corruption and malpractice at the biggest and most symbolic multinational of them all, the United Nations. Almost a dozen dauntless whistleblowers assemble to
deliver their devastating critique of systemic failures ignored at the highest levels. We begin by hearing of how the identities of Uighur activists were passed over to the Chinese authorities, of kickbacks in Kosovo and Russia, pollution from a UN camp in Haiti which led to a cholera outbreak, and appalling, seemingly irrefutable evidence of widespread sexual abuse and harassment both within and linked to the UN itself.
At least as bad as the allegations themselves are accounts of, at best, wilful cowardice (or ignorance), and at worst persecution and punishment of those calling out rule-breaking. The damning postscript suggests that no lessons are being learnt, the exploitation of diplomatic immunity continues and the most vulnerable continue to be let down by those who are supposed to champion their causes.