Olga Cechurova and Paolo Pietrosanti reached Den Haag on December 10th in order to meet the UNPO staff and its leadership.

The UNPO - Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization - is an organization created 6 years ago which represents those nations and peoples not represented in the UN system. The UNPO is not a NGO, given that among its members are Governments in exile.

Even though we would have liked to speak individually to each and everyone of the chiefs of the various UNPO desks, a 10 persons meeting was held, to which took part the staff and the former-current General Secretary Michael van Walt van Praag and the current one Jampa Tsering.

Some of the staff members asked us to expone some general informations about the TRP.

We have then asked to be more informed on how the UNPO operates and lives, and how to deepen our cooperation, above all in the frame of the EP work, and in the perspective of UN Commission for Human Rights in Geneva.

UNPO has obviously thanked us for the help we gave in the occasion of the UN Commission in Geneva.

Our cooperation will be deepened, and the UNPO staff agreed to constantly submit to us their contributions and ideas for our presence and work in the EP and in the UN, regarding the issues of their concern.

The UNPO headquarters is in a small 3 floor building. Michael said that the space they have on disposal is quite small for the 20 persons who work there. Just 6 of them are full time and payed activists. The budget of the UNPO is between 600 and 700,000 USD. Their income comes from EU, and from contributions coming from the communities represented by the organization.

They used to have even an office inside the Geneva UN building, an office rent together with other organizations, but some problem of convivence with those other organizations brough the agreement to an end.

In the EP they have some links, apart from the one to us. Karl von Habsburg is one of them, but they have also other links. Our feeling is that they have avoided to tell us too much about their links in the EP, though it seems that there are just a few. Our impression is also that they have very limited awareness about the EP work and functioning, therefore they were really interested in our explanation of some proceedings in the EP that could be useful for our cooperation (i.e. the Resolutions of Urgency, Questions to the Commission, EU budget amemdments).

Then, we had a close meeting with Michael, with the real brain of the UNPO. Apart from the fact that this man speaks 7 or 8 languages, there is an enormous difference between him and the others.

We have taped an interview to him, that was transcripted and inserted in Agora. And we had a chat.

Michael has said in the interview, and deepened in our chats, that there is no alternative to put on the agenda of the international institutions and forum the adequacy of the state.

Michael said also that there is no channel of communication open between the Dalai Lama and Bejing: No one. About the relationships between TRP and Tibetans he thinks that Ms Koren was badly impressed by our behavior in Geneva: she got convinced that we wanted to exploit the situation and the issue for our own interests. The representative of the Dalai Lama in Paris is probably more open. But what Michal said regarding us and Tibet is that it is a matter of uncomprehension; nothing more. Even individual comprehension. The dialogue, he thinks, is definitely possible.

Samdong is not marginal at all. He represents one of the viewpoints, but his prestige is notable, and it has not been deminished by the bad results of the October's attempt to Sathyagraha.

Michal is absolutely on disposal to cooperate to the TRP. In fact, he is going to leave its engagement in the UNPO. He does not know if totally or partially, and how. But he said that he is more than on disposal to receive proposals of engagements from us.