The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mrs Mary Robinson, has said that it was the Chinese authorities, and not her office, who blocked access this week to Tibet to The Irish Times Asia Correspondent, Mr Conor O'Clery.
In a letter yesterday to The Irish Times, Mrs Robinson said that in the planning of her official visit to China much effort had gone into "seeking to include all journalists who wished to come, and particularly for the visit to Tibet".
The letter added, "I was not aware until today (Wednesday) that our efforts to secure a pool of journalists had failed and that the Chinese authorities had withdrawn the permission relating to Conor O'Clery. Needless to say I was deeply disappointed at the outcome".
Mrs Robinson said there was never any "veto" by her office on Mr O'Clery's coverage of her visit to Tibet. The letter added: "As UN High Commissioner for Human Rights I believed it was fundamentally important to seek to have a pool of journalists, including of course Conor O'Clery, rather than only Irish TV and an Irish journalist accompanying me on the official visit." The full text of Mrs Robinson's letter is published on page 17.
The editor of The Irish Times, Mr Conor Brady, responding to Mrs Robinson's statement said: "This is just playing with words. The Chinese have been very clear about this. They were happy to have Conor O'Clery travel to Tibet and cleared him to go on September 2nd. On September 4th they called him to say he couldn't go as a result of what they had been told from the High Commissioner's office in Geneva.
"Mrs Robinson says she only became aware yesterday (Wednesday) that there would not be a pool of reporters for the Tibet visit and that the Chinese had withdrawn the permission relating to Conor O'Clery. These are extraordinary statements. At no time was there any understanding that there would be a pool. The Chinese made that clear from the beginning, as I understand it. Conor O'Clery himself met Mrs Robinson on Monday at the Irish Embassy in Beijing and they spoke about the fact that his permission had been withdrawn".
Mr O'Clery said Mrs Robinson said she had lobbied to have a pool of reporters accompany her. "That is good news, but why block The Irish Times from travelling when that proved impossible? This is the mystery. If Mrs Robinson wanted as many reporters as possible to travel, then surely she should have asked for more to be added to the small pool of two Irish journalists, who had been given permission, rather than by dropping one?"
Yesterday Mr Peter Goff of the World Press Institute in Vienna said that Mrs Robinson had made an error of judgement. "The message that she now emits to this authoritarian regime is that those in power may control how and where they are portrayed in the media. To open oneself up to this possible interpretation is wrong, particularly in a country where the fundamental principles of freedom of the press and freedom of expression are flagrantly disregarded," he said.
The general secretary of the International Federation of Journalists in Brussels, Mr Aidan White, said: "It is bizarre that the UN's leading campaigner for human rights should have a hand in blocking a distinguished journalist from accessing a region which has been shrouded in secrecy and where abuse of human rights has been routine."
"This bizarre mix-up shows what happens when UN sensibilities get in the way of the struggle for human rights and press freedom. A golden opportunity for an extra dimension to press coverage of this historic visit has been missed," he said.
The editor of Index On Censorship, the London based journal on freedom of expression, Ms Judith Vidal-Hall, said it was important at this time that journalists have as much access as possible to Tibet. The message about human rights abuses had to be got out.
