The Rosett Report » How Many Countries in the UN? State Gets It Alarmingly Wrong
By Claudia Rosett On September 21, 2014
With the United Nations General Assembly’s 69th annual opening about to begin its “High-Level Week” of summits and speeches in New York, the State Department has been pushing out material highlighting the UN’s core role in the Obama administration’s foreign policy. Among the most avid of these endorsements is an article released Sept. 17 by the State Department, on its official Dipnote blog, headlined: “UNGA 69: Why the UN Matters More Than Ever [1].”
Near breathless in its enthusiasm for the”diplomatic marvel” of the UN General Assembly opening, the article begins by reeling off a few facts and figures about this event, including a statement that: “World leaders and representatives from 194 countries will come together to work on an agenda packed with burning issues… .”
Whoa. Let’s replay that tape. Did State really mean to say “194 countries”? There are only 193 countries in the UN. So, what is this 194th country that State was referring to?
Wondering if there might be some story here of a new UN member state that even the UN did not know about, I emailed the State Department to ask what this mysterious 194th country might be.
A State Department official wrote back to say, oops, the article “should have read ’193 countries.’ ” The State official added: “The drafter of the blog put in the wrong number, and we unfortunately did not catch the error before it was posted to the web.”
Well, we all make mistakes. But this mistake is not small. For years now, under the slogan “Palestine 194" …
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