The Geneva Option

by Adam LeBor

  “At a five-star hotel in Mauritius?”

  “Wherever my work takes me.”

  Yael stared at him with disdain. “Rina is right. You are a pious hypocrite who cares about nothing except his own self-advancement.”

  Hussein’s eyes blazed with anger. “Enough.”

  His voice turned icy. “It was a mistake to ever involve you in my family affairs.”

  The photograph of the young woman rattled against the desk as he placed it facedown. “I have consulted senior colleagues. The feeling in this house—”

  Yael closed her eyes and breathed deeply before she spoke but could barely control her temper. “The feeling in this house? Whose feelings? Yours? Or the P5’s? You know full well that I did not leak my memo to the New York Times. But I knew that sooner or later, something would leak out. I remember sitting in this office the day you asked me to do this job. You guaranteed that you would stand by me. ‘Whatever happens, I will protect you.’ That is what you said. You gave me your word. So why aren’t you protecting me?”

  Hussein looked at the wall of celebrity photographs as he spoke. “Yael, as of now you are on indefinite paid leave. An internal investigation has been launched into the circumstances in which your memo to me appeared on the front page of the New York Times. It will also be looking into claims that you engaged in inappropriate personal behavior with local staff while on mission in Kandahar. If it finds no grounds for action, we can discuss your future with the UN at a later date, when we are all calmer.”

  Kandahar. Her resistance collapsed. She stood up to leave.

  Hussein leaned forward, twirling a pencil in his hands. “Please wait. Yael, you know the details of many of the most sensitive events in which the UN has been involved. I would remind you of the confidentiality agreement you signed when you joined us. Specifically of the potential criminal penalties, which have universal jurisdiction among member states, if you breach its terms. And please hand in your UN passport, telephone, and laptop to Madame Dubois.”

  “Is there anything else?”

  Hussein nodded. “Yes. Your name, face, and personal details are known to numerous governments and non-state actors with whom we are forced to deal.”

  “Meaning?”

  Hussein waited for a moment before he spoke, bending the pencil between his fingers. “Regrettably, despite our best efforts, some of them have questionable human-rights records. And long arms. Very long. But as long as you remain under our . . . imprimatur, as it were, they will respect your personal security.”

  Yael asked, “And if I do not?”

  The pencil snapped.

  Sami pressed stop and saved the sound file of the messages on Olivia’s voice mail. He transferred them to a USB memory stick attached to his key ring and wiped the file off his laptop with a government-security-level erasure program. Later, when he was off the UN’s network, he would back the messages up on the encrypted storage database site where he stored sensitive information. He printed out the other information he had found. A Google and database search of Olivia’s name turned up numerous photographs of her standing by the SG’s side over the last year: in Astana, Kazakhstan; on a visit to UNESCO; in Washington, DC, Jerusalem, Paris, and Beijing.

  The most recent photograph and brief article showed her with the SG, a couple of weeks earlier, visiting the Goma refugee camp. There were numerous photographs of the visit on the UN Development Program website, several of which showed Hussein deep in conversation with a tall, thin European man with pale skin and snow-white hair. Sami had never seen such a man inside the building. Who was he?

  Yael opened the door of the SG’s office to find Yvette Dubois and two UN policemen standing outside. She handed the Frenchwoman her passport, laptop, and mobile telephone. Dubois placed them in a cardboard box, turned on her heel, and left without saying thank you or good-bye, her high heels clattering on the polished wooden floor.

  The younger officer loomed over Yael with a soldier’s ramrod posture and haircut. The other was middle-aged and overweight, his paunch hanging over a belt laden with a gun, handcuffs, flashlight, and pepper spray. The policemen escorted Yael down the familiar beige corridor toward her office. The walls were lined with posters and photographs showing smiling, multiethnic children, many promoting the “Year of Africa.” The size and proximity of each workplace to the SG’s suite was carefully delineated according to its occupant’s rank and seniority. Yael’s was six doors away, and she merited both a window and a two-seater sofa, which placed her high in the pecking order.

  The 38th floor was usually a hive of activity, crowded with secretaries, advisers, and assistants buzzing around self-importantly. This morning it was silent and still, and every door was closed, except Mahesh Kapoor’s. She heard a voice call her name as she walked past, and the SG’s chief of staff appeared, dressed in his trademark black turtleneck sweater and black linen suit. His mane of thick dark hair was tied back in a bundled ponytail, with a single streak of gray on one side. He looked even more like a Bollywood film star than usual, Yael thought.

  Kapoor stood in front of Yael and placed a hand on each of her arms. He shook his head as he spoke. “Yael, I am sure this is all a huge misunderstanding. I am going to sort it all out. You will be back in your office in a few days and we will be saving the world together again.”

  The officers stood watching her, irritated at the delay, but unwilling to interrupt the SG’s chief of staff. Yael looked at him, enjoying the presence of a friendly face. “I don’t think so, Mahesh. Not after that memo in the New York Times. The SG has made up his mind.”

  Mahesh walked closer. She smelled soap and chewing gum. “I will tell you something,” he said, smiling mischievously as he whispered in her ear. “Sometimes the SG needs to have his mind made up for him. This may be one of them.”

  He stepped back. “Now that is between the two of us. Our little secret,” he said, his fingers lightly brushing her arm as he left.

  The younger officer stepped forward. “Mr. Kapoor, we have to escort Ms. Azoulay from the building,” he said as he took hold of Yael’s arm.

  Mahesh instantly swiveled on his foot and turned to face him, taking the policeman’s hand away from Yael’s arm and dropping it. “Your orders are to escort Ms. Azoulay, officer. Not manhandle her,” Mahesh said indignantly. He rested his hand again on Yael’s arm. “Don’t worry, I am going to sort this out. You had better go now.”

  The officer looked at his elder counterpart, a question on his face. “Leave it,” the senior officer said. Yael thanked Mahesh and walked a few doors away to her office. The senior officer opened the door, which was unlocked, told her to wait outside, and directed the other to search the room. The younger policeman methodically and enthusiastically went through Yael’s shelves and desk drawers. He gathered up her battered UN rucksack, a pair of walkie-talkies, and a blue peacekeeper’s beret she had been given in Afghanistan.

  “Can I keep the beret?” she asked the senior officer.

  He shook his head.

  “Why not?”

  “UN property, ma’am.” He gestured at Yael to go inside.

  She opened her filing cabinet. It had been emptied. “Where are my papers?” she asked.

  He shrugged. “UN property.”

  Yael reached for a DPKO coffee mug and looked again for the officer’s approval. He shook his head.

  “Yes, I know,” said Yael as she put the mug back down on her desk.

  The policemen watched carefully as she gathered her personal belongings: photographs and postcards, two filigreed porcelain teacups from Kandahar, a bottle of throat-searing slivovitz she had picked up in the Balkans, a small Iraqi prayer rug, and several airport thrillers.

  The senior officer said, “Please turn your purse inside out and turn out your pockets onto your desk, ma’am.”

  “Is this really necessary?” Yael asked.<
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  “Just do as I ask, please, ma’am. Then we can all go about our business,” the policeman said. “Are you in possession of any items or information, confidential or otherwise, belonging or relating to the work of the United Nations or any of its subsidiary or allied organizations?”

  “No. I am not,” said Yael.

  She pulled her bag inside out and emptied her trouser pockets as instructed: they yielded a set of keys to her apartment, a crumpled pack of Marlboro Lights, a Zippo lighter, tissues, chewing gum, a wallet, a half-eaten apple, and her pen. The younger officer riffled through her possessions, trying the lighter, and looking through her wallet. Yael watched, her face expressionless as he picked up the pen.

  The officer weighed it in his hand. “Heavy,” he said.

  “It’s a fountain pen. I like to write with ink,” said Yael.

  The young policeman looked at her disbelievingly.

  “Go ahead. Take a look.”

  He unscrewed the top. Black ink spurted out from the nib, staining his hand. He pulled a face and put the pen down. He nodded at Yael. “OK, they are all yours.”

  Yael said, “Yes. I know.”

  She put her things inside her shoulder bag. The policemen took her to the elevator.

  The door opened and a tall, ruddy-faced Englishman in a tweed jacket grinned at her for a second until he registered the scene in front of him. Colonel Quentin Braithwaite was now under-secretary-general, or chief, of the DPKO. He purposefully cultivated the mien of a public schoolboy about to put jam in his housemaster’s shoes. In fact, he was one of the most adroit UN operators Yael knew, and she liked and admired him. The British army officer had served in Bosnia, Kashmir, and Afghanistan. He was the undeclared leader of the UN’s interventionist faction, who thought that a fleet of attack helicopters and several companies of well-armed peacekeepers would quickly teach most troublesome warlords the error of their ways.

  Braithwaite looked at Yael, and at the two policemen, taking in the situation. She saw surprise and then anger flicker in his pale blue eyes.

  The DPKO chief nodded at Yael. “We’ll talk as soon as I find out what’s going on.”

  Yael thanked Braithwaite. To her amazement, the Englishman stepped forward and hugged her. He smelled of lime cologne. “Don’t worry. We are going to sort all this out,” he said as he walked down the corridor.

  The DPKO chief turned as he entered the SG’s anteroom. “Call me, Yael. Anytime,” he bellowed.

  Yael stepped into the elevator, the policemen on either side of her. It seemed to stop on every floor. As soon as the door opened, the lively babble from those waiting outside immediately ceased. Numerous colleagues from the DPA and DPKO with whom Yael had worked got in as the elevator made its way downstairs. One or two greeted her warily but most fell silent as soon as they saw the policemen and quickly edged away. A space soon appeared around her as though she had a contagious disease, which, in UN terms, she did. None asked her what was going on or if she needed any help.

  Leila, an Egyptian secretary from the Department of Information, got in on the 14th floor. Yael had recently spent an evening with Leila advising her how to fend off the advances of her Brazilian boss and keep her job. Leila had promised to cook her an Egyptian dinner in return. She said nothing to Yael but stood staring at her with her mouth open, until Yael put a finger under her chin and gently pressed upward. Leila closed her mouth and turned bright red. Thanh, a new junior assistant at the DPKO, got in on the 8th floor. Still young, in her early twenties, and finding her way at the UN, Thanh Ly was French-Vietnamese and head-turningly beautiful. Her desk was a magnet for the male members of the department. Yael had several times rescued her from their attentions.

  Thanh walked straight over to Yael. She took Yael’s hand and squeezed it.

  “Can I help?” she asked.

  Yael shook her head. “No, but thanks for asking,” she replied, and meant it.

  Eventually the elevator reached the ground floor and the policemen escorted her past the newsagent and candy store, through the turnstiles, and into the public lobby. It was crowded with tourists and visitors waiting for their passes at the security desk. Almost everyone turned to look at the spectacle of Yael and her escorts. The policemen walked her through an exhibition of gruesome photographs commemorating the Rwandan genocide. A large banner proclaimed “Never Again,” and a floor-to-ceiling poster for a charity called Africa Child Rescue displayed a photograph of near-naked children laboring in a mine. A bank of flat-screen televisions covering most of a wall showed Fareed Hussein nodding gravely as he was interviewed by UN television, and promising that the UN had learned the lessons of the 1990s. Africa Child Rescue, he intoned, was a new initiative, a unique program that would be at the heart of the UN’s Year of Africa, combining the resources and dynamism of the corporate world with the knowledge and experience of the UN.

  They stopped at the security tent. The chubby senior officer patted her down slowly, drawing out the process as long as he could. The young officer put her bag through the X-ray machine and guided her through the metal detector. Finally, the policemen walked her past the hordes of gawking tourists, down the steps, through the black metal fence, and onto the sidewalk at First Avenue.

  “You are now free to go, ma’am,” said the junior officer regretfully.

  Yael smiled. “Yes. I know. This is New York. You have no jurisdiction here.”

  “I’ll remember that on your next visit to the UN, ma’am,” he replied, stone-faced.

  Yael pointed at his hand. The policeman looked down at his palm, stained with ink from her fountain pen.

  “It’s indelible. It doesn’t come off,” she said, smiling sweetly. “Ever.”

  His face twisted with anger, and he stepped toward her.

  Yael nodded. “Be my guest. Because if you take one step closer, officer, I will call the NYPD and have you charged with assault.”

  The senior officer put his hand on his colleague’s arm. “Leave it. We’re done,” he said, shaking his head as they walked back into the security tent.

  Yael stood still for a moment, her bravado evaporating as she tried to process what had happened to her. It was a crisp autumn day, the kind New York did well. A cold breeze blew in hard from the East River; the sun was shining in a bright blue sky dotted with white clouds. Sirens howled in the distance, traffic honked and stalled, and the air smelled of coffee and exhaust fumes. Everything looked exactly the same as usual. The giant sculpture of a revolver with a twisted barrel was perched on its plinth, the lines at the security tent snaked down to the pavement, and the flags of the member states were a blaze of color, flapping in the wind. The new American UN mission loomed over the corner of East 44th Street and First Avenue, its cream-colored concrete façade with no windows on the lower floors still fresh and shiny. But she knew nothing would ever be the same.

  Yael stepped off the sidewalk without looking. A tourist bus flew toward her, honking so loudly she jumped backward instinctively, her heart pounding as the bus thundered past. Yael shook her head, focused, and stepped into the road again, this time looking carefully as she crossed First Avenue. She turned left at the corner of 46th Street at the Turkish UN Mission, walked past the blue wooden fence around the empty lot that covered most of the block, and continued up First Avenue toward the Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza. The open space was a popular site for protests. A crowd of dozens of demonstrators was gathered, shouting and waving placards with graphic pictures of the Rwandan genocide. Two cops stood nearby chatting.

  A young Indian woman waving a megaphone stood behind a large banner that declared, “No deals with murderers: put Hakizimani on trial.” Her upper-class British accent sounded familiar. Yael went to take a closer look. After all, it was thanks to her that they were there at all.

  Seven

  The young Indian woman with the megaphone was, indeed, familiar. She was
Rina, the only daughter of Fareed Hussein. Rina was enthusiastically leading the crowd in a chant: “African resources for Africa!” and “No more UN sellouts!” Rina Hussein was one of Yael’s rare failures. A year or so earlier the SG sent Yael on what he called “his most delicate mission”—to try to reconcile with his estranged daughter. The two young women quickly became close. Rina was great company: sharp, fast, and possessed of a dry wit. Yael did not have many friends and found herself drawn to Rina, who certainly seemed to enjoy her company. Yael kept procrastinating over the real reason for her meetings with the SG’s daughter, perhaps because she sensed the likely outcome. One evening, over dinner at a chic bistro in Harlem, Yael carefully raised the topic of Rina’s father and his wish to make contact. Rina said nothing. She simply picked up her bag and walked out. She never returned Yael’s calls or e-mails. Eventually Yael gave up.

  Yael looked briefly and regretfully at the SG’s daughter, and walked around the demonstration into Dag HammarskjÖld Plaza. The large plaza, named for the UN’s second secretary-general, was one of Yael’s favorite places in Manhattan. The plaza covered most of a block between First and Second Avenues on East 47th Street. Considering it was located between two of the city’s busiest roads, the plaza was a surprising oasis, at least when there were no demonstrations. A row of wooden benches lined either side, under iron streetlights garlanded with flower baskets. There was a café in a greenhouse—a popular spot for diplomats who wanted to meet away from their offices—six fountains under square wrought-iron canopies, and a small garden named for the actress Katherine Hepburn, who had lived nearby. The rows of trees on either side almost touched each other, making a canopy of branches. The trees were shedding their greenery now, and the wind blew the autumn leaves across the wide open space.

  Yael sat down on a bench and looked out at the nearby monument to Raoul Wallenberg. Four black pillars pointed skyward, while a briefcase lay at the bottom, signifying unfinished business. Wallenberg, like Hammarskjöld, was also a Swedish diplomat, but based in Budapest in 1944. Wallenberg had saved tens of thousands of Hungarian Jews in the closing months of the Second World War by issuing them with Swedish papers and placing them under his protection. Over the years, when Yael was plagued with doubts about the deals she had brokered, even though she knew they were the lesser of two evils, she often came here to sit and think. Wallenberg too had dealt with the devil, the Hungarian Arrow Cross Nazis, giving their murderous regime the diplomatic recognition they craved by deigning to negotiate with them. That was how he had plucked Yael’s grandmother, Eva Weiss, from a lineup of Jews waiting to be shot or deported. Wallenberg had been arrested by the Soviets in Budapest in January 1945 and had never been seen again. Mystery still surrounded his fate.