The UN has said that it will ignore any remarks made at two official events by representatives of a fictional nation created by a fugitive Indian ‘godman’, Nithyananda. In February, participants from the United States of Kailasa attended two meetings of a UN committee in Geneva, as reported by the BBC.
Their remarks, according to a UN official, were “tangential” and “irrelevant” to the topics under discussion.
Nithyananda, is wanted in India for a number of alleged offences, including rape and sexual abuse. He has refuted the allegations made against him; he claims to have created the United States of Kailasa (USK) in 2019.
Indian media covered USK’s attendance at the UN events last week but has not yet made any comments on it.
A UN official told the BBC in an email that “USK representatives attended two UN public meetings in Geneva in February”.
The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) had a discussion on the representation of women in decision-making systems on February 22.
On February 24, the Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (CESCR) convened a second debate on sustainable development. USK representatives took part in this session as well.
Vivian Kwok, a communications officer at the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, which manages the two committees, said these general conversations are open to anybody with an interest.
She also said that a statement made by a USK representative at the second discussion would not be taken into account as its focus “was tangential to the topic at hand”.
Nithyananda hasn’t appeared in public since 2019, yet he still frequently posts sermon videos on his social media accounts. On the invitation of two Tory lawmakers, the Guardian claimed that Nithyananda’s UK representative attended “a sumptuous Diwali celebration at the House of Lords” last year.
