UNNWO.org: The Strange Story of a Strange Website
By Joe from The Gaslight Hour
It was 8:37 PM when I received a tweet informing me of the existence of a UNWO.org. I was playing a videogame at the time, but I put it down because I thought it would only take me five minutes to debunk the website as a hoax. I did not pick the game back up that night.
What is UNNWO.org?
UNNWO.org is a one page Wordpress site split into three sections. The first section, the “about” section, consists of one long, tedious sentence: “The United Nations New World Order Project is a global, high-level initiative founded in 2008 to advance a new economic paradigm, a new political order, and more broadly, a new world order for humankind, which achieves the UN’s Global Goals for Sustainable Development by 2030, and the happiness, well-being, and freedom of all life on Earth by 2050.¹” At one point this sentence included a reference to Jayme Illien and Ndaba Mandela, but the reference was edited out between May 23rd and May 25th, 2020². It’s worth noting that the phrase “sustainable development” is a common bugaboo in conspiracy circles, much like the phrase “new world order.” Seeing the two phrases together won’t calm the nerves of those looking for evidence of malfeasance.
The next section is labeled “initiatives.” There are three initiatives listed. The first is labeled “happytalism” and includes a link(archive) to a website promoting what the author Jayme Illien grandiosely calls “a new economic paradigm.” He shares few details, but the site allows you to sign up to receive a white paper at some unspecified date. I have no plans on holding my breath. The second initiative is called “UNIDOHappiness” and also links(archive) to an outside site that seems to be run by Jayme Illien. This site is slightly more detailed, and promotes the legitimate UN-backed holiday “The International Day of Happiness.” Amusingly, the site allows visitors to submit “pledges” that are displayed on the website. There doesn’t appear to be any moderation. The final initiative is labeled “UN Global Goals” and links(archive) to a legitimate UN website that outlines the goals set out in the UN 2030 Agenda.
The final section is labeled with the hashtag #TenBillionHappy. Given hashtags have been out of vogue on twitter for at least four years, it likely never had much chance of getting traction. As of May 25th, 2020, the most recent posts on the hashtag are almost all trolls, and before that, it’s NGOs or likely Illien associated accounts.
Who Owns UNNWO.org?
My first thought was to run a whois search on the website. The website is registered via GoDaddy, a common choice for low-effort websites. Much of the whois information isn’t filled out giving it an even more amateurish feel. Fortunately, the registrant organization and state fields are filled out. They point to Illien Global in NY.
The actual UN.org website is registered via NetworkSolutions, the whois information is filled out properly, and the registrant organization is listed as the United Nations. This would seem to conclusively prove that UNNWO.org was a hoax. However, things are more complicated than that.
A verified UN Twitter account tweeted(archive) a link to an amateurish press release(archive) that seemed to confirm a connection between the “United Nations New World Order Project” and the UN proper. Given that, I decided to find more information about Illien Global, its strange namesake Jayme Illien, and the connection between the United Nations and his “United Nations New World Order Project.”
Who is Jayme Illien?
Jayme Illien is an international man of mystery. His now-deleted(as of May 24th, 2020) Wikipedia page is full of contradictions and extraordinary claims. The references are full of dead links. One part of the page claims his birthplace is unknown, another part claims he was born in Kolkata, India. The internet is littered with amateurish press releases about his antics, some of which were published by mainstream outlets such as Business Insider(archive).
The pages claim that he has served in management positions at various fintech companies such as DBFX, FXCM, and Swissquote. He seems to have served as an advisor to various startups in more recent years.
Some of the pages (including the now-deleted Wikipedia page) claim that he either was a covert operative or a candidate in the clandestine officer programme of the CIA³ ⁴. This is difficult to confirm, and I doubt the CIA would confirm if I asked. I do have to wonder what the CIA would think of this information about one of its recruits being spammed all over the internet.
Regardless of whether he works for the CIA or not, he gets around. He’s been spotted in Aleppo(archive), Turkey, and Iraq(archive). More relevant to our inquiry, he’s worked as a UN representative for the UN-registered NGO Economists for Peace & Security.
International Day of Happiness
What Jayme’s most famous for is his involvement in the drafting of 2 UN resolutions. One of them suggests the United Nations come up with an alternative measure to GDP to measure the wellbeing of member nations⁵, the other more famous one suggests establishing an International Day of Happiness⁶. Both of these resolutions are one page and low on details.
The International Day of Happiness got a mainstream publicity boost in 2014 when Hip Hop producer Pharell Williams encouraged fans to upload videos of themselves dancing to his new hit single “Happy” in honor of the International Day of Happiness⁷. This resulted in an unfortunate incident in which six Iranians were arrested for filming themselves dancing unveiled. The dancers had to apologize on state television⁸.
The UN Responds
I reached out to the Spokesman for the Secretary-General at the UN, Stéphane Dujarric. He was unaware of the website and decided to investigate. The investigation concluded it’s not an official UN website. The UN legal team is in the process of sending a cease and desist to the owners. The Spokesman added, “the term ‘New World order’ is not terminology that we would ever use in any fora.”
But What about the Tweet?
I also reached out to the UPU to try to determine how the press release was tweeted from an official account. The Manager of Communication & Events David Dage told me,“The UN does not have a ‘New World Order’ project, and the people who issued the press release are speaking for themselves and not for the Universal Postal Union.” When I asked him about how the press release got tweeted, he added, “I think it worth saying that we thought it was a fair reflection of some of the matters touched upon by International Happiness Day.”
Loose Ends
I made many attempts to get into contact with Jayme Illien and his company. On the morning of May 26th, the “Happiness Day press team” answered an email and promised a response in 24–48 hours. I later got a response after that window closed saying they’d been inundated with press inquiries and would get back to me by the end of Thursday, May 28th, 2020. As of this writing on Friday, May 29th, 2020, that hasn’t happened, and UNNWO.org is still up.
Plugs
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Citations:
1. unnwo.org(archive)
2. https://archive.fo/unnwo.org
3. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/unidohappiness-founder-safe-alive-and-well-as-massive-airstrikes-new-ground-assault-pound-aleppo-syria-300336442.html (archive)
4. https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/unidohappiness-founder-illien-touches-down-at-nato-21st-international-economics-and-security-conferenceunited-nations-happiness-day-founder-former-un-iraq-adviser-and-cia-recruit-jayme-illien-1002313381 (archive)
5. https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/715187?ln=en
6. https://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=%20A/RES/66/281
7. https://time.com/31956/international-happiness-day-pharrell/ (archive)
8. https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/05/iranians-dancing-to-happy-arrested-forced-to-publicly-apologize/371327/ (archive)