DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL
Press Briefing
DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL
19961204
FOR INFORMATION OF UNITED NATIONS SECRETARIAT ONLY
Sylvana Foa, Spokesman for the Secretary-General, said at today's noon briefing that this morning the Secretary-General had met Nzanga Mobutu, the son of President Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire. Mr. Mobutu had been in New York since Monday and had been meeting people in the United Nations Headquarters as an envoy from his father. He had met the Secretary-General this morning and sought his advice on the current crisis in eastern Zaire. Much of the conversation had revolved around the needs of the 600,000 refugees who were still lost and wandering around in the forests of eastern Zaire.
Later this afternoon, the Secretary-General would see Yossi Beilin, a Member of the Knesset of Israel, she said. In the evening, he would attend a United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) fiftieth anniversary event. Following that, he would go on to the twenty-fifth anniversary award ceremony of the International Peace Academy.
The Secretary-General would be represented by Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, Marrack Goulding, at the Peace Implementation Conference for Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ms. Foa said. That Conference, also known as the London Conference, had opened today. Also attending from the United Nations would be the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Sadako Ogata, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Jose Ayala-Lasso, and the Commissioner of the United Nations International Police Task Force (IPTF), Peter Fitzgerald. A sideline conference on Eastern Slavonia would be attended by the United Nations Transitional Administrator for Eastern Slavonia, Jacques Klein.
The Contact Group was now working on an omnibus resolution on the Stabilization Force, which would be called the SFOR, she said. That force would replace the Implementation Force (IFOR). The omnibus resolution would include mention of the mandate of the International Police Task Force, which was to expire on 20 December. "So we are looking at what is going to happen to IPTF, whose mandate expires on 20 December", she said, adding "Our understanding is that the Contact Group is going to seek adoption of a resolution -- the omnibus resolution -- by early next week and I imagine that it would include an extension of the IPTF mandate".
The Security Council this morning was discussing the Secretary-General's report on eastern Zaire, dealing with the implementation of resolution 1078 (1996), Ms. Foa said. Evidently, it was also looking at Haiti. In addition, a briefing on Sierra Leone was scheduled by Permanent Representative James Jonah. Under other matters, the Council had been briefed by Under-Secretary- General Chinmaya Gharekhan on Somalia and Zaire. This afternoon, it would
hold consultations of the whole on recommendations for the appointment of the Secretary-General. Those consultations would be held under the "one plus two" formula, which meant participation by one permanent representative and two assistants. "That cuts down on the number of contacts you'll have", she said.
The Secretary-General's report on the United Nations Angola Verification Mission (UNAVEM III) would be available for distribution this afternoon, she said, adding "I understand they are working like crazy down in the basements getting it ready". In the report, the Secretary-General recommends that the present mandate of UNAVEM III, which expires on 11 December, be extended until 28 February 1997. He also recommends that the withdrawal of UNAVEM III military units should resume in February 1997, with a view to complete drawdown within six to seven months. "So we are going down in the number of troops", she said.
The withdrawal of four military, support and infantry units had already been initiated, Ms. Foa said. Currently, UNAVEM III had 7,003 military personnel, including 341 observers, deployed at 70 locations throughout Angola. In the report, the Secretary-General had said that the implementation of the Lusaka Protocol, the second anniversary of which was commemorated on 20 November, "continues to proceed in fits and starts". He had gone into detail on the problems that had been encountered in the quartering process and the incorporation of the troops of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) into the Angolan army.
"What he is saying is that, although considerable progress has been achieved on the military front, some of the tasks in the consolidated timetable -- remember in the timetable we put up, everything was going to be done by 15 November -- were not fulfilled by the deadline and it was now hoped that they would be completed by early December at the latest", she said, adding "its early December by my watch".
Ms. Foa went on to state that there was good news from Oslo. The Unidad Revolucionaria Nacional Guatemalteca (URNG) and the Government of Guatemala had signed their cease-fire accord. She reminded correspondents that "the finalization of the Guatemalan peace process is travelling". There would be signings in Oslo, Norway, Stockholm, Sweden and Madrid, Spain on various parts of the peace agreement. It would culminate on 29 December in Guatemala City, where the final overall peace agreement would be signed. "We got a message this morning saying it -- the cease-fire accord -- had been signed and everybody was quite pleased", she added.
The Secretary-General had asked the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Administrator, Gustave Speth, to represent him at the Summit of Heads of State and Government of the Americas, to be held in Santa Cruz de la
Daily Press Briefing - 3 - 4 December 1996
Sierra, Bolivia, Ms. Foa said. The Secretary-General had hoped to go himself, but because there were so many things going on at Headquarters right now, he had decided it was not the time for him to be away.
Was the Secretary-General still a candidate to succeed himself? a correspondent asked. She replied that he was.
Another correspondent said he wanted to return to the story of the "mad-faxer". The story was that somebody had been faxing around pro- Boutros-Ghali material in anonymous faxes. Ms. Foa said she had heard yesterday that the 'mad-faxer' had struck again, adding "I thought the 'mad-faxer' had been locked up".
The correspondent said it seemed from his investigations that the "mad-faxer" had something to do with Diane Wolf, who lived on the Upper East Side of Manhattan and was a friend of the Secretary-General's wife. Could that be confirmed? he asked. Moreover, some of the material that had been faxed around had been sent from the United Nations' Executive Office. He wondered if anybody in the Executive Office had the authority to fax pro- Boutros-Ghali material to her for distribution.
Ms. Foa responded that "we do have a problem with the mad-faxer", but, actually, what was being faxed was not pro-anything. "What we do, as many of you know because you come in and steal it off my desk with great regularity, is we put together a package of press clippings every day for people so that everybody does not have to buy the London Times, the Guardian and the Independent", she said. "It saves money, so we get them all in one place and we look for interesting articles that are of significance in the world and these are put together in a little pamphlet of clippings and a lot of the press here, of course, comes in and uses them because they are quite useful to you."
What was being faxed around were either wire reports or parts of that press clippings service, she said. As to how the press clippings reached the "mad-faxer", that was certainly a question for comment. However, it seemed the last batch of faxes had been sent outside the building from a fax machine in the office, though not to the "mad-faxer". "We are looking at it", she said. "But "mad-faxer" please stop. It is getting to be ridiculous. Anybody can buy the London Times themselves".
Was the "mad-faxer" a friend of the Secretary-General and Mrs. Boutros-Ghali? a correspondent asked. Ms. Foa said she did not know for sure who the "mad-faxer" was.
Samsiah Abdul-Majid, spokeswoman for General Assembly President Razali Ismail (Malaysia), said the General Assembly this morning had adopted four resolutions on the question of Palestine and three on the situation in the
Daily Press Briefing - 4 - 4 December 1996
Middle East. On the question of Palestine, it had adopted a draft resolution relating to the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. That resolution had been adopted by a vote of 104 in favour to 2 against, with 46 abstentions By that resolution, the Assembly authorized the Committee to continue to exert all efforts to promote the exercise of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people and to give special emphasis to the need to mobilize support and assistance for them.
By another resolution (document A/51/L.36), adopted by a vote of 152 in favour to 2 against, with 4 abstentions, she said, the Assembly reaffirmed the necessity of achieving a peaceful settlement of the question of Palestine, the core of the Arab-Israeli conflict, in all its aspects. In addition, it called upon the concerned parties, the co-sponsors of the peace process and the entire international community to exert all the necessary efforts to ensure the success of the peace process. It stressed the need for the realization of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, primarily the right to self- determination and the withdrawal of Israel from the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967. The other resolutions related to the Department of Public Information (DPI) and the Division of Palestinian Rights of the Secretariat and had been adopted by a vote of 157 in favour to 2 against, with 3 abstentions and 107 in favour to 2 against, with 46 abstentions, respectively.
On the situation of Middle East, a resolution on Jerusalem (document A/51/L.38) had been adopted by a vote of 148 in favour to 1 against, with 13 abstentions, she said. The operative paragraphs of that resolution had been read by her yesterday and, hence, she would not read them again. The draft resolution on the Syrian Golan (document A/51/L.39) had been adopted by a vote of 84 in favour to 2 against, with 71 abstentions, following an oral revision to its paragraph 5, The revised paragraph called for the resumption of the talks on the Syrian and Lebanese tracks and respect of the commitments and guarantees reached during the previous talks. A draft resolution on the Middle East peace process (document A/51/L.40), most of the operative paragraphs of which had been read out to correspondents yesterday, had been adopted today by the Assembly by a vote of 159 in favour to 3 against, with 2 abstentions.
Tomorrow the Assembly would take up assistance in mine-clearance and the strengthening of the coordination of humanitarian assistance of the United Nations, she continued. On that matter, it would have before it four draft resolutions relating to assistance of States affected by sanctions against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (document A/51/L.22), and assistance to Liberia (document A/51/L.24), Lebanon (document A/51/L.25/Rev.1) and Mozambique (document A/51/L.30).
Daily Press Briefing - 5 - 4 December 1996
For those correspondents who were interested in the reports of the First Committee (Disarmament and International Security), Ms. Abdul-Majid announced that the plenary would take up its reports and resolutions on the afternoon of Tuesday, 10 December.
A correspondent wanted to know the meaning of the term "oral revision", specifically in the context of the draft resolution on Syrian Golan (document A/51/L.39). Ms. Abdul-Majid responded that the oral changes to that draft resolution had been presented by Syria during the meeting and had been approved by all the co-sponsors of the draft. The operative paragraph that had been the subject of oral revision had been read out by her.
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