DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL

Press Briefing

DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL

Juan Carlos Brandt, Acting Deputy Spokesman for the Secretary-General, began today's noon briefing by announcing that the Security Council was holding consultations on the Republic of the Congo and on the situation in Angola. It was discussing a draft presidential statement on the Congo and was being briefed on Angola by Assistant Secretary-General in the Department of Peace-keeping Operations Hedi Annabi. The Council was expected to hold a formal meeting following its consultations.

In briefing the Council, Mr. Annabi said the Angolan peace process was facing its most critical moment since the signing of the Lusaka Protocols and that tensions persisted in the country, Mr. Brandt said. Meanwhile, the Secretary-General's report on Angola would be issued by 15 August, in accordance with Council resolution 1118 (1997) of 30 June.

Mr. Brandt said that Myriam Dessables, an Information Officer in the Spokesman's Office and a member of the Secretary-General's mandated upcoming investigative team to Congo Kinshasa, had called from Geneva to say that briefings and consultations organized for the three members of the investigative team assigned to the Democratic Republic of the Congo have begun. The team would meet tomorrow in Geneva to begin a series of consultations that would last until Tuesday, 19 August, after which they would hold a press conference. The briefings had originally been scheduled for 13 to 15 August, but members felt they needed more time to prepare for their mission.

Tomorrow, the team would meet with the Officer-in-Charge of the Office of the High Commissioner/Centre for Human Rights, Ralph Zacklin, as well as with Special Rapporteur Roberto Garreton and a representative of the Joint Investigative Mission of the Commission on Human Rights, Bacre N'Diaye, he said. Later this week, they would meet with representatives of international and non-governmental organizations.

The Acting Deputy Spokesman drew attention to a press release on the refugee situation in the Great Lakes region, issued by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). He said the High Commissioner had strongly condemned the expulsion of eight recognized refugees in a pre-dawn military operation in Gabon who were part of a group of 168 Rwandans due to be sent back to their country.

"The High Commissioner, Sadako Ogata, strongly condemns the Gabonese Government's action in forcing these eight back", Mr. Brandt said, reading out from the UNHCR press release. "Such conduct by Gabon, which is a signatory to international conventions on the treatment of refugees, is a flagrant violation of the most basic human rights and humanitarian principles."

Providing details on those expelled, Mr. Brandt said the 168 Rwandans were among 1,300 who had entered Gabon last month after trekking for months across the equatorial forest of the former Zaire and fleeing fierce fighting in Congo-Brazzaville. The others had already returned voluntarily to Kigali.

Among the eight certified refugees who were expelled was a 23-year-old woman from Rwanda's south-west prefecture of Gitarama, who had fled the July 1994 genocide that claimed the lives of more than 500,000 people, Mr. Brandt said. She had returned later that year from the former Zaire only to witness the murder of her parents and six other members of her family when gunmen attacked their house at night. She had told UNHCR protection officers that she had managed to survive only by lying among the corpses of her family members, pretending to be dead. The protection officers described her as a delightful young woman who had managed to put her traumatic past behind her and was looking forward to a new life with her 14-month-old baby.

Turning to developments relating to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, the Acting Deputy Spokesman said that six of eight persons arrested in Kenya on 18 July would appear before the President of the Tribunal, Judge Laity Kama, on Thursday, 14 August, for a public inter partes hearing to decide whether to release them or to extend their detention. Since they were still only suspects, they should be in detention for a period of 30 days only.

According to Rule 40 bis of the Tribunal's Rules of Procedure, the provisional detention of a suspect might be ordered for no more than 30 days from the day after his or her transfer to the Tribunal's detention unit, Mr. Brandt said. At the end of that period, at the Prosecutor's request, a judge might decide, subsequent to an inter partes hearing, to extend that detention for a further period of not more than 30 days. The detention could be extended twice, for a total of 90 days. A press release on the subject was available at the Spokesman's Office.

He went on to say that the United Nations Mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina (UNMIBH) had sent briefing notes to Headquarters on the visit by Princess Diana of the United Kingdom to the United Nations Mine Action Centre in Sarajevo over the weekend. Also according to those notes, the United Nations was some $16 million short of its required funding for demining in Bosnia and Herzegovina, having received only $7 million of the $23 million appeal. With the money at its disposal, the Centre had so far trained 120 of the 1,200 deminers it ultimately hoped to have.

Meanwhile, the Secretary-General's Special Representative, Kai Eide, and the Commissioner of the International Police Task Force, Manfred Seitner, were going to Banja Luka today, where they would invite the President of the Republika Srpska, Biljana Plavsic, to reopen negotiations on the restructuring of the Republika's police force, Mr. Brandt said. The UNMIBH hoped

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negotiations would start this week, with a view to arriving at an agreement by the end of the month.

On the oil-for-food formula in Iraq, the Acting Deputy Spokesman said United Nations Overseers had so far received 17 oil contracts, as of this morning, and had approved six of them, involving 35.02 million barrels of oil. The breakdown of the six contracts was available in the Spokesman's Office.

Mr. Brandt said the Secretary-General had now arrived in Finland. However, before leaving Sweden, he had a breakfast meeting with the Speaker of Parliament, Birgitta Dahl. During the hour-long meeting, the Secretary- General asked her for comments on her experience regarding gender balance. The Speaker informed him that 14 women, who were Parliamentary Speakers, would meet in two weeks in Addis Ababa to share their experiences and ideas. The Secretary-General suggested that they produce a proposal on the role of parliamentarians in the next millennium.

The Secretary-General had then visited the Swedish Armed Forces International Command with Sweden's Minister of Defence, Bjorn von Sydow, Mr. Brandt said. He was invited into a white-painted armoured personnel carrier and driven through the grounds of the base, where soldiers enacted some of the scenarios they encountered during peace-keeping operations. For example, he was driven through check-points and shown a re-enacted encounter with "Bosnian" refugees.

Later, the Secretary-General had travelled to Solliden, where he had lunch with King Carl XVI Gustaf and Queen Silvia at their summer home before leaving for Helsinki, Mr. Brandt continued. In Finland tonight he would meet with President Martti Ahtisaari during a private dinner hosted in honour of the Secretary-General and Mrs. Annan by the Finnish President.

Mr. Brandt drew attention to a joint press release from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the World Food Programme (WFP), in which they estimate that Afghanistan would need 170,000 tons of emergency food assistance for some 1.75 million people in the coming months, despite what was expected to be its largest harvest in 18 years of civil strife. The aid would be distributed to the most vulnerable Afghans, including displaced persons, returnees, female-headed households, the sick and the elderly. The press release was available in the Spokesman's Office. (See Press Release FAO/3645- WFP/1044 of 12 August.)

Also available was a report from the Department of Humanitarian Affairs on the volcanic eruption in Montserrat, the Acting Deputy Spokesman said. The Caribbean Disaster Emergency Response Agency had reported on a substantial increase since 2 August in the volcanic activity of the Langs Soufriere Volcano. The Department was in contact with the Government of the United Kingdom, which had not yet asked for international assistance.

Daily Press Briefing - 4 - 12 August 1997

Drawing attention to a "UNDP Flash" from yesterday, which was also available, Mr. Brandt said the Sudanese Government and some of the rebels there had joined forces to slow the spread of HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases in the southern part of that country. The Government and the Sudan People's Liberation Movement were contributing in cash and kind for the preparatory phase of a three-year programme. Some $309,000 from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and other United Nations agencies would help finance an assessment of HIV prevalence in southern Sudan.

He also drew attention to another part of the "UNDP Flash", which reports on the creation of a web site to track storms and other disasters in Viet Nam.

Mr. Brandt announced that there would be a press conference tomorrow, 13 August, in room 226, by members of the Preparatory Committee for the Establishment of an International Criminal Court. The media would be briefed by the Chairman of the Working Group on Complementarity and Trigger Mechanism, Adriann Bos (Netherlands), and by the Chairperson of the Working Group on Procedural Matters, Silvia A. Fernandez de Gurmendi (Argentina).

Asked whether the Swedish Parliamentary Speaker, Ms. Dahl, was a candidate for Deputy Secretary-General, Mr. Brandt said he did not know if that was the case. "I'm sure that you are asking that question because she is a prestigious member of that group of female Speakers of Parliament and that the Secretary-General has indicated that he would want very much that a woman be selected for that post", he said.

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