DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL

Press Briefing

DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL

Fred Eckhard, Spokesman for the Secretary-General, began today's noon briefing by drawing attention to a press statement from Kinshasa by the Secretary-General's investigative mission on human rights to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The team had identified the area of Mbandaka as the site it wished to visit first. It was north of Kinshasa, in the north-western part of the Congo, where reportedly there had been a massacre in May involving refugees from Rwanda. Since the team had no indication that the site had been tampered with, it was decided to make Mbandaka the first target. The team informed the Congolese Government that it wanted to leave on Wednesday for Mbandaka.

The Secretary-General's report on the situation in Liberia was available today, Mr. Eckhard said. In it, he indicates that in order to capitalize on the momentum generated by the successful completion of the Abuja peace process and to strengthen peace-building efforts in Liberia, he has decided to reconvene the Special Conference on Liberia, at the ministerial level, on 3 October in New York. He informs the Council that the President of Liberia, Charles Taylor, has welcomed his proposal on arrangements for a continued United Nations presence in the country following the withdrawal of the United Nations Observer Mission in Liberia (UNOMIL). The head of a small United Nations office in Liberia will serve as the focal point for the Organization's post-conflict, peace-building activities in Liberia, and will have overall authority for coordination of the United Nations system in that country.

The Commission on National Reconciliation in Tajikistan, which was headed by the leader of the United Tajik Opposition, Said Abdulla Nuri, began its work in Dushanbe this afternoon, the Spokesman said. The Commission set up four sub-committees on four areas of concern -- political, military, refugees and legal -- and elected their chairmen. They began work on the timetable for the implementation of the General Peace Agreement of 27 June, and were likely to adopt a timetable for their work by next week.

The Security Council had no plans to meet today, Mr. Eckhard said. On Friday, it adopted a resolution on the oil-for-food programme in Iraq, extending to 120 days the first 90-day period for selling $1 billion in oil. Also by that resolution, the second 90-day period was shortened to 60 days. So, the total remained at $2 billion, but there was a little more time to sell the first half. The Council vote was 14 in favour to none against, with 1 abstention, the Russian Federation. With the adoption of the text, four more oil contracts were approved: 1.8 million barrels for a Russian company, a second Russian contract for another 1.8 million barrels, 2 million barrels for a company from the United Kingdom and 1.8 million barrels for a Spanish company. There were now 28 oil contracts approved and three pending.

Mr. Eckhard said the fourth round of direct talks on Western Sahara began yesterday at the James Baker Institute for Public Policy on the Rice

University campus in Houston, Texas. The Secretary-General was to have reported to the Security Council on the situation in Western Sahara today; however, because of the ongoing talks in Houston, he asked the Council to allow him to delay his report until later this month, so as to take into account the outcome of the Houston session. The Spokesman understood that James Baker III, the Secretary-General's Personal Envoy for Western Sahara, had told the parties to be prepared to stay in Houston until agreement was reached. "So, we will see how long that takes", he added.

The revised proposed programme budget for 1998-1999 (document A/52/303) was on the racks today, "so those of you who are literate in the budgetary process can wade through it", Mr. Eckhard said. Basically, it described changes that would be required in order to implement the Secretary-General's proposed reform package. There was a difference, a downward revision, of $12.7 million in the proposed programme budget. Under the Secretary-General's proposal, that sum would go into a development account, should the General Assembly approved that procedure.

Mr. Eckhard reminded correspondents of a press conference this morning on the 1997 report of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The report was embargoed until 10 p.m. today. There were also two press releases issued concerning the International Day of Peace, to be observed tomorrow, when some 300 students from New York City schools would visit Headquarters. The day had also been designated by the United Nations Department of Public Information (DPI) as "Students Day at the UN", and there was a special programme on the CyberSchoolBus website of the United Nations Home Page announcing a peace poem contest. The second press release was the text of a message by the Secretary-General on that occasion.

The Secretary-General met today with the Executive Committee on Economic and Social Affairs, one of four committees designed to coordinate policy in the four key areas of the work of the United Nations, Mr. Eckhard said. The Executive Secretaries of the regional commissions, who were here for the meeting, would meet this afternoon as a group with the Secretary-General. The Spokesman hoped to have a text of the Secretary-General's statement to the prayer service on the occasion of the opening of the fifty-second session of the General Assembly, scheduled for 5:30 p.m. today at the Holy Family Church.

Mr. Eckhard drew attention to the availability of two texts of messages by the Secretary-General delivered on his behalf in Geneva by Vladimir Petrovsky, the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva. One statement was made to the 98th Inter-Parliamentary Conference in Cairo on 11 September, and the other, from today, was a message in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, to the International Conference on the Central Asia Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone.

A press conference sponsored by the Italian Mission was scheduled for 11 a.m. tomorrow, 16 September, in room 226, the Spokesman said. The National Italian American Coordinating Association and the Conference of Presidents of

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Major Italian American Organizations would speak about Security Council reform.

The Spokesman then welcomed four fellows to the briefing -- recipients of the Memorial Scholarship Fund of the United Nations Correspondents Association (UNCA). He introduced Marco Granelli, of the Pretoria News in South Africa; Carol-Ann George, of the Barbados Advocate in Barbados; Melisa Dedovic, of the national weekly Lijiljan in Bosnia and Herzegovina; and Ashutosh Gupta, of AAJ Tak TV-Today, India.

"Any questions for a sleepy Monday?", he asked. A correspondent asked about a column by Tom Friedman of the New York Times which suggested that Saddam Hussein was making money on oil futures by alternatively cooperating or failing to cooperate with the United Nations, thus affecting oil prices. Mr. Eckhard said it was clear that the work of the United Nations in that area had an impact on oil prices, but the Organization had no comment with respect to the question of the intentional manipulation of those prices. Asked whether the Security Council had taken the matter into consideration, he said he did not think the Council had the luxury of doing so, because it was driven by political pressures, not financial ones. "So, the market goes whichever way it will in response to the actions that the Council takes, but the Council isn't making money on the market either", he said.

Did the deadline of Wednesday to allow the human rights team to travel to the Mbandaka region represent an ultimatum?, a correspondent asked. Mr. Eckhard said the team had informed the Government that it was their intention to be in Mbandaka on Wednesday. As their statement said, this was their fourth week in Kinshasa and they were eager to get into the field. "I don't know if I would characterize it as an ultimatum, I think what we are hoping, and certainly what the Secretary-General wants, is that the ministers and sub-ministers will simply comply with the President's written approval to the Secretary-General that this team can get its work under way."

Asked if the Mbandaka site had been suggested by the Government or by the team itself, Mr. Eckhard said it was the team's decision. The Government's official position, as expressed by the President, was that the team could get under way. There had been some discussion with lower-level officials as to whether the site of the investigation should be confined to the eastern part of the Congo or include all of the Congo -- "and we feel it should be all of the Congo", he said.

Had the focus of the investigative mission shifted from that of the Human Rights Commission's investigative team, which was to have looked at the treatment of Rwandese refugees in eastern Zaire? a correspondent asked. "Yes, in that sense, yes", Mr. Eckhard said. Since that time, there had been additional incidents, and so the new team, created by the Secretary-General, wanted the whole Congo as its focus. It had therefore broadened from the original mandate of the Human Rights Commission team.

Daily Press Briefing - 4 - 15 September 1997

Who, specifically, were the refugees who had allegedly been massacred at the new site? the correspondent asked. Mr. Eckhard said they were Rwandan refugees who had made their way across the Congo and were on the Congo River border with Congo-Brazzaville. Based on his reports, they were apparently attacked by military, with some 100 refugees killed by gunfire and others pursued into the bush. "So this is something we would like to investigate", he said.

Asked whether that incident was before or after President Kabila's take- over, Mr. Eckhard said the alleged massacre took place in May, but he did not know the exact date. Those reports needed to be verified through an investigation, he added.

Asked for specific figures from Sarajevo on how many people had crossed inter-ethnic borders yesterday for the municipal elections there, Mr. Eckhard said he would check for the correspondent.

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