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, Associate Spokesman for the Secretary-General, began today's briefing by recalling that yesterday the Security Council had considered the Secretary-General's report on the situation in Afghanistan, and also received two briefings by the Secretariat on the situations in Liberia and in Rwanda. Concerning Afghanistan, the Council discussed the presidential statement which it was expected to adopt in a formal meeting today. In it, it was expected to reiterate its concern at the continuing military confrontation in Afghanistan, and to stress that the Afghan conflict had no military solution. It would also call upon all States to end immediately the supply of arms to all parties to the conflict.

In his briefing to the Council on Liberia yesterday, the Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs, Ibrahima Fall, announced the Secretary-General's appointment of Felix Cyril Downes-Thomas as his representative in Liberia and head of the United Nations Peace-building Support Office in that country, the Associate Spokesman continued. Mr. Downes-Thomas, a national of the Gambia, was currently a director in the Complex Emergency Division of the Department of Humanitarian Affairs. A biographical note was available in the Spokesman's Office, he added.

Still on yesterday's activities, he said that following the Secretariat's briefing on Rwanda, the Council decided that its President, Ambassador Fernando Berrocal Soto (Costa Rica), would convey to the press its strong condemnation of the recent brutal massacre and killing of refugees and non-combatants in that country. It also urged the Government of Rwanda to cooperate fully with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Members of the Council stressed the importance of the role of the Special Rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights on the situation of human rights in Rwanda and supported fully the efforts of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to that end. Along with the presidential statement on Afghanistan today, the Council was also considering the Secretary-General's report on the United Nations Mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina (UNMIBH).

Turning to Iraq, he said that United Nations agencies involved in the distribution of humanitarian goods in the north of the country had met with government representatives in Baghdad late last night and provided them with a new distribution plan for that area. The input of those officials would be incorporated in the national distribution plan that the Government had been requested to submit to the Secretary-General for approval before 5 January. United Nations officials were expected to hold another meeting with the officials shortly to discuss the matter further. In that connection, Mr. Brandt said the pace of handling applications for humanitarian goods picked up last week, noting that the Security Council Committee monitoring sanctions on Iraq, had approved 47 applications under Phase II. As of the end of last week, the Committee had received 244 applications, out of which it

approved a total of 186, blocked two and put 20 on hold. The dollar value of those approved applications was $843 million; total oil proceeds for Phase II amounted to approximately $1.7 billion.

Concerning the human rights investigative team in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mr. Brandt said that following the evacuation of most of the international personnel in Mbandaka yesterday, the team was now assessing the situation with a view to returning to the area as soon as conditions permitted. It remained a high priority and a very important element of their investigation for them to be able to carry out their work there, he stressed.

Mr. Brandt announced that the text of a briefing given today by John Mills, the media information officer for the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, was available in the Spokesman's Office. It indicated that the Human Rights Commission's Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan, Choon-Hyun Paik, had completed his mission in that country; that mission took place between 30 November and 13 December. He had visited Kabul, Kandahar, Jalalabad and Faisabad. Mr. Paik also visited two areas in the north of Afghanistan where there had been allegations of mass killings. The first of those had been in a number of villages near Mazar-i-Sharif, where advancing Taliban forces were alleged last September to have massacred civilians of the Hazara tribe. In one village, 53 people had been killed when the Taliban entered the village demanding weapons and shooting civilians, whether or not weapons were provided. In the second village, 30 elderly people who had stayed behind when others fled the Taliban advance were also killed.

Continuing, Mr. Brandt said that the Special Rapporteur was told that similar killings had also occurred in two other villages. Near Shebergen to the east of Mazar-i-Sharif, the Special Rapporteur visited two types of mass graves and was told by the local leader, General Rashim Dostum, that more than 2,000 people had been killed. Today, no United Nations figures were available for the number of deaths, the Associate Spokesman added, noting that those killed appeared to have been Taliban soldiers captured during an earlier advance in May, together with members of local militia or political groups. Mr. Mills had described the manner in which those people were killed as "horrendous". Prisoners were apparently taken from detention, told that they were going to be exchanged, and then were trucked to wells, the kinds used by shepherds. There, they were thrown into the wells either alive or, if they resisted, shot and then tossed in. About nine such wells had been identified; their depth being about 10 to 30 metres, with another 10 to 15 metres of water. Shots were fired into the well and hand grenades thrown in before the top of the wells were bulldozed over, Mr. Mills further stated.

Daily Press Briefing - 3 - 16 December 1997

Mr. Brandt said that in Geneva today, the High Commissioner for Human Rights had issued a statement stressing the importance of the independence of special rapporteurs of the Commission on Human Rights. In it, she called on all Member States to respect the privileges and immunities that were due to special rapporteurs as granted by the 1946 Convention on the Privileges and Immunities of the United Nations. That text was also available in the Spokesman's Office.

He announced that today, in Lome, Togo, the 16 members of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) had opened a two-day extraordinary summit to consider questions of peace and security in the subregion. The Secretary-General was being represented by his Special Envoy, Francis Okelo, who delivered the Secretary-General's message; the text of that message was also available in the Spokesman's Office (see Press Release SG/SM/6423). In it, the Secretary-General stressed that the coordination of diplomatic efforts in the subregion was an essential ingredient for the success of any international, regional and subregional initiative. He praised the successful working relationship between ECOWAS and the United Nations that had brought peace to Liberia, describing it as an important model of cooperation for the resolution of other conflicts, especially since ECOWAS and the United Nations were now working to resolve the conflict in Sierra Leone. The ECOWAS, Mr. Brandt reminded correspondents, was formed in 1975 and it grouped 16 States; its newly-appointed Executive Secretary was Lansana Kouyate, the former Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs, whom many correspondents surely would remember.

Turning to the Secretary-General's final day of his visit to Malaysia, he said it had begun with a breakfast meeting with President Fidel V. Ramos of the Philippines, with whom he discussed the situation in Cambodia and Myanmar. He had then met with the Foreign Minister of Indonesia, Ali Alatas. Their agenda included the United Nations peace effort in East Timor, and again, Cambodia and Myanmar.

The Secretary-General's final bilateral meeting of the morning was with President Jiang Zemin of the People's Republic of China, with whom he discussed China's relations with the United Nations, Cambodia, Iraq and United Nations reform.

He then met with the United Nations staff at "WISMA UN" (United Nations House), Mr. Brandt said. With agency and programme representatives, he reviewed United Nations projects and objectives in Malaysia and then addressed a gathering of about 100 local and international staff, telling them to humanize the United Nations by building strong ties to the people.

The Deputy Prime Minister of Malaysia, Anwar Ibrahim, and his wife hosted an official lunch for the Secretary-General and his wife.

Daily Press Briefing - 4 - 16 December 1997

Giving further details, the Associate Spokesman said that the Secretary- General's afternoon began with a bilateral meeting with Senior General Than Shwe, Chairman of the State Peace and Development Council, Prime Minister and Minister of Defence of Myanmar. The 45-minute meeting covered a range of political issues, democratization, economic development, and the efforts to eradicate narcotic drugs. The General agreed to receive an envoy of the Secretary-General, Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs Alvaro de Soto, who would travel to Myanmar in January for discussions with the Government as well as with opposition leaders, including Aung San Suu Kyi.

The Secretary-General and his wife then had an audience with the King and Queen of Malaysia, The Yang Di Pertuan Agong Tuanku Ja'afar and Tuanku Najihah, Raja Permaisuri Agong, Mr. Brandt said. That was followed by three bilaterals, one with the Prime Minister of Singapore, Goh Chok Tong, the second with the Sultan of Brunei, and the third with the Malaysian Foreign Minister, Ahmad Badawi.

Mr. Brandt said that the day's programme ended with a dinner talk organized by the Institute of Diplomacy and Foreign Relations, the text of which was also available. The Secretary-General would begin the long westward flight home on Wednesday morning, arriving in New York in the evening of that day.

The Associate Spokesman drew attention to the latest update on the situation in Somalia, copies of which were also available. The most recent death toll stood at 1,786, at least 230,000 people were displaced, more than 30,000 livestock lost. He said that the World Food Programme (WFP) had announced today that it would provide urgent food aid for at least 600,000 Somalis who had lost their crops and their household reserves in two months of devastating floods. A Department of Humanitarian Affairs situation report on the subject was also available in the Spokesman's Office.

Concerning the background briefing on United Nations reform which was postponed yesterday, he announced that it would now take place on Thursday, 18 December, at 3 p.m. in Room S-226. It would be conducted by two senior Secretariat officials.

He announced a press release from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) concerning a mission report which said that most of the States of the former Soviet Union were showing a gradually improving food supply situation. The report also stated, however, that affordability remained the main problem.

Asked for an update on Angola, he said there had been a telephone conversation yesterday between President Jose Eduardo dos Santos and the leader of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), Jonas Savimbi. Following that conversation, President dos Santos today received a letter from Mr. Savimbi in response to an earlier letter he had

Daily Press Briefing - 5 - 16 December 1997

sent to Mr. Savimbi on Saturday. Among the issues that were touched on in both the letter and the telephone conversation were the planned meeting between them in Angola, the return of UNITA to Luanda, and the extension of State administration into UNITA strongholds of Andulu and Bailundo.

Also asked about another letter reportedly sent by Mr. Savimbi to United States Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, and whether she "intended to share the letter with the Secretary-General", Mr. Brandt said he did not know about the issue, and referred the correspondent to the United States Mission. In reference to the phone call and the letters to which he had referred, he said it demonstrated that there was communication between them, pointing out that those contacts were as recent as this week. "We pray for a meeting between the two of them as soon as possible", he added.

The correspondent said there had been a report of Mr. Savimbi having criticized the last report of the Secretary-General as being "biased", and that he understood that the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Angola, Alioune Blondin Beye, was supposed to discuss the issue with the Secretary-General. Had that been done? The Associate Spokesman said it had indeed been discussed. "I have to tell you that we don't mind criticism", he went on. "That indicates that we are doing what we are supposed to do."

To a question about whether the General Assembly would wind up this week, Mr. Brandt joked: "If I knew that, I probably would not be here", adding that it was the expectation of most people that Member States and the President of the General Assembly would want to end this portion of the Assembly by Friday, 19 December. "That is the expectation", he stressed.

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