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, Senior Associate Spokesman for the Secretary- General, began today's noon briefing by saying that the Security Council this morning first took up Sierra Leone and that Assistant Secretary-General Hedi Annabi had introduced the Secretary-General's report on the subject. Following those consultations, the Council had begun a formal meeting on Bosnia and Herzegovina to adopt a resolution.

By that resolution, the Council would emphasize its support for the continued role of the High Representative in assisting the parties in the implementation of the Dayton Peace Agreement, Mr. Brandt said. The Council would also authorize Member States to continue the multinational Stabilization Force (SFOR) for a further planned period of 12 months, and would decide to extend for an additional 12 months the mandate of the United Nations Mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina, UNMIBH, which included the International Police Task Force (IPTF).

During a day and a half in Baghdad over the weekend, Mr. Brandt said, the Executive Chairman of the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM), Richard Butler had held talks with Iraq's Deputy Prime Minister, Tarik Aziz. Ambassador Butler had indicated at an 11 o'clock briefing this morning, local time, before departing for Kuwait, that the Iraqi Government and UNSCOM had agreed to a new two-month work programme on their priority areas.

Ambassador Butler said he considered that as good news, the Associate Spokesman said. Ambassador Butler also expressed hope that with Iraq's full cooperation, he would be able to begin to prepare a report required under paragraph 22 of Security Council resolution 687, in October. Ambassador Butler would visit Baghdad next on 9 August to have other meetings with Mr. Aziz to assess what had been accomplished by then and to see what else needs to be done.

As mentioned before, Mr. Brandt said, the Secretary-General's report on the United Nations police support group in the Danube region was available as of today (document S/1998/500). The report noted that on 7 June, there were 794 Croats, 673 Serbs and 49 persons of other ethnicities serving in the Force in the Danube region of Croatia. Their activities were monitored by 180 civilian police officers in the United Nations support group. While the overall security situation in the region was relatively stable, there had been an increase in the incidents of ethnic intimidation reported.

Most of those cases were in the north of the region, Mr. Brandt said, where displaced people had sought to return. Police response to ethnically related incidents was not always satisfactory, the Secretary-General stated in the report, although the overall performance of the police had improved since the beginning of the support group monitoring. In the absence of

international police monitoring, police performance would likely deteriorate, the Secretary-General concluded.

Strong governmental intervention to discourage intimidation was needed, the Secretary-General's report concluded, according to Mr. Brandt. The Secretary-General also proposed downsizing the support group to 120 beginning in August, and continuing through September. The downsizing would occur, provided that the Government took major steps to resolve problems related to reconciliation, two-way returns, property restitution and ethnically related incidents.

A press release from the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia was available upstairs, the Senior Associate Spokesman said. It indicated that a former commander of a detention camp, Milorad Krnojelac, was detained today by members of the SFOR forces in Foca, southern Bosnia. He was handed over to the International Criminal Tribunal and was transferred to the Tribunal's detention unit. He was charged on the basis of both his personal responsibility and as a superior for acts of his subordinates, with counts of crimes against humanity, breaches of the Geneva Conventions and violations of the laws or customs of war, which included persecution, torture, beatings, inhuman acts, killings, murder, imprisonment and enslavement.

The humanitarian airlift from Sarajevo to Tirana proceeded over the weekend as scheduled, Mr. Brandt said, with two flights on Saturday and three others on Sunday. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and its partners were organizing a road convoy to carry the much needed emergency supplies to the more than 10,000 refugees from Kosovo in northern Albania. A delegation of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights had arrived in the area to investigate accounts of human rights violations in Kosovo.

As seen on the news, the Secretary-General was in Rome, the Associate Spokesman said. This morning the Secretary-General officially opened the United Nations Diplomatic Conference in Rome, which was convened to establish an international criminal court. While acknowledging the difficulties the delegates faced in the five-week session before them, the Secretary-General urged them to remember that "the eyes of the victims of past crimes" were fixed upon them. "Give," he said, "succeeding generations a gift of hope. They will not forgive us if we fail." The text was available in English and French. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, was also expected to address the plenary in the afternoon.

Prior to the opening, Mr. Brandt said, the Secretary-General had met with President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro of Italy. He thanked the Government of Italy for hosting the Conference. At midday, the Secretary-General gave a press conference. The text was available in room 378. He then attended a luncheon hosted by President Scalfaro. After lunch, the Secretary-General met with Javier Solana, Secretary-General of the North Atlantic Treaty

Daily Press Briefing - 3 - 15 June 1998

Organization (NATO). They discussed the United Nations and NATO joint operations in Bosnia, the crisis in Kosovo, and United Nations-NATO relations generally.

The two Secretaries-General then went to the Italian Senate to participate in a conference on crisis management and NATO reform, hosted by the Italian Senate Foreign Relations Committee and NATO, Mr. Brandt said. Both addressed a session on the lessons of the former Yugoslavia. The United Nations Secretary-General described the joint United Nations-NATO peacekeeping mission in Bosnia as "a model of credibility and legitimacy in large-scale international peacekeeping". The lessons of Bosnia must now be applied to Kosovo, he added. "All our hopes for a peaceful future for the Balkans will be cruelly mocked", he concluded, "if we allow Kosovo to be another killing field. It is in our hands now." The full text of the speech was available in room 378.

In the early evening, the Secretary-General was briefed on the conflict between Eritrea and Ethiopia by Mr. Rino Serri, Under-Secretary of State in the Italian Foreign Ministry. Mr. Serri had just returned from the region, the Senior Associate Spokesman said. The Secretary-General was due to attend a dinner in his honour hosted by the President of the Italian Senate, Nicola Mancino. Tomorrow, the Secretary-General would continue his two-day visit to Rome. To begin with, he would have a private audience with the Pope in the morning.

On the question of the international criminal court, the Senior Associate Spokesman said a four-point statement was available in room 378. It was issued in Rome by the Inter-Agency Standing Committee on behalf of the United Nations humanitarian agencies and its non-governmental organization partners, which supported the early establishment of the court. The humanitarian agencies called for the inclusion in the jurisdiction of the court, the "wilful denial" of aid, direct attacks against civilians and the forceful deportation or displacement of populations. They also said that attacks against humanitarian personnel should be considered a crime under the jurisdiction of the court. Individual agency representatives were also expected to make similar appeals at the Conference.

The Deputy Secretary-General had been back since Friday, Mr. Brandt said. She had only one official appointment, the rest were "internals". In the morning, she had met with a group of students participating in the United States State Department's model United Nations programme.

As announced on Friday in answer to questions, Mr. Brandt said, as part of the internal reorganization of the thirty-eighth floor, the Secretary- General had redesignated Elizabeth Lindenmeyer as his Special Assistant, and Shashi Tharoor as Director of Communications and Special Projects.

Daily Press Briefing - 4 - 15 June 1998

Today, Brunei Darussalam and Papua New Guinea had become the seventy- seventh and seventy-eighth Member States to make their full payments to the United Nations regular budget, Mr. Brandt said. They gave checks, one of more than $200,000 for Brunei and another of $70,000 by Papua New Guinea. Thanking both countries, Mr. Brandt said that as of this date last year, 65 countries had paid in full. The list of countries that had paid, the so-called honour- roll, was available in room 378.

A United Nations update from Islamabad had arrived right before the noon briefing and was available in room 378, he said. It was for an appeal of nearly $7 million to fund emergency rehabilitation in northern Afghanistan. That was for the victims of the 30 May earthquake.

Also available were a couple of press releases from the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP), he said. One was on the announcement of an agreement signed between UNEP, the Swiss Government and the University of Geneva, for the purpose of enhancing UNEP's ability to collect and disseminate information on environmental conditions. The other was about a referendum on genetically modified organisms.

Finally, there was a press release available from the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, he said. It indicated that a one-week plenary session of the judges, which ended last week, adopted major amendments to the Rules of Procedure and Evidence in order to speed up cases before the Tribunal. Some of the measures included: judgment and sentencing, which would be dealt with as one and not two separate procedures; counsel assigned to indigent subjects would have at least 10 years of relevant experience; if a number of witnesses were called to prove the same facts, appearances would be reduced; a gender-sensitive approach to victims would be displayed; and physical and psychological rehabilitation of witnesses would be ensured, with special counselling in cases of sexual assault.

Just to remind journalists, the Security Council had adopted a resolution last Friday evening concerning the situation in Angola, he said. In that resolution, the Council condemned the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) for failing to implement fully its obligations under the Lusaka Protocol and demanded that UNITA fully cooperate without conditions in the immediate extension of State administration throughout the country, especially in Andulo, Bailundo, Mungo and N'harea. Failure to do so would result in additional sanctions applied to UNITA on 25 June. The sanctions would include freezing funds and financial resources, prohibition of official contact with UNITA, and prohibition of uncontrolled diamond trade.

A journalist asked whether UNITA had made any move to fulfil its obligations since the resolution was passed by the Security Council on Friday. Mr. Brandt said no.

Daily Press Briefing - 5 - 15 June 1998

A journalist asked whether there was any news from the United Nations team that had gone to Albania to assess the possibility of collecting arms from the population there. Mr. Brandt said no, the only news was in terms of the humanitarian aspects of operations. When would the team headed by Under- Secretary-General Dhanapala report? the journalist asked. When the head of the team, Under-Secretary-General Dhanapala returned to Headquarters, Mr. Brandt answered. When would that be? It had been announced as a three- day mission, the reporter said. Three-day missions could become four- or five-day missions, Mr. Brandt said, depending on the conditions met upon arrival. He would check and get back to the reporter.

In fact, Mr. Brandt later told the reporter, Mr. Dhanapala had left Albania and after a brief stop-over in Geneva was due in New York next Wednesday, 17 June. Mr. Dhanapala would report to the Secretary-General .

Another journalist asked what the understanding was regarding NATO or other groups needing a mandate of the Security Council for further actions in Kosovo. There seemed to be different interpretations published by governments. The German Government seemed to have two different views, that of the Secretary of Defense, which was different from the one for Foreign Affairs. "Right", Mr. Brandt responded. "That is an excellent question to present to one of the Security Council members. I'm sure they would love to give you an answer."

Had anybody been arrested in Kosovo? a journalist asked. Mr. Brandt said there had been much talk about the abuses there and just weeks before, the United Nations had issued a strong condemnation on behalf of the Secretary-General over the attacks on innocent civilians. But he did not know whether anyone had been arrested or if many had been, he said. The attacks against innocent civilians was of concern to the international community. Some of the situation had prompted NATO to display a bit of its force this morning, in the air near the region.

In his talks with NATO in Rome, had the Secretary-General indicated who should call the air strikes in Kosovo? a reporter asked. Should it be the Kosovo separatist army, the United Nations Secretary-General or the Roman Pope? Responding, Mr. Brandt said he had no guidance regarding the Secretary- General's conversations with NATO Secretary-General Solana. The Secretary- General had had meetings with Mr. Solana on a variety of issues, including the relationship that existed between the two organizations. Kosovo was one of those issues. There were no more details.

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NOTE:In the briefing of 10 June, the sentence of the second paragraph on page 5 should read as follows:

"Mr. Eckhard replied there were no dates yet for another meeting, but there would be one."