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 reporting that the Security Council had taken up the question of Western Sahara this morning. Before it was the report of the Secretary- General. Following that, members held consultations on the Secretary- General's report on Bosnia and Herzegovina. They went into a formal meeting and adopted a resolution approving the creation of a programme to monitor and assess the court system in Bosnia and Herzegovina as recommended by the Secretary-General.

He said the Council then went back into consultations to continue on the subject of Western Sahara. It was understood that members had before them a draft resolution and that there was talk of possibly adopting that resolution on Monday.

Turning to the subject of Iraq, Mr. Eckhard said that the Iraqi oil- pricing formula for August had been put on hold yesterday afternoon. The 661 Committee, which oversees the sanctions on Iraq, had a deadline of 4 p.m. yesterday to decide on the recommendation of the Oil Overseers on the oil- pricing formula for August. That recommendation was put on hold at the request of a member of the Committee.

The Spokesman then reported that the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, had issued a statement today in Kigali and Geneva, saying she regretted that no agreement had been reached during discussions with the Government of Rwanda on the establishment of a new United Nations human rights presence in that country. The parties were unable to agree on the inclusion of ongoing human rights monitoring in the new mandate.

He added that the High Commissioner's position was that the United Nations must retain the means to monitor the human rights situation in Rwanda, and not just help to build and strengthen national institutions as preferred by the Government. There would be no follow-on mission, therefore, and no human rights field operations in Rwanda as envisaged at this time, and the mission would effectively conclude its work at the end of this month. The complete text of the High Commissioner's statement was available in the Spokesman's Office. (See Press Release HR/4377.)

Mr. Eckhard then referred to the firing incident close to a United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) position in southern Lebanon. That incident occurred on 13 July and involved the injuring of an Irish UNIFIL soldier and a Lebanese civilian by a mortar round fired by the Israeli Defence Force and its local Lebanese auxiliary, known as the de facto forces.

The Security Council had taken up that matter yesterday, and the President had mentioned it to the press, expressing the Council's concern over the incident, he added. Unfortunately, the problem had continued, but this time the firing was by Lebanese armed elements. A report had been received from UNIFIL that at 0500 hrs today, 16 July, one mortar round fired by those armed elements impacted five metres from a United Nations checkpoint located north of Brashit, while another round impacted 100 metres from a nearby United Nations position. Although there were no injuries, a safety zone around United Nations positions should be respected by all parties.

Turning to the Secretary-General's Latin American trip, Mr. Eckhard said that he had left Uruguay for Argentina yesterday evening. This morning, he had met in Buenos Aires with Argentine President Carlos Menem, as well as with Foreign Minister Guido Di Tella and others. They had discussed the President's proposal for so-called "White Helmets", or volunteers in support of humanitarian missions. They had also talked of the follow-up meeting to the Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change, which would be hosted by Argentina this November, as well as other issues.

This evening, the Secretary-General would deliver a speech on "The Need for Multilateralism" at the Argentinean Centre for International Relations, he continued. An embargoed copy of that speech was available in the Spokesman's Office. The Secretary-General's programme in Argentina would continue tomorrow, and on Saturday he was scheduled to fly to Guatemala. (See Press Release SG/SM/6641.)

The Spokesman said that the Secretary-General's report on the United Nations Preventive Deployment Force (UNPREDEP) in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia was available on the racks. Referring to recent events in Kosovo that had highlighted the danger of renewed violence in the area, and the serious repercussions such violence could have on the security of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, the Secretary-General recommended the extension of UNPREDEP's mandate for a further period of six months, until February 1999, and an increase in UNPREDEP's troop level by 350.

He went on to say that the majority of those additional troops would be deployed at nine new permanently manned observer posts along the Kosovo and Albanian borders. A reserve of two platoons of about 60 soldiers -- supported by a 35-member medical unit and three helicopters -- would perform limited ground and air patrolling duties, according to the Secretary-General's recommendation. Closed consultations on UNPREDEP among Security Council members and troop contributors were scheduled today at 3:30 p.m.

Mr. Eckhard then said that, according to a press release from the International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia, the judges successfully concluded a review of their judicial procedures aimed at streamlining and expediting the proceedings of the Tribunal. Details were available from the press release in room S-378.

Daily Press Briefing - 3 - 16 July 1998

He said that the 1998 edition of the United Nations World Economic and Social Survey was available on the Internet and as a United Nations document. A limited number of copies of that report, printed in its entirety, were available in the Spokesman's Office. The survey tracks the slowing of the world economy and recommends measures to reverse that trend.

On the racks was a press release from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) concerning a ministerial-level conference next week in Maputo on the sustainable management of Africa's coasts, the Spokesman said. That conference was jointly organized by the Mozambique Government, UNEP, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and the Finnish Government. It represented a further step in strengthening intra- African cooperation. Received just a few minutes ago, from the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, was a statement issued in Khartoum, Sudan, by Martin Griffiths, the Deputy Emergency Relief Coordinator, concerning the humanitarian crisis in southern Sudan, Mr. Eckhard said.

He concluded the briefing by announcing a special briefing for journalists to be given by Ivan Tosevski, Chairman of the Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearance, and others, which would take place tomorrow, Friday, 17 July, at 11 a.m. in room S-226. Further information could be obtained from Shala Mokgethi at extension 3-8104.

A correspondent asked whether the United Nations was losing its grip in Africa in light of events in Rwanda, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Angola and the Sudan. Was the Organization in control of what was going on in Africa? The Spokesman said the United Nations did not have responsibility for running the whole continent. The Rwanda case was a setback for the Organization's human rights efforts in that country; clearly, the High Commissioner wanted ongoing monitoring, while the Government did not want it. The United Nations could not impose itself on Member States, so it had reluctantly acceded to the Rwanda Government's request, and had effectively shut down its mission there. There were no lessons to be drawn continent-wide from what had just happened in Rwanda.

What had become of the Secretary-General's recovery programme for Africa? the same journalist asked. The Spokesman's Office could arrange for a briefing on that subject, Mr. Eckhard replied. It was a rather technical subject on which he would not wish to speak off the top of his head.

Referring to the Security Council resolution on the monitoring of the court system in Bosnia and Herzegovina, another correspondent asked whether that was a new United Nations mission and who would finance it. Mr. Eckhard said it was an extension of the existing mandate of the United Nations Mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina (UNMIBH). If there were any budgetary implications, the costs would be shared on an assessed basis by all Member States according to the peacekeeping formula.

Daily Press Briefing - 4 - 16 July 1998

Would it be fair to say that the United Nations human rights effort in Africa was a failure, given the list of problems it had faced and its incapacity to involve beneficiary institutions? another journalist asked. The Spokesman said the present case was a specific one involving one Member State. That conclusion could not be drawn from the Organization's experiences in Rwanda or in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Both countries were negative as far as human rights monitoring went. On the other hand, there was the information gathering panel that was about to travel to Algeria, so the Congo and Rwanda were not typical of the Organization's work on the continent.

Another correspondent asked when the panel would travel to Algeria. Mr. Eckhard said it would first go to Lisbon for briefings before leaving for Algeria, where it would arrive on 22 July.

Asked for a comment on the Haitian President's designation yesterday of a new Prime Minister after a year of working without a government, he replied that there was hope that this time the nomination would go through and a government would be formed. The Secretary-General, who had been expressing his concern over the unresolved situation of the formation of a government in Haiti, would be very pleased if that happened.

* *** *