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, told correspondents at today's noon briefing that, as previously informed, the Security Council had no consultations or meetings scheduled for today other than a meeting for countries contributing troops to the United Nations Observer Mission in Angola (MONUA). Tomorrow it would have consultations on Kosovo and Angola. The Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, Kieran Prendergast, would brief the Council on possibly both items, but definitely Kosovo.

Mr. Brandt said several correspondents had been asking since last Friday for an update on the injuries sustained by United Nations staff members in the two bombings in Dar es Salaam, United Republic of Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya. Thankfully those persons were on their way to recovery. However, he had to regrettably inform correspondents that a number of the Organization's staff lost relatives in the explosions. The Spokesman's Office was still getting reports from the two capitals on that, but the numbers were yet to be determined. Correspondents would be kept posted about further developments.

Mr. Brandt said that on Friday afternoon the Spokesman's Office had made the announcement about the appointment of Issa Diallo as the new Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Angola. A biographical note on Mr. Diallo had also been provided for correspondents. In case they had missed that, he reminded them that the note was still available in the Spokesman's Office.

Mr. Brandt said that the Spokesman's Office had been informed by the United Nations Security Coordinator that the group of United Nations and non- governmental organization (NGO) staff members who had been stranded in Goma, due to the recent upheavals in the eastern region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, had now been evacuated to Rwanda. With that evacuation, all international staff in the two Kivu provinces had now left the country.

Mr. Brandt said that on late Saturday, the Spokesman's Office received a press communique issued in Lisbon, about the meeting between Mario Soares, Chairman of the Panel of Eminent Personalities, and the Secretary-General, that took place on the same day. The Panel was established by the Secretary- General at the request of the Algerian Government. Mr. Soares reported to the Secretary-General on behalf of the Panel's members on the progress of its work. According to the communique, last Thursday the Panel concluded its meetings in Lisbon, where it discussed its report to the Secretary-General. It agreed on the broad lines of its approach and would now continue to work on the report's finalization. The report would be released in about two or three weeks, Mr. Brandt added.

Mr. Brandt said the Secretary-General was also asked about the Panel on Sunday at 12:15 p.m. (local time) when he visited the Lisbon World Exposition. A correspondent there asked him for information on his meeting with Mr. Soares and whether he thought that the Panel had achieved the desired effects. The Secretary-General responded by stressing, first of all, how grateful he was to the former President of Portugal, Mr. Soares, for taking on such a delicate and sensitive mission. It was a mission that was made up of a group of six: each one of them a leader in his own right. But Mr. Soares led the team very effectively and the mission was able to talk to many more people and visit many more sites, including prisons and sites of massacres, that other previous visitors had not been able to do.

Continuing, Mr. Brandt stated that the Secretary-General said he was expecting a very good report from Mr. Soares and was really grateful to him for the work he had done -- it took courage, imagination and leadership which he had demonstrated. He once more expressed his extreme gratitude for the former President's work. The transcript of the press encounter at the Lisbon Exposition had been out since yesterday afternoon and also dealt with other issues such as the bombings in Dar es Salaam and Nairobi, and Angola.

Mr. Brandt informed correspondent that the Secretary-General's first appointment in Lisbon today was with Kofi Panou, the Foreign Minister of Togo, at the latter's request, with whom he discussed the recent elections in Togo. The Secretary-General then went to the Foreign Ministry of Portugal, where he met privately first with the Foreign Minister of Portugal, Jaime Gama. Their discussions centred on Guinea-Bissau, East Timor and Angola. They then met for an expanded meeting on those topics with their delegations. After the meeting the Secretary-General and the Foreign Minister held a press conference. The Spokesman's Office was in the process of receiving the transcript, which would be made available to correspondents. The issues, in addition to Iraq, were all Portuguese related: Guinea-Bissau, East Timor and Angola.

Mr. Brandt said that the Secretary-General then went to a lunch hosted by the Foreign Minister. At 5 p.m. today (local time), he would meet with Mr. Diallo, who was in Portugal to be briefed on his new assignment in Angola. The Secretary-General's last appointment for today would be a private dinner with the Permanent Representative of Portugal to the United Nations, who is also Chairman of the Security Council Committee monitoring the sanctions regime against Iraq, Antonio Monteiro, and his wife.

Concerning other material available in the United Nations about the Secretary-General's activities on the weekend, Mr. Brandt told correspondents that on Sunday he had visited the United Nations Pavilion at the Lisbon World Exposition which marked the 500th anniversary of Portuguese navigator Vasco da Gama's discovery of a sea route to India. In that connection, he also visited the pavilion of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies at that time.

Daily Press Briefing - 3 - 10 August 1998

Mr. Brandt said that Deputy Secretary-General Louise Frechette was back in New York after a well deserved two-week leave and would be having a series of internal meetings today.

Mr. Brandt told correspondents that available in the Spokesman's Office was a press release in English and French from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on the case of a United Nations Special Rapporteur facing lawsuits in Malaysia. He said the release was referring to the background on the case of the Special Rapporteur for the independence of judges and lawyers, Param Cumaraswamy. Last week, the Economic and Social Council had asked the Court for an advisory opinion on the matter. Malaysia had indicated that it was not against that and it would make its own presentations to the World Court. More details were available in the release.

The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) asked the Spokesman's Office to tell correspondents that it had challenged international political and economic policy makers to give young people a broad role in their decision- making processes, Mr. Brandt said. Those remarks, by the Executive Director of UNICEF, Carol Bellamy, came as 400 youth representatives met at the World Youth Forum in Braga, convened by Portugal and the United Nations, and issued urgent recommendations to the World Conference of Ministers Responsible for Youth, now meeting in Lisbon. The Spokesman's Office also had several summaries of the briefings by the Spokesperson for the Lisbon Ministerial Conference and a news dispatch from the Department of Public Information (DPI). All of those documents were available in the Spokesman's Office.

Concerning the meeting between the Secretary-General and the Special Envoy of the Secretary-General for Iraq, Prakash Shah, a correspondent wanted to know specifically if there were any details about the message Mr. Shah was given to take to the President of Iraq, Saddam Hussein. Mr. Brandt confirmed that the meeting did take place and that the Special Envoy was on his way to Iraq. He could not say exactly what the message was but would venture to say that it was not very different from anything the Secretary-General had recently said about the subject to the Security Council and the press regarding the latest impasse.

Asked if an invitation had been issued to the Deputy Prime Minister of Iraq, Tariq Aziz, to come to New York, Mr. Brandt said that was something which was discussed between the Secretary-General and the members of the Council last Thursday. The Secretary-General had told the press that he had indicated that to the Council. Mr. Brandt said it was up to the Council to make that invitation at the present time.

When asked if he knew when Mr. Shah would be arriving in Baghdad, Mr. Brandt said that the Special Envoy was on his way and he imagined that he would be there in the next few hours.

Daily Press Briefing - 4 - 10 August 1998

A correspondent wanted to know about the likelihood of Mr. Shah taking a new initiative to President Hussein. Mr. Brandt said that the Secretary- General, as correspondents already knew, had discussed with the Council a way to have some sort of overall review of the existing relationship between the Council and the Government of Iraq with regard to the regime of sanctions and the situation concerning the work of the United Nations Special Commission on the disposal of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction (UNSCOM). Mr. Brandt could not elaborate on anything else, but referred correspondents to the comments made by the Secretary-General last week.

Another correspondent wanted to know if the United Nations was assisting Iranian diplomats who were trying to get out of Afghanistan. Mr. Brandt said he was aware of that story and it had been his last inquiry before coming to the briefing. So far, however, the Secretary-General's Office had not received any formal communication from the Iranian Government regarding that situation. He said that through dispatches from the United Nations Security Coordinator in the area, the Spokesman's Office had learned that one of the Organization's aircraft was able to extract Iranian diplomatic staff from Bamyan and take them to Islamabad. The dispatch did not say, however, how many diplomats were involved. That was the only information available at the moment, he added.

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