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 outlining the Security Council's agenda for the day. Council members were briefed this morning on the situation in Tajikistan by the Director of the Asia and Middle East Division of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations, Joachim Hutter, for which they had before them the interim report of the Secretary-General on Tajikistan (document S/1998/754 and Add.1). The Council President, Danilo Türk (Slovenia), had just read out a statement on Tajikistan to the press outside the Council chamber.

Under other matters, Council members discussed a draft presidential on the situation in Kosovo, he said. They would continue their consideration of that item tomorrow.

Mr. Eckhard said the Secretary-General was trying to have a private vacation in West Africa, but was getting wrapped up in semi-official duties. It was appropriate, therefore, to tell the press of his whereabouts and the nature of some of those official duties. He arrived in Mali yesterday for a visit of a few days. On 21 August, he would have lunch with the President of Mali, Alpha Oumar Konare, and he would pay a courtesy call on the Prime Minister, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita. He would also pay his respects to the family of Alioune Blondin Beye, his former Special Representative for Angola, who was killed in an airplane accident on 26 June.

Concerning the situation in Angola, he said that the newly appointed Special Envoy of the Secretary-General for Angola, Lakhdar Brahimi, was expected to arrive in New York today for further consultations, following his stay in Angola in July and early August, as well as a number of visits to the neighbouring States of Namibia, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Zambia. Mr. Brahimi would engage in several consultations at Headquarters with United Nations Staff prior to briefing the Security Council, which was expected early next week.

Turning to the situation in Iraq, he said the United Nations was bringing to Headquarters two oil industry experts to speed up the processing of contracts for spare parts for the Iraqi oil industry. The Spokesman's Office had reported yesterday that 41 contracts had been received so far and "a bunch more" had just arrived, bringing to 55 the total number of contracts.

Mr. Eckhard said the two experts were from the Saybolt company of the Netherlands. Both had taken part in the visit to Iraq last March by the Secretary-General's team of experts. The team had reported on the "lamentable" state of the oil industry, and it had endorsed the Iraqi request for $300 million worth of spare parts as the absolute minimum required. Given the highly technical nature of the topic, the experts would work closely with the Office of the Iraq Programme. They would provide additional information

to the Security Council Committee established under resolution 661 (1990) to monitor the implementation of sanctions against Iraq. A note or press release by the Iraq Programme was expected later today.

The Spokesman went on to say that two United States newspapers yesterday cited United Nations sources on the views of the Secretary-General concerning the political motivations of the United States Government in connection with the Iraqi situation. For the record, those were not the views of the Secretary-General; at no stage and in no forum had he expressed the views attributed to him in those reports. In fact, as a matter of principle, he would not comment on the internal politics of a Member State. Mr. Eckhard then drew attention to the signing by Togo of the Convention on the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings. The number of signatories now stood at 28. There were no ratifications as yet; 32 were needed for the Convention's entry into force. Asked about reports of suspicious circumstances surrounding the death of Dag Hammarskjold, the first Secretary-General of the United Nations, Mr. Eckhard said he had seen the press reports this morning and supposed they referred to comments made by Desmond Tutu in connection with some documentation that had been submitted to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission which he headed. For now, the Spokesman's Office had no comment on the document which Mr. Tutu had described this morning. Furthermore, the matter rested, for the moment, with the South African authorities. Asked to elaborate on his earlier comments concerning the role of the Secretary-General in the Iraqi situation, Mr. Eckhard said the Secretary- General had spoken to the Iraqi authorities by telephone. He had also met with the Council members in closed session and presented them with his perception of the problem. In addition, he had sent his Special Envoy for Iraq, Prakash Shah, with whom he had met in Lisbon, to Baghdad with "a firm message" for Iraq to "come back into compliance" with Security Council resolutions and to cooperate with the inspectors of the United Nations Special Commission for the disposal of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction (UNSCOM). The Spokesman said he believed that the Secretary-General felt very much involved. Of course, he was prepared to continue to work with the Council. The next step in the process was the briefing of the Council by Mr. Shah, which might take place early next week. So the Secretary-General did feel involved. He was doing what he could and he was prepared to work with the Council to try to resolve the situation in a peaceful way. Asked to elaborate on the suspects in the shooting deaths in Tajikistan on 20 July of four team members of the United Nations Mission of Observers (UNMOT), Mr. Eckhard said he had nothing to add to his remarks of yesterday. The Mission had not reported any specific names of suspects to the Spokesman's Office. The opposition, however, had called for their detention. That was all that was known by his Office at the present time. * *** *