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 announcing that the Security Council had met this morning to review the sanctions against Iraq. That was the fortieth such review, which was held every 60 days, as required by Security Council resolution 687 (1991). Council President Danilo Türk (Slovenia) would make a statement to the press following the adjournment of those consultations.

Under other matters, the Council was expected to continue its discussion, begun yesterday, on a draft presidential statement concerning the situation in Kosovo, he said. If agreement was reached on the draft, the Council would adopt the statement in a formal meeting.

The Spokesman said the United Nations had passed on to its offices in Afghanistan the warning by the United States embassy in Pakistan that all non- Muslim foreigners working in Afghanistan should leave that country because of safety concerns. The United Nations was preparing to move United Nations staff from Afghanistan, on an individual basis, should they wish to do so. All non-essential travel inside Afghanistan had been suspended to reduce the risk to staff. Meanwhile, the United Nations continued to operate inside Afghanistan and all of its programmes were continuing according to the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Operations (OCHA). The United Nations, itself, had not received any threats.

Available today was a progress report of the Secretary-General on the situation in Western Sahara (document S/1998/775), Mr. Eckhard said. The report finds that the total number of persons identified to vote in the referendum there was now 145,928. The Secretary-General notes in the report that the prospects were excellent for completing, this month, the identification of applicants from all Saharan tribes, other than those few that were still being contested. The Secretary-General added, however, that his Special Representative for Western Sahara, Charles Dunbar, had not received any practical suggestions from Morocco or the Polisario Front which would allow for a reconciliation of their differing points of view on the question of the contested tribes.

He said that the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva this morning appointed Mark Moher (Canada) as Chairman of the Ad Hoc Committee to negotiate a prohibition on the production of fissile material for nuclear weapons. The Committee was created on 11 August to draft a treaty to ban the future production of plutonium and enriched uranium. A press release from Geneva was available in the Spokesman's Office.

A press release from the World Food Programme, issued today in Abidjan, protests the looting of relief supplies in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mr. Eckhard said. Apparently, more than 800 metric tonnes of food aid

were looted and three vehicles were commandeered over the past two weeks in Uvira and Bukavu in the eastern Congo.

Mr. Eckhard drew attention to a document dated 11 August, but which appeared on the racks only yesterday. It was the Secretary-General's report on the Development Account, which was the result of a reform initiative (document A/52/1009). The report states that for the budget biennium 2000- 2001, the Development Account would be increased from its current level of $13 million by $40 million, thereby bringing it to a total of $53 million. Those funds were the result of administrative savings. The objective was to shift United Nations funds from the administrative side to the development side. The Under-Secretary-General for Management, Joseph E. Connor, was prepared to take correspondents' calls regarding questions about the Development Account.

The Spokesman announced payments to the regular budget by Bahrain and Côte d'Ivoire, making them the eighty-eighth and eighty-ninth Member States to pay their 1998 budget assessments in full. Bahrain presented a check in the amount of over $189,000; Côte d'Ivoire paid over $126,000.

He said there was a bit of confusion earlier in the week concerning the investigation into the plane crash in Angola on 26 June that killed the Secretary-General's Special Representative for Angola, Alioune Blondin Beye. In fact, an interim report had been issued in his absence, on 30 July. Anyone else who might have been away from Headquarters could check the Spokesman's Office for the record of that date.

A correspondent asked if the Special Envoy of the Secretary-General for Angola, Lakhdar Brahimi, had returned to New York and whether any details were available about what had transpired following his departure from Angola for a surrounding-nation tour. The Spokesman said Mr. Brahimi was due back any minute. He was expected to brief the Security Council early next week, although no specific date was available as yet. He would be in the building tomorrow, since he was expected to chair a meeting of the so-called "6 + 2" Committee on Afghanistan. Mr. Brahimi "still wore his Afghanistan hat". That Committee was composed of the six neighbouring States of Afghanistan, as well as the United States and the Russian Federation.

Another correspondent drew attention to a letter yesterday from the Permanent Representative of the Democratic People's Republic of the Congo, Mwamba Kapanga, describing the situation in his country. Asked for an update on the Secretary-General's position, the Spokesman reiterated his statement of yesterday that the United Nations was watching that situation closely. As he had reported yesterday, the Secretary-General was in Mali today.

The Spokesman warned against trying to "turn the Secretary-General into a magician" who could find instantaneous solutions to all the world's problems. The Secretary-General followed those issues closely, was often in touch with the key players by telephone, and tried to "nudge" things in the

Daily Press Briefing - 3 - 20 August 1998

right direction. He did not grandstand, however, and go before the cameras when he did not feel there was something very specific he felt he could accomplish.

The correspondent said the Secretary-General had gone to Iraq when the situation had warranted it, and that it seemed all of Africa would pay the consequences for the situation in the Congo. Mr. Eckhard said the Secretary- General had gone to Iraq with a mandate from the Security Council and an indication from Iraq that there was something that could be negotiated. It was not likely that his flying into the Congo today would change anything. "He is doing what he can from where he is."

There were those who felt that the Secretary-General might be the only one who could do anything for the Congo now, the correspondent said. Mr. Eckhard said he had nothing further to add.

Asked to describe the telephone conversation between the Secretary- General and Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister, Tariq Aziz, and whether any conversations had taken place today, Mr. Eckhard said that the last telephone conversation between them of which he was aware had been when the Secretary- General was in Lisbon approximately one week ago. The correspondent said he understood that the two had spoken by telephone yesterday, to which the Spokesman said he was not aware of such a conversation.

The correspondent then asked if there was any reaction from the Secretary-General or from other senior United Nations officials to Iraq's refusal again today to cooperate with the United Nations Special Commission for the disposal of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction (UNSCOM) after the Commission had sent a letter offering again to "talk about things". Mr. Eckhard said the issue concerned what the Executive Chairman of UNSCOM, Richard Butler would do -- he would most likely be reporting to the Council -- and what the Security Council would do in response.

Replying to a question about how many United Nations personnel were in Afghanistan, the Spokesman said that, for security reasons, his Office did not wish to report those numbers precisely. However, it was "in the area of a couple of dozen".

Asked for further information about a report from Geneva citing prostitution as a main source of employment in South-east Asia, Mr. Eckhard said the International Labour Organization (ILO) had issued the report. He had nothing more to add on that, but he offered to put the correspondent in contact with the ILO office, either in New York or Geneva, for a follow-up.

Daily Press Briefing - 4 - 20 August 1998

CORRECTION

The third paragraph on page 2 of yesterday's noon briefing notes incorrectly describes Dag Hammarskjold as the first Secretary-General of the United Nations. Mr. Hammarskjold, a national of Sweden, was the second Secretary-General, serving from 1953 through his death in 1961. The first Secretary-General was Trygve Lie of Norway, who held office from 1946 to 1953.

* *** *