DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE FOR SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL

Press Briefing

DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE FOR SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL

Fred Eckhard, the Spokesman for the Secretary-General, opened today's noon briefing by announcing it was a pleasantly quiet news day at United Nations Headquarters, a good day for a briefing by the Chief of the Emergency Liaison Branch of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Kevin Kennedy, who had just returned from an assessment mission to Angola, where deteriorating security was hampering emergency aid delivery, and by the Deputy Director of the Emergency Response Division of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Frank O'Donnell, who had been on the joint UNDP/OCHA mission with Mr. Kennedy. (The briefing by Mr. Kennedy and Mr. O'Donnell is issued separately.)

A flight on a United Nations Special Commission on Iraq (UNSCOM) carrier had taken 86 personnel into Baghdad today, Mr. Eckhard said. Those personnel would be reopening their offices and they should begin monitoring declared sites tomorrow. Another flight tomorrow would bring in the last six Chilean crew members handling the helicopter transport for UNSCOM, which is expected to get under way with its full range of activities shortly. On the humanitarian side, all the United Nations staff members who had been pulled aside to Amman, Jordan, and had been scheduled to return, had now arrived back in Baghdad.

Mr. Eckhard then said the Security Council had met this morning for consultations on Burundi and had been briefed by the Assistant Secretary-General of Political Affairs, Ibrahima Fall, on the massacre of civilians by Burundian armed forces in Bujumbura Province. About 100 people were estimated to have died in that early November incident. The Council had then discussed a draft resolution introduced yesterday on the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia with a view to adopting it in a formal meeting today. The Resolution condemned the failure so far of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to execute arrest warrants issued by the Tribunal, and demanded the immediate and unconditional execution of those warrants.

For the second day in a row, Mr. Eckhard said, the World Food Programme (WFP) had sounded alarm bells in Angola. In a press release issued in Rome today, the WFP had expressed fear that a major food airlift in south-eastern Angola would possibly be required within the next few weeks after authorities had suspended deliveries because of grave security concerns. A WFP convoy returning from delivering food to Huambo and Kuito under United Nations escort had been turned back on Sunday. Intense fighting had reportedly been taking place between Government forces and those of the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) in that area, which until now had been the only relatively safe passage for trucks delivering emergency food aid to a large portion of the South. "Our briefing guests will have more to say on that", Mr. Eckhard added.

The spokesman for the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights had announced today in Geneva that the Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Nigeria, Soli Sorabjee of India, would be visiting the country of his charge for the first time from 22 November to 1 December. The visit followed an invitation extended by the Government of Nigeria last September. Mr. Sorabjee had been appointed in October 1997 by the Chairman of the Commission on Human Rights.

This morning, the Secretary-General had received the World Methodist Peace Award, the Spokesman said. In his acceptance speech, he continued, the Secretary-General had recalled attending primary school at a Methodist institution in Ghana. There, he had said, the teachers had understood the value of knowledge infused with a moral purpose. The Secretary-General had recalled one Reverend in particular who had taught the students to "look beyond the obvious and remember there was more than one side to a story and more than one answer to a question". The full text of the Secretary-General's speech was available in room S-378.

Also in room S-378 were embargoed copies of the Secretary-General's speech this evening to the Foreign Policy Association in New York, Mr. Eckhard said. The Secretary-General was expected to touch on the subject of United States arrears to the United Nations and to stress the importance of the United States being engaged in foreign affairs.

The Director-General of the United Nations Office in Geneva, Vladimir Petrovsky, had delivered a speech today on behalf of the Secretary-General in Tirana, Albania, at a ceremony commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Mr. Eckhard said. The text of the speech was available in room S-378.

"On the subject of elephants", Mr. Eckhard said, recalling that last week it had been announced that the United Nations would receive a four-ton cast of a sleeping elephant from the Governments of Kenya, Namibia and Nepal. The cast had arrived and would be unveiled tomorrow at noon in the United Nations garden. Statements would be made by the representatives of the donor Governments, and the Secretary-General would deliver an address before unveiling the cast, reportedly created true to life by anaesthetizing an elephant, making a plaster cast and pouring a metal cast from the plaster. There would also be a poetry reading entitled, "A Charter for Elephant Rights".

The Third United Nations World Television Forum would be held this week on Thursday and Friday in the Economic and Social Council Chamber with the theme this year being, "The Future of Audiovisual Memory: Looking at the Twentieth Century -- Towards the Twenty-first Century", the Spokesman said. Among the subjects scheduled for discussion were the role of television in cultural progress and the impact of digital television on programming. Participants would also address the convergence between television and the

Daily Press Briefing - 3 - 17 November 1998

Internet. The Forum itself would be webcast live on the United Nations Home Page at and a note to correspondents would be issued with full details.

The summary of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) press briefing in Geneva today had included an item on the suspension of the UNHCR airlift repatriation of Sierra Leoneans from Guinea, following the discovery of several meningitis cases in some of the refugee camps, Mr. Eckhard said. The summary was available in room S-378.

On signatures, Mr. Eckhard said, Jordan and Paraguay had ratified the Convention on the Prohibition of Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-personnel Mines and on their Destruction, bringing the number of signatories on that convention to 51. Tuvalu had yesterday signed the Kyoto Protocol to the 1992 Framework Convention on Climate Change, bringing the number of signatory parties to 62.

Mr. Eckhard then welcomed six Iranian journalists attending the briefing as guests of the Department of Public Information (DPI), along with two staff members of the Boston Globe.

Asked by a correspondent to confirm that the UNSCOM inspectors would begin their work by "doing inspections of declared sites", Mr. Eckhard said the inspectors would begin their work by "monitoring" those declared sites. "Monitoring of declared sites does not include anything intrusive", Mr. Eckhard said. "That's the normal daily work of the inspectors who eventually do expect to get down to the full range of their activities."

Jadranka Mihalic, spokesman for General Assembly President Didier Opertti (Uruguay), said the plenary this morning had been considering agenda item 42, assistance in mine clearance. A draft resolution on the item (document A/53/L.28) had been introduced by Austria on behalf of the European Union, and 18 other speakers had been inscribed to address the Assembly on the issue.

Tomorrow morning, Mr. Mihalic said, the plenary would first take up the issue of Bethlehem 2000 and a related draft resolution (document A/53/L.37) before considering agenda item 44, the situation in Central America: procedures for the establishment of a firm and lasting peace and for progress in fashioning a region of peace, freedom, democracy and development. Three reports of the Secretary-General were before the Assembly, as were two draft resolutions. So far, nine delegations had been inscribed to address the Assembly on the item.

As for the work of the Main Committees, the spokesman said the Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization) would this afternoon conclude

Daily Press Briefing - 4 - 17 November 1998

its consideration of questions relating to information. The Second Committee (Economic and Financial) was holding informal consultations this morning on several draft resolutions before it.

In the Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) this afternoon, Ms. Mihalic continued, several draft resolutions would be introduced concerning the report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, as well as human rights questions. The Committee was also expected to take action on five other drafts on human rights questions. The Fifth Committee (Administrative and Budgetary) was holding informal consultations all day on the United Nations common system.

The Sixth Committee (Legal), Ms. Mihalic said, had been scheduled to take action this morning on three resolutions related to the United Nations Decade of International Law and one on the report of the Special Committee on the Charter of the United Nations and strengthening of the role of the Organization. This afternoon, the Committee had been scheduled to take action on drafts related to the report of the Committee on the Relations with the Host Country and on establishment of an International Criminal Court. At the end of the afternoon, the Sixth Committee would hold informal consultations on measures to eliminate international terrorism.

* *** *