DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL

Press Briefing

DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL

Manoel de Almeida e Silva, Deputy Spokesman for the Secretary-General, commenced today's noon briefing by informing correspondents that Fred Eckhard, the Secretary-General's Spokesman, was not at today's briefing because his mother had passed away last night. He said Mr. Eckhard had informed him that she was with her three children (Mr. Eckhard, his sister Nancy and his brother Donald) and had passed away peacefully. He believed the funeral would be on Monday.

In today's briefing there were two very distinguished guests -- the Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, Nitin Desai, and the Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Jose Antonio Ocampo, the Deputy Spokesman said. They would brief correspondents on a paper about the United Nations recommendations on international financial reforms. (That briefing will be issued separately).

The Deputy Spokesman then moved on to the Secretary-General's activities. The Secretary-General had left Luxembourg this afternoon, and was now in Davos, Switzerland, for the World Economic Forum. This evening, he would meet with the senior United Nations officials who were also participating in the meetings. Those were the Executive Director of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), Carol Bellamy; the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Sadako Ogata; the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson; the Executive Director of the United Nations Office for Drug Control and Crime Prevention, Pino Arlacchi; and the Director- General elect of the International Labour Organization (ILO), Juan Somavia.

Over the weekend, Mr. Almeida e Silva continued, the Secretary-General would meet with various world and business leaders, including a private session tomorrow for philanthropists which was organized by the United Nations Foundation. This would be chaired by Goran Lindahl, President and Chief Executive Officer of Asia Brown Boveri. More details on his agenda might be available over the weekend.

On Sunday, the Deputy Spokesman continued, the Secretary-General would be the keynote speaker at a session entitled "Global Politics for a Global Economy". He would be delivering the speech which had been the subject of the background briefing provided to journalists yesterday. Those who had been at that briefing had been given an advance copy of the speech with a strict embargo until Sunday at 11:30 a.m. New York time. Those who did not have it were welcome to collect a copy from the Spokesman's Office, he said, but it was under strict embargo.

The Deputy Spokesman said that earlier today in Luxembourg, where the Secretary-General had arrived last night, he had held various meetings, with the Prime Minister, Jean-Claude Juncker, the Foreign Minister and the

Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Trade Cooperation and Public Works. He had also met with the President of the Parliament, which had been followed by an audience with his Royal Highness, the Lieutenant Representative Prince Henri. He had later paid a courtesy call to the Lady Mayor of the city of Luxembourg. During his meetings, the Luxembourg authorities had expressed warm appreciation to the Secretary-General for having accepted to include Luxembourg in his schedule. They had also stressed the importance of his reform efforts, and their admiration and appreciation for all the work he had been doing as Secretary-General.

The Secretary-General had paid tribute to the Luxembourg Government for their support for the United Nations, the Deputy Spokesman said, and he had emphasized the importance he placed on keeping up communication with governments and parliaments of small countries. There had been a press conference at the end of his stay in Luxembourg. The transcript was not yet available, but was expected later today when it would be available to correspondents.

The Security Council was meeting this morning to consult on Eritrea/Ethiopia, Iraq and the situation relating to Kosovo, Mr Almeida e Silva said. The Council was expected to adopt a resolution on Eritrea/Ethiopia. Under other matters, there was a possibility that the Council might take up a paper on "practical proposals to the Sanctions Committees for the improvement of their work". Correspondents might recall, he said, that this had been an item on the Council's agenda yesterday but the item had been postponed.

Also yesterday, for the record, the Council had extended the mandates of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) and the United Nations Observer Mission in Georgia (UNOMIG) for a further period of six months, and had rolled over the mandate of the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO) until 11 February, he said.

On Ethiopia/Eritrea, the Deputy Spokesman said he had a statement attributable to the Spokesman of the Secretary-General. It read as follows: "On 15 January it was announced that the Secretary-General had decided to send his Special Envoy, Mohamed Sahnoun, to Eritrea and Ethiopia. It was also indicated that the dates for Ambassador Sahnoun's visit would be announced later. Following consultations with the parties and others concerned, Ambassador Sahnoun will be visiting Asmara, Eritrea, and Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from 1 to 6 of February, returning to New York thereafter".

The Secretary-General had submitted to the Security Council his report on Western Sahara, the Deputy Spokesman said. In it, the Secretary-General noted the Moroccan Government's decision to engage in detailed discussions with his Special Representative and the Chairman of the Identification Commission on the voter identification and appeals protocols. The Moroccan

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Government was now studying the clarifications provided by the United Nations. The Secretary-General hoped that the current consultations could lead to a prompt resumption of identification and to the initiation of the appeals process. He also welcomed the Moroccan Government's decision to formalize the status of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in the Territory. The Moroccan Government had also decided to proceed with the signature of the status-of-forces agreement concerning MINURSO.

The Deputy Spokesman said the talks on East Timor had continued today, after the Secretary-General's Personal Representative, Jamsheed Marker, had met yesterday with the Indonesian and Portuguese delegations. He had met for about an hour with the Portuguese and for close to two hours with the Indonesians. Today at 11 o'clock, Mr. Marker had resumed the talks in a tripartite format. They were expected to break for lunch and to continue in the afternoon. Talks would resume again on Tuesday. As he had yesterday, Mr. Marker had told the Spokesman's Office that he would talk to the press at the second floor stakeout at about 1:20 to 1:30 this afternoon. The Spokesman's Office would announce that he was on the way down over the public address system.

Mr. Almeida e Silva said a security assessment mission was due to travel to Freetown early next week at the request of the United Nations humanitarian coordinator, which would like to see the earliest possible return of international aid workers to the beleaguered city. A mission fielded by the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) and UNICEF had returned last night from Sierra Leone and had reported that the situation in Freetown was very serious, particularly in the health and sanitation sectors.

Meanwhile, he continued, the Secretary-General's Special Envoy, Francis Okelo, who had been at the centre of diplomatic activity to resolve the conflict in Sierra Leone, was scheduled to meet in Conakry, Guinea, today with troop contributors to the Economic Community of West African States Monitoring Group (ECOMOG). The Secretary-General, in his report to the Security Council of 7 January, had commended the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the United States for their support to ECOMOG and had encouraged other Member States to make further contributions. In that context, the Deputy Spokesman welcomed the most recent contributor to the Trust Fund for ECOMOG -- Canada -- and also welcomed a pledge by Italy to assist ECOMOG forces as they worked to restore security in that country.

In Arusha this morning, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda had heard the pre-sentencing briefs on the case of Omar Serushago, the Deputy Spokesman said. The accused had tearfully asked for forgiveness for his crimes from the people of Rwanda, the Court, the international community and God. Omar Serushago had pleaded guilty to genocide and other crimes during his initial appearance on 14 December 1998. He was the first leader of the Interahamwe militia to plead guilty before the Tribunal. The sentence would be

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delivered on 5 February. A press release was available with more detail in the Spokesman's Office.

Also available in the Spokesman's Office, he said, were two press releases from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). One was on the conclusion of the second round of talks on a global treaty on persistent organic pollutants such as DDT and PCBs. The second announced the appointment by UNEP Executive Director, Klaus Toepfer, of Willem Wijnstekers of the Netherlands as Secretary-General of the Geneva-based Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.

On payments, Mr. Almeida e Silva said, two more countries had joined the honour roll today by paying their dues in full and on time. Poland had come through with more than $2 million, and South Africa, with about $3.8 million. The Deputy Spokesman also thanked Germany for paying over $50 million towards its regular budget dues. A list of countries that had paid their contributions was available in the Spokesman's Office.

Moving on to treaties, he said that Israel had just signed the Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings. So far, 41 countries had signed that treaty, but only Uzbekistan had ratified it.

Concluding the briefing, Mr. Almeida e Silva said, was the usual Friday Week Ahead feature. He gave some highlights from the full listing, which was available in the Spokesman's Office. As correspondents knew, the Secretary- General would be in Davos over the weekend and on Sunday he would deliver a speech at the World Economic Forum. The Secretary-General was expected to be back in New York on Monday afternoon.

As the Presidency of the Security Council turned over to Canada on 1 February, he continued, the new President would hold bilateral meetings on Monday. Also beginning Monday, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) would hold a week-long international seminar in Vienna on the Year 2000 (Y2K) issue as it affects nuclear safeguards. An information sheet was available from the Spokesman's Office for interested correspondents. The Commission on Human Rights working group on arbitrary detention would visit Indonesia and East Timor from 1 to 12 February. The team hoped to visit several detention facilities, including one reportedly holding a large number of political detainees, including Xanana Gusmao, with whom they hoped to meet.

The programme of work for the month of February was expected to be agreed upon in Security Council consultations on Tuesday, he said. Western Sahara, Kosovo, the Central African Republic, Haiti, Angola and, of course, Iraq were expected to be discussed during the course of the week. Louise Arbour, in her capacity as Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, would leave on Tuesday for Arusha, United Republic of Tanzania, headquarters of the Tribunal, where she would spend most of the

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month. Finally, the Secretary-General's Personal Representative, Mr. Marker, was expected to talk to reporters at the end of the current round of talks on East Timor.

In response to a request that the Mr. Sahnoun meet with the press, Mr. Almeida e Silva said he would ask him.

He explained to a correspondent seeking to know which "proposal" on Iraq was now the main theme of discussion by the Council, he explained that he was not in a position to comment on it at this time. It was a matter that was being handled by the Security Council within its consultation room, and by the different members of the Council.

A correspondent asked the Deputy Spokesman to convey, on behalf of the press at Headquarters, condolences to Mr. Eckhard and his family.

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