DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SECRETARY-GENERAL

Press Briefing

DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SECRETARY-GENERAL

The following is a near-verbatim transcript of today’s noon briefing by Shirley Brownell, spokeswoman for the President of the General Assembly, and Fred Eckhard, Spokesman for the Secretary-General.

**Introduction

It is my great pleasure to introduce to you the spokeswoman for the incoming President of the General Assembly, who will be elected this afternoon. She is Shirley Brownell. Many of you know her as the Chief of the News Distribution Section -- those people who bring you those helpful little summaries of the wire services three times a day, as well as the clippings.

Shirley, congratulations on your new appointment.

Starting today we will start to do things a little bit differently. Shirley will lead off the meeting –- seeing as I can never start on time, despite my New Year’s resolution to try to do so this year. So we’ll use those minutes productively by letting Shirley brief you. I’ll be back, late as usual.

**Briefing by Shirley Brownell

Thank you, Fred, for that introduction.

I’d like to say, by way of introducing myself, that I know some of you personally, and others by your bylines. It has been my job these past five years to monitor what you in the media write and says about the United Nations, and then to disseminate those stories in house. They are in the format of Daily Press Clippings and Political Information Bulletins. In this new capacity, I hope, over the coming months, to share with you information about the President of the General Assembly, Foreign Minister Theo-Ben Gurirab of Namibia, and the Assembly over which he presides. My office is located on the second floor, in Room C-204; and my phone number is 963-0755. Stop by when and if you have questions, and I’ll be happy to assist you.

Now to the work of the Assembly. The General Assembly will convene at 3 p.m. today, which is also the International Day of Peace. The Chairman of the delegation of Uruguay will open the session, followed by a minute of silent prayer or meditation. At this first meeting, the Assembly will appoint the nine members of the Credentials Committee. The names are confidential until announced.

The Assembly will then elect the President of the fifty-fourth session, Foreign Minister Theo-Ben Gurirab of the Republic of Namibia. The newly elected President will then address the Assembly. Copies of his statement, with a 3:30 p.m. embargo, will be available in room 378 after the briefing.

Following his acceptance speech, the President will preside over the admission of three new Members -- the Pacific island nations of Kiribati, Nauru and Tonga – which will bring membership of the Organization to 188 Member States. The flag-raising ceremony for the three new Member States will take place in front of the Delegates’ Entrance, after the adjournment of the second plenary meeting, at about 5 p.m. today. I have pictures from a web site of the three new Member States’ flags.

The Assembly will adjourn its first meeting, followed immediately by consecutive meetings of the six Main Committees to elect the Chairmen. Expected to chair the Committees are: Raimundo Gonzalez (Chile), to head the Committee on Disarmament and International Security (First Committee); Sotirios Zackheos (Cyprus), to chair the Special Political and Decolonization Committee (Fourth Committee); Roble Olhaye (Djibouti), to chair the Economic and Financial (Second Committee); Ambassador Vladimir Galuska (Czech Republic), who will chair the Social, Humanitarian and Cultural Committee (Third Committee); Penny Wensley (Australia), who will chair the Administrative and Budgetary Committee (Fifth Committee); and Percy Mangoaela (Lesotho), who will chair the Legal Committee (Sixth Committee). The Main Committees will then adjourn and this will be followed by a second plenary meeting.

At the second plenary meeting, the Assembly will elect its 21 Vice-Presidents: five from African States; five from Asian States; one from Eastern European States; three from Latin American and Caribbean States; two from Western European and other States; and the five permanent members of the Security Council -- China, France, Russian Federation, United Kingdom and the United States. These 21 Vice-Presidents, the Chairmen of the Main Committees and the Assembly President will constitute the 28-member General Committee, which will meet at 10 a.m. tomorrow, 15 September, in Conference Room 3 to take up the organization of the session, adoption of the agenda and the allocation of 166 provisional items, five supplementary items, plus an additional item requested by the Secretary-General, on the financing of the United Nations Mission in East Timor, for a total of 172 items.

A reminder: the Assembly President will hold a press conference at 11 a.m. on Thursday, 16 September, here in Room 226.

A final note: as of this afternoon, you can find information about the fifty- fourth General Assembly presidency on the United Nations Homepage on the Internet. The address is: .

**Question and Answer Session

Question: There was a move about two years ago to cut back the agenda and let the General Assembly focus more on themes. I notice that now we are back to 172 items. When did this happen and how?

Spokeswoman: I think this is a case of “mission creep”. Every year, there are requests for the inclusion of more items in the agenda, and gradually, the number of items increase. But from time to time, the Assembly makes an effort to pare them down.

Question: Why is it the Western European and other States have only one Vice- President, while Africa has five and Asia has five?

Spokeswoman: This is done according to a formula approved by the Assembly. You have to bear in mind that four of the five of the permanent members of the Security Council represent Western and Eastern European countries -- France, the United Kingdom and the United States from the former group, and the Russian Federation from the latter. If you add up the numbers, you therefore get a total of two General Committee members from Eastern Europe, and five from Western European and other States.

Briefing by the Spokesman for the Secretary-General

Congratulations with your inaugural briefing. We are going to have Navanethem Pillay, the President of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, join us at the briefing shortly.

**East Timor

Personnel from the United Nations Mission in East Timor (UNAMET) in Dili were relocated to Darwin, Australia, late last night. Sixty international staff and 60 local staff with immediate dependents left the compound along with 1,424 internally displaced persons (IDPs) who had sought refuge in the compound. They were transported on 11 flights organized by the air forces of Australia and New Zealand.

The relocation became necessary because the conditions at the compound were becoming untenable; overcrowded and poor sanitary conditions in an overall context of serious security concerns. The compound had become a large IDP camp and the very poor security conditions did not allow UNAMET staff to fulfil their mandate. Fearing for their safety, we negotiated with Indonesia and Australia for their evacuation as well. As you know, the IDP group is composed mostly of women and children. And by now there may be a new member of the group -- one woman went into labour during the flight to Darwin and was rushed to a hospital on arrival.

UNAMET staff have been under tremendous hardship and they will take a few days rest in Darwin in order to be able to return to East Timor once law and order are restored to allow them to continue their work following the popular consultation of 30 August. The Secretary-General described the situation when he was asked this morning. He said, “give our people a bit of rest for them to go back in and do their work. They’ve been holed up, not able to do much. We kept a core staff and will be going back shortly.”

Twelve UNAMET, Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) international staff remain in Dili. They are now in the Australian Consulate, which has electricity and water. The most senior UNAMET officer in Dili and the acting Head of the Mission that stays behind is the Chief Military Liaison Officer - Brigadier General Rezaqul Haider of Bangladesh.

Our Security Coordination Office here in New York was informed at 1:30 this morning that the UNAMET compound was being looted by Indonesian military personnel, the very people we asked to secure the compound when we moved to the Australian Consulate. Office equipment and computers were carted away and vehicles were trashed.

You may have seen reports that the compound has been set on fire, as well, but the information we have from about 10 hours ago was that a small house in the vicinity was on fire. We cannot confirm at this time that the compound was set ablaze.

Meanwhile, here in New York, the Security Council started consultations on East Timor at 11:30 this morning. A draft resolution on the establishment of a multinational force was circulated. Council members consider this an urgent matter and want to adopt the resolution as early as possible. We understand that an expert meeting will take place this afternoon to review the draft and the matter may be reviewed under other matters in consultations previously scheduled for this afternoon.

Today’s session is a follow up to consultations the Council held yesterday afternoon, when they heard the report of the Council Mission that went to Jakarta and Dili. They were also briefed by the Secretary-General on latest developments and on his meeting with Foreign Minister Ali Alatas of Indonesia.

This morning the Secretary-General met again with Mr. Alatas. He also had separate meetings with Foreign Minister Jaime Gama of Portugal and Alexander Downer, the Australian Foreign Minister. Upon entering headquarters today, the Secretary- General said that good progress was made yesterday and that “we are going to move ahead”. He added that his hope is that it should be possible to have elements of the multinational force on the ground by the weekend at the latest.

The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reports that an estimated 200,000 of East Timor’s population of 800,000 remain in their homes. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said reports from various sources speak of families being separated while being forcibly taken to West Timor.

Some of the 13,000 internally displaced assembled in four sites in Dili: the harbour; the regional police headquarters; the government compound; and the military headquarters. They told UNHCR they were terrified after being told by the Indonesian military that they would be taken to West Timor or elsewhere in Indonesia. They say they had been assembled in the four sites by the military. They want to stay in Dili, but they are too terrified to say it aloud in the atmosphere of total intimidation, which prevails there. Some said before the arrival of the Security Council delegation last Saturday, they were ordered to wear bandannas with Indonesian colours to pose as opponents of independence.

The overall degree of displacement in East Timor is not known, but it could go into hundreds of thousands.

In Jakarta, the newly appointed humanitarian coordinator Ross Mountain is in discussion with United Nations agencies and donor governments about the feasibility of airdrops to East Timorese in need of urgent humanitarian assistance. The World Food Program (WFP) says it will be announcing its emergency program for East Timor tomorrow.

United Nations humanitarian organizations together with local and international partner groups are ready to reach the most vulnerable as soon as security permits.

For more information on the humanitarian situation, we have available a note prepared by OCHA, the notes from the UNHCR briefing in Geneva and a Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) press release.

**Security Council

The Security Council will hold consultations at 4:30 this afternoon. On the agenda: International Tribunals of the Former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. Louise Arbour, the Prosecutor of the Tribunals, will give Council members her last briefing before she goes on to her new functions in Canada tomorrow. Mrs. Arbour is expected to review the work of the Prosecutor’s Office. She will speak to the press at the stake out area after she briefs the Council

During this afternoon’s consultations, Council members will also be briefed by Hedi Annabi, Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, on the postponement of the elections in the Central African Republic.

**Federal Republic of Yugoslavia

I have a rather long statement attributable to the Spokesman of the Secretary- General on the deteriorating humanitarian situation in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY). I will read part of it, but you can get the full text in my office.

The Secretary-General is alarmed at the deteriorating humanitarian situation in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (excluding Kosovo), particularly in view of the coming winter. Data collected by the United Nations indicates that the vulnerable population of Serbia and Montenegro is growing. In addition to half a million refugees and internally displaced from previous Balkan conflicts, an estimated 200,000 people have been displaced from Kosovo to other parts of the FRY. There is a real threat of rising food prices and dwindling drug supply, problems which will be exacerbated by plummeting household income. Of greater concern is that winter electricity supplies are projected to be 30 to 50 per cent below requirements, which threatens to deprive the urban poor – the displaced, the elderly, children, the unemployed, the institutionalized -– of heating, running water, health-care and the capacity to freeze and cook food.

In light of the increasingly disturbing situation, the Secretary-General has asked the Emergency Relief Coordinator to lead efforts to mobilize resources to meet these needs. The Secretary-General strongly urges donors to give prompt and generous support to this strictly humanitarian operation.

**Kosovo

On Kosovo, UNHCR, saying it has been back in Kosovo for 90 days since Monday, today reported that some 810,000 refugees have so far streamed back into Kosovo, and thousands more return each week on direct flights from third countries to Pristina or nearby Skopje airports, while others come back in their own vehicles.

UNHCR also says its winterization program is well underway. This is a critical time for the winter preparations, and a great many Kosovars living in mountainous regions are already feeling the autumn nip. Some people living in tents up in the hills complain that they cannot sleep at night because of the chill.

The security situation facing non-Albanians has been a major concern for UNHCR. Violent attacks particularly against Serbs and Roma occur regularly. UNHCR and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) have released a report on the matter, and they are calling for more outspoken attention to this matter not only by the international community, but by local leaders at all levels, as the message must get down to the community level that violence is unacceptable.

Meanwhile, the Secretary-General’s Special Envoy for the Balkans, Carl Bildt, is heading today to Bucharest where he will represent the Secretary-General at a ministerial meeting of the South-East European Cooperation Process. The meeting will address important topics for the region as a whole. On Thursday, Bildt will be in Brussels to take part, again on behalf of the Secretary-General, in the inaugural meeting of the Regional Table of the Stability Pact for South-Eastern Europe.

**Cuba

The Special Rapporteur on the use of mercenaries, Enrique Bernales Ballesteros, is visiting Cuba at the invitation of the Government of that country. During the mission, which will take place from 12 to 18 September, the Special Rapporteur intends to collect first-hand information in order to evaluate allegations of mercenary activities against Cuba.

In his reports to the General Assembly and the Commission on Human Rights, the Special Rapporteur had mentioned communications received from the Government of Cuba in which reference was made to mercenary attacks on that country. The communications referred to various groups involving Cuban nationals residing in southern Florida in the Unites States.

**Democratic Republic of the Congo

On the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), there continues to be deployment of the United Nations mission there. Most of the first batch of military liaison officers is now in the field. As of today, there are three in Kinshasa, in the DRC; one in Windhoek, Namibia; two in Kampala, Uganda; two in Kigali, Rwanda; and two in Harare, Zimbabwe. Later today, we will have one in Bujumbura, Burundi; four in Lusaka, Zambia, who will work with the Joint Military Commission (JMC). Tomorrow there will be eight more in Kinshasa. And another group of four is expected in Nairobi to receive their induction course.

**International Year for the Culture of Peace

This morning, the Secretary-General officially launched the International Year for the Culture of Peace by ringing the Peace Bell on the front lawn.

He acknowledged that sometimes it may seem as if a culture of peace does not stand a chance against the cultures of war, violence, impunity and intolerance. Achieving peace may be a painfully slow process, and results can be fragile and imperfect. “But,” he said, “peace is in our hands. We can do it.”

You can pick up copies of that speech on the racks (Press Release SG/SM/7130).

**HIV in Africa

A new study of HIV rates in several African countries shows that younger women are catching the disease mostly from older men, according to the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).

The study found that up to 23 per cent of teenage girls are infected, compared to only four per cent of teenage boys. “The unavoidable conclusion,” said UNAIDS Executive Director Peter Piot, “is that girls are getting infected not by boys their own age, but by older men.”

You can read more about that in the press release that is available.

Any questions before we go to Ms. Pillay? **Question and answer session

Question: Do you have any information on security restrictions during the opening of the session?

Spokesman: Yes, we had a meeting yesterday with the Chief of Security, Mike McCann. He is going to give us something in writing for you, I hope by the end of the day. The good news is that the arrangements last year, that shut down everything on First Avenue and surrounding areas for 10 days, this year will only be done for 3 days, and it will not be 24 hours a day as last year, but will be only for daylight hours. But we’ll get the specifics for you. Otherwise, I think everything is pretty much the same as in previous years. He promised us something in writing and I hope we’ll have it soon.

Question: Is the Secretary-General going to sit down with all three, or two of the three Foreign Ministers this afternoon?

Spokesman: I don’t know how that is going to play out. I know I mentioned a day or two ago that he had hoped to have a trilateral meeting, but there isn’t one on his program for today. The focus is quickly shifting to the Security Council, now that they have a draft resolution –- I assume they have one. I think they may be going late into the night considering that draft.

Question: Could that resolution be passed before the meetings upstairs are finished?

Spokesman: I hope not. The consultations with the Foreign Ministers, we feel, are important to sort out any remaining uncertainties. We feel that if we get these things sorted out now, we’ll prevent lots of problems developing on the ground. But at the same time, the Council is eager to adopt this resolution. The two things are running in tandem.

Question: Is there going to be any document signed upstairs? Will the Indonesian Foreign Minister sign anything that says somewhere that Australia will be the commander?

Spokesman: That detail will be in the Security Council resolution. I don’t know that any other document is necessary, but I have to double check for you.

Question: I’ve heard that Australia nor any other countries will be mentioned in the Security Council resolution. Will the Secretary-General still go with Australia leading the force, and if not, who is next in line?

Spokesman: I think that is for the Security Council members to decide. The Secretary-General continues to consult and will consult in the course of today. I don’t think there is any question that Australia will participate in the force. A week ago, the Secretary-General announced that Australia was willing to lead, and we’ll just have to see how that plays out. I frankly don’t know the latest. I think it’s the Council Members that are debating that point now.

Question: Who is guarding the Australian Consulate where the United Nations staff is staying?

Spokesman: I don’t know, I can only speculate. As a diplomatic facility, I assume they have a certain security element from their own nation. And, of course, the Indonesian military are also responsible for maintaining law and order [laughter].