PRESS BRIEFING ON PROTECTION OF CIVILIANS IN ARMED CONFLICT BY EMERGENCY RELIEF COORDINATOR, A.I.

Press Briefing

PRESS BRIEFING ON PROTECTION OF CIVILIANS IN ARMED CONFLICT BY EMERGENCY RELIEF COORDINATOR, A.I.

Carolyn McAskie, Emergency Relief Coordinator, a.i., briefed correspondents at Headquarters today on the protection of civilians in armed conflict.

She said she had come to remind correspondents of the Security Council's ongoing focus on humanitarian issues, noting that the Council set aside a day every month for considering humanitarian issues. In January the Council had taken up Africa, in February it had discussed the safety of humanitarian workers and in March it had considered humanitarian activities generally. Tomorrow, the Council would follow up on the issue of the protection of civilians in armed conflict.

She said the Council met on the item in February 1998. The Secretary- General's report and another meeting in September followed that meeting. Tomorrow, the Secretary-General would be reporting to the Council on progress made on the recommendations and resolution that had emerged from the last meeting. The discussion will include such issues such as displacement, impunity and pressure on governments to ratify international instruments, the questions of conflict prevention, targeted sanctions and special measures for women and children. She looked to the Council for guidance and was anticipating a resolution or presidential statement to come out of tomorrow's meeting. Her office was ready to report to the Council at any time.

There remained, however, a number of issues that humanitarian organizations continued to face and where they needed the support of the international community, issues that were different from those of the past, she said. There had been an increase in bandit elements that were difficult to control and that deliberately targeted civilians and humanitarian workers. Millions of citizens had been displaced in places like Afghanistan and Burundi. In Chechnya, the war was displacing a large number of persons. Attempts were being made to find ways to deliver assistance to persons inside Chechnya, but the conditions there for the most part precluded such efforts. Her office had been successful in assisting displaced persons outside of Chechnya.

Responding to a question from a correspondent, she said security personnel had warned humanitarian workers not to go into Chechnya. Although they had managed to deliver several truckloads of food and non-food items into Grozny on 2 February, continued banditry in the area posed a problem. It was feared that workers would be nabbed and used as hostages in negotiations. She recalled that several humanitarian workers had been kidnapped in the past. The Russian Federation was not putting specific obstacles in the way -- although they were conducting the war. In fact, the Russians were anxious for the humanitarian workers to go into Chechnya. It was up to the humanitarian workers to decide when it was feasible.

Regarding Sierra Leone, she said that even with the deployment of the United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone (UNAMSIL), humanitarian workers were still unable to reach certain areas in the North. The situation of women in Sierra Leone was

McAskie Briefing - 2 - 18 April 2000

particularly difficult. The human rights workers on the UNAMSIL team had reported that the incidence of sexual attacks was worse than in Bosnia, where rape was considered a war crime. In fact, situations where girls were held for several months and years at a time constituted sexual torture. In Angola, there were millions of displaced people.

Asked for an update on the situation in the Horn of Africa and whether or not Eritrea's offer of its port for the delivery of humanitarian goods had been accepted by Ethiopia, she said that her position was that she would like to use all the ports. Currently, humanitarian activities were being managed through Djibouti and Somalia, but in the long run all available ports would be needed. At the moment, she was waiting for a report from the Executive Director of the World Food Programme, Catherine Bertini, who is also the Special Envoy of the Secretary- General on the Drought in the Horn of Africa.

Ms. Bertini's office was pulling together information from her mission on the places they had visited -- Eritrea, Ethiopia, Djibouti and Somalia. They would also be meeting with country coordinators from neighbouring countries to determine if major international assistance would be required. That Office would be holding a press conference in Nairobi tomorrow and she would be better able to answer questions on the situation then. She said she would be willing to hold another briefing tomorrow when she had more up-to-date information.

In reply to another question, Ms. McAskie described areas in which there had been progress in the protection of civilians in armed conflict. She noted that there was an Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The age of child soldiers had been raised. Also, the International Red Cross Conference in October had dealt with a number of those issues and was putting pressure on States in terms of their responsibility under international humanitarian law. The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs had been increasingly moving into areas to hold meetings with rebel groups to talk about humanitarian law and what it meant. The first step had to be taken somewhere, she said. Moreover, it was important to let the rebels know that the world was watching their actions.

Missions today included child protection workers, human rights workers and humanitarian liaison workers, she noted. They were trying to bring human rights and humanitarian workers closer to the political and peacekeeping aspects. On another front, humanitarian organizations have been advocating ratification of the Statute of the International Criminal Court. There were 95 signatories, but only six nations of the 60 nations needed had ratified the Statute.

Continuing, she said that Frances Deng, Representative of the Secretary- General for Internally Displace Persons, had produced a work on how existing international law could be applied to the protection of internally displaced persons. Those booklets had been distributed, along with a handbook for United Nations personnel in the field, on how to implement the principles.

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