DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL

Press Briefing

DAILY PRESS BRIEFING OF OFFICE OF SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL

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

Briefing by Spokesman for Secretary-General

We’ll now start the regular briefing.

**Kosovo Elections

In Kosovo today at 4:30 p.m. local time, which was 10:30 a.m. here in New York, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative in Kosovo, Bernard Kouchner, along with the Chairman of the Central Election Commission and the Deputy Commander of KFOR, certified the results of the municipal elections which took place in the province on Sunday 28 October.

The Central Election Commission noted that all rules and regulations were complied with and that the turnout was 79 per cent.

The results of 27 municipalities were certified while the results of three municipalities were not, due to low voter turnout. These three -– Zvecan, Zubin Potok and Leposavic –- are inhabited mostly by Kosovo Serbs. The members of those municipal assemblies will be appointed by the Special Representative in the next several days pending by-elections which could be held in the next year.

The swearing in for all the municipal assemblies will take place on 11 November.

The announcement of the certification was delayed by a bomb threat received at United Nations Interim Administration in Kosovo headquarters at about 2:30 p.m. local time. The UNMIK premises were evacuated for about an hour. Staff was permitted to return after the buildings were declared safe by ordnance experts.

**Brahimi Report Follow-Up

Among the documents out on the racks today is an addendum to the report of the Secretary-General on the resource requirements needed to implement the recommendations of the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations, which was chaired by Lakhdar Brahimi.

The report provides details on plans to revise the structure and staffing of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations, by adding an estimated 189 new posts and establishing three different offices headed by Assistant Secretaries-General. The offices would deal respectively with operations; with military and civilian police affairs; and with logistics, management and mine action.

The added cost of such changes in the Peacekeeping Department is estimated at some $12 million.

Daily Press Briefing - 2 - 7 November 2000

In addition, proposed changes to the Department of Political Affairs -– including the addition of an information and strategic analysis secretariat for the Executive Committee on Peace and Security -- would result in an addition of 44 new posts to the Department, at an added cost of some $6 million.

**Ebola Update

The World Health Organization (WHO) reports the cumulative number of cases of the Ebola haemorrhagic fever in the Gulu district of Uganda as 284. This figure includes 91 deaths. There have been three confirmed cases in the Mbarara district, including one death.

The mortality rate for this strain is holding steady at around 30 per cent, a much lower figure than other strains reported last week, and over 110 persons have been discharged from the hospitals. Although these figures are encouraging, WHO states that they will not be able to declare the outbreak over until 42 days after the last case is reported.

**Office of Iraq Programme

According to the weekly update from the Office of the Iraq Programme, in the week leading to 3 November, Iraq exported 14.8 million barrels of oil for an estimated revenue of $389 million.

Since the start of the current phase eight of the oil-for-food programme in June, Iraq has exported 316 million barrels of oil worth just over $8 billion.

There was yet another increase in the total value of contracts placed on hold by the Security Council’s Sanctions Committee on Iraq. At the end of last week, it stood at $2.3 billion, both for humanitarian supplies and oil industry spare parts and equipment. The transport and telecommunications sector continues to have the highest level of contracts placed on hold, with almost half of the circulated contracts, 47.5 per cent to be exact, currently put on hold by Committee members.

**UNHCR Notes

Today’s press briefing notes from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees mentions efforts to assist thousands of Angolan refugees who have either crossed or are waiting to cross the border into the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

The UNHCR warns that a fuel shortage in the Congo has complicated efforts to transport aid from Kinshasa to the Angolan refugees, several thousand of whom have already arrived in the southern province of Bandundu. Aid flights that had been planned for the weekend were postponed because of lack of airplane fuel, and the UNHCR is hoping that it can fly some needed supplies to the region later today.

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**Geneva Notes

Tomorrow, in Geneva, Senegalese singer Youssou N'dour will be named the International Labour Organization’s Ambassador in the global campaign against child labour. Also tomorrow, the ILO is expected to issue a report on its recent mission to Myanmar.

Further details can be found in today’s briefing notes from Geneva, which also include some more information on United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson’s trip to the Middle East, which begins tomorrow.

**Reports

Among the documents on the racks today is the report of the Secretary- General on Questions Relating to Information, and the financial report and audited financial statements for the biennium ended 31 December 1999 by the Board of Auditors. There is also a list of delegations to the fifty-fifth session of the General Assembly, which is a popular document.

**Secretary-General’s Trip

As we announced, the Secretary-General will leave this evening for Geneva on a trip that will also take him to Bahrain and Qatar.

The general outline of his programme is available in my office, and also on our Web site under “Daily Schedule”.

**World Chronicle

And the Department of Public Information has asked me to tell you that the World Chronicle programme No.810 will feature Joseph Connor, the Under-Secretary- General for Management, and you can see that today on in-house television channels 3 or 31 starting at 2:30.p.m.

That’s all I have for you. Anything, before we go to Sue?

Question: On Côte d’Ivoire, could you confirm that Mr. Brahimi will be sent by the Secretary-General to speak with the Ivorian authorities about United Nations participation in the next parliamentary elections?

Spokesman: I cannot confirm that at this time. I’ll double check for you after the briefing if I can say anything about that. Anything else? Okay Sue, over to you.

Briefing by Spokeswoman for President of General Assembly

Thank you. The plenary this morning finished their discussion on the International Atomic Energy Agency but they will not be taking any action on the resolution until Friday. Then they took up Cooperation between the United Nations and the Organization of African Unity and there will be no resolution on that

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until later. Following that, they will deal with cooperation between the United Nations and the Caribbean Community. There will be a draft resolution on that which we expect them to adopt today.

The final agenda today relates to the Millennium celebrations’ Bethlehem 2000 Project. After adoption of this resolution, which we expect today, this item will be taken off the agenda of the General Assembly. So that’s one less item for next year.

Tomorrow the plenary will discuss cooperation between the United Nations and the Inter-Parliamentary Union. I don’t think the resolution on this will be ready for tomorrow though.

**Third Committee

In the Third Committee this morning, discussion continued on the question of refugees and the report of the High Commissioner for Refugees.

This afternoon, the Committee will hear the introduction of 19 draft resolutions, mostly relating to human rights issues. Action on these and all the other resolutions before the Third Committee will start tomorrow and will continue through Friday, which is supposed to be the last day for the Committee.

**Fourth Committee

In the Fourth Committee: the programme of work for the Fourth Committee is available in the Spokesman’s Office for this week. Today they're having a working group meeting, as for yesterday, and informal consultations. And tomorrow morning you can expect some action on some draft resolutions.

**Fifth Committee

The Fifth Committee is scheduled to conclude its discussions on human resources-related items today and programme planning.

And there is a slightly updated version of the timetable of the General Assembly which we have in the Spokesman’s Office, if you would like it. That’s all I have. Any questions?

Question: The Special Committee on Peacekeeping Operations is meeting in closed session. Is there going to be some sort of report passed on to the Fourth Committee when they consider the report?

Spokeswoman: I assume they will have something for the Fourth Committee. I know they were still discussing it when I was down there earlier. But they adjourned until five o’clock this afternoon so I’m not sure when they would have anything ready.

Question: Would it also be made available to us?

Spokeswoman: Oh yes, if it goes to the Committee it would be a public document.

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Question: Do you think we would get it tomorrow?

Spokeswoman: I don’t know about tomorrow. Let me see. I’m not sure they are going to be ready. The working group might not be ready by then. But I can find out for sure if they are going to take it up later. Is that all? Thank you.

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