DAILY PRESS BRIEFING BY THE OFFICE OF THE SPOKESMAN FOR THE SECRETARY-GENERAL

The following is a near-verbatim transcription of today's noon briefing by Fred Eckhard, Spokesman for the Secretary-General:

**Guest at Noon Briefing

Catherine Bertini, Executive Director of the World Food Programme (WFP), is the guest today.  She will be releasing a new WFP World Hunger Map and a press release on hunger hot spots in the year 2001.

**Secretary-General at UNOPS Building

The Secretary-General began his work this morning by taking a guided tour of the new offices in the Chrysler Building of the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS), the arm of the United Nations which provides management services for the United Nations system and Member States.

The event began with the Secretary-General and Reinhart Helmke, the Executive Director of UNOPS, cutting a ribbon at the entrance of the new offices.  After touring the new UNOPS offices on the fourth and fifth floors of the Chrysler building, the Secretary-General said he was impressed by the innovative use of office space.  We have copies of his remarks made at the inauguration of the offices available upstairs.

**Depleted Uranium

The United Nations mission in Kosovo says that the United Nations and KFOR have taken the issue of depleted uranium very seriously since their arrival in June 1999.

The Secretary-General’s Special Representative Bernard Kouchner has made an urgent appeal to the World Health Organization (WHO) to send public health experts to assist in monitoring any possible health consequences among the civilian population of the use of depleted uranium.  According to initial findings by WHO and the Kosovo department of health, there has been no increase in the incidence of leukemia among adults over the past four years.

Kouchner is also in touch with North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Secretary-General, George Robertson, on how to coordinate approaches.

Meanwhile, WHO held a press conference in Geneva a short while ago and we have their background briefing note available for you upstairs.  The WHO said it does not have enough information about the exposure situation in Kosovo, nor about the number of soldiers involved to determine of the leukemia rate is higher than normal.

The United Nations Environment Program Executive Director and the head of its Depleted Uranium Assessment Team, which is currently finalizing its study on depleted uranium, will hold a news conference on Wednesday in Geneva.

**Security Council

There are no Security Council consultations scheduled for today.

Tomorrow, the Council expects to discuss Sierra Leone in its closed consultations.  Also tomorrow, Council President Kishore Mahbubani (Singapore) expects to convene a meeting of the troop contributing countries for the United Nations Mission of Observers in Prevlaka (UNMOP).  The Secretary-General's latest report on that Mission came out on the racks last week.

**Sierra Leone/Guinea

The United Nations Mission in Sierra Leone held two meetings over the weekend with the rebel Revolutionary United Front (RUF), during which RUF representatives reaffirmed their commitment to peace and their willingness to work with the United Nations.

Meanwhile, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is considering a limited return to a volatile border area in southern Guinea, where some 250,000 refugees and displaced persons are in urgent need of food and medicine.  A UNHCR team reached the area for the first time in weeks.

**Budget

Today, three more Member States paid their contributions in full to the regular budget for the current year.  Egypt has made a payment of over

$837,000, Finland over $5.4 million and Norway over $6.7 million, bringing to nine the number of fully paid-up Member States.  They have until the end of the month to pay their dues for 2001 before they slip into arrears.

**Press Briefing at UNCA Club

The Correspondent's Association (UNCA) has asked me to announce that the President of the Security Council, Ambassador Kishore Mahbubani, will brief the press today at 3 p.m. at the UNCA Club.

**Question and Answers

Question:  There are a couple of letters on the racks this morning from Turkey setting up their view of the Northern Cypriot approval of the mission in Cyprus.  Is this anything new as far as the United Nations is concerned and is this likely to affect the scheduled proximity talks?

Spokesman:  It sounds like I will need to consult the United Nations lawyers before answering the question, particularly on something as sensitive as Cyprus.  I will take a pass now and get back to you after the briefing.  [He later announced that the Secretary-General still expects proximity talks to take place in the early part of this year.]

Question:  Do you have any information concerning the visit of Alvaro de Soto [Special Advisor to the Secretary-General on Cyprus] to the region in anticipation of the proximity talks?

Spokesman:  I do not know if we have specific dates.  I will have to check on that with you and let you know after the briefing.  [He later said that Mr. de Soto is expected to travel to the region in the next few weeks, but that precise dates had not yet been set.]

Question:  Any further word on when the Iraqi officials might come to discuss the issue of arms inspectors and sanctions?

Spokesman:  No.  As you know, the Secretary-General took off the first week of January.  We will announce a trip tomorrow that he'll be making that will take him away for the last two weeks of January.  He had a window in January of just this second week and no date has been fixed.  He said as he came into the building this morning that he expected that it would not happen before February, but again, we have no dates.

Question:  Can you tell us anything about the meeting with Secretary of State Albright?

Spokesman:  I understand that it was the Secretary of State that asked for the meeting so we don’t know what is on her agenda.  I believe that she is planning on talking to anyone who might wish to ask her a question on the way out of the building.  We will squawk when she leaves the thirty-eighth floor. Otherwise, I will try to get a read out for you from the Secretary-General.

Question:  Do you have any information concerning the Israeli-Palestinian fact-finding mission?

Spokesman:  That is no longer on the agenda, as far as I understand.  [The Security Council, on December 18, rejected a resolution proposing a monitoring force for the Occupied Territories, by a vote of 8 in favour, with 7 abstentions.  Nine positive votes are needed for passage.]

Question:  Why is the actor who plays James Bond here at the United Nations today?

Spokesman:  Mr. [Pierce] Brosnan indicated an interest in getting involved with the United Nations but he wanted to know more about the work of the Organization.  In addition to meeting with the Secretary-General, he will also get briefings by the disarmament department, the peacekeeping department, and United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF).  He has a full programme of briefings in the building today.

The Secretary-General commented, coming into the building today, that celebrities can have a positive impact on the public and enhance their understanding of the United Nations.  He did not mention any specific thing that Mr. Brosnan might be asked to undertake.  I think that at this point it is an educational exercise for him.

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