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

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

The following is a near-verbatim transcript of today's noon briefing by Manoel de Almeida e Silva, Deputy Spokesman for the Secretary-General.

Good afternoon.

**AIDS Drugs Case

I'm going to start with a statement attributable to the Spokesman:

"The Secretary-General is delighted by the news that the pharmaceutical companies have withdrawn from their legal action against the Government of South Africa, after reaching an amicable settlement on the question pending before the High Court of South Africa over the 1997 Medicines Act 90, concerning national legislation on parallel importing and compulsory licensing of medicines. 

"The Secretary-General hopes that this will result in medicines to treat HIV/AIDS and other diseases becoming much more widely available in South Africa at prices that those who need them can afford, and that it presages a new era of cooperation between governments and the private sector in the struggle for better health care throughout the developing world. 

"The credit for this positive outcome goes to the wisdom and perseverance of the parties concerned, and to the constructive intervention of President Thabo Mbeke."

The statement is available in the Spokesman's office.

**Middle East

This morning in Gaza, Peter Hansen, the Commissioner General of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), was blocked at an Israeli checkpoint for an hour and half as he was heading from his office in Gaza to the Khan Yunis and Rafah refugee camps to get a first-hand look at the recent damage from the fighting which took place there.

Hansen and his party were eventually allowed to proceed after UN staff contacted officials at the highest level at the Israeli Ministry of Defence in Tel Aviv.

Later in the day, Terje-Roed Larsen, the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, met with Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres in Tel Aviv.  The two discussed a range of issues, including security questions, political issues, the economic crisis in the Palestinian territories as well as the humanitarian situation.  Larsen focused particularly on Israel’s restrictions on the movement of UN personnel in Gaza and the West Bank, referring to the incident involving Peter Hansen.  Larsen said: "These restrictions were in violations of Israeli international obligations”.  Larsen also told Peres that UNRWA’s work was of critical importance.

The Foreign Minister invited both Larsen and Hansen to meet with him in person tomorrow to discuss a full range of issued related to humanitarian access

in Gaza and the West Bank.  This evening Larsen is scheduled to meet with the President of the Palestinian Authority, Yasser Arafat.

**Burundi

As you know, yesterday’s coup attempt in Burundi failed when the last of the rebel soldiers who had seized the radio and TV station surrendered at about 1 a.m. last night.

This morning, as he entered the building, the Secretary-General, in answer to a question, said:  “I am relieved that the coup failed”.  He added: “I think this coup, if it had succeeded, would have complicated the situation further.  So we are all relieved that it has not succeeded, but it also underscores the work we have to do to try and calm the situation in Burundi”.

Our staff on the ground reports that the atmosphere on the streets of the capital is calm and that no shots appear to have been fired during the failed coup attempt.

They also inform us that President Pierre Buyoya landed back in Burundi about three hours ago.

**Security Council

Here in New York, the Security Council began consultations this morning with a briefing by Assistant-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations Hédi Annabi on the bomb attack in Pristina, which we reported to you on yesterday.  The attack was condemned as an outrage by the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Kosovo, Hans Haekkerup, in a press release issued yesterday afternoon.

The Council then began discussing the report by the Monitoring Mechanism dealing with sanctions against the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), which was issued yesterday.

A formal meeting is scheduled following the consultations, with a view to vote on a resolution regarding the extension of the mechanism mandate.

Eritrea/Ethiopia is also on the formal meeting agenda.  The Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping, Jean-Marie Guéhenno, is expected to brief on the latest developments, in particular the establishment of the so-called Temporary Security Zone, which we briefed you on yesterday, and the immediate challenges posed by it.

**Democratic Republic of the Congo

As we reported to you yesterday afternoon, the rebel group Rally for Congolese Democracy gave the green light to the United Nations deployment of the Moroccan contingent to Kisangani in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) as soon as Friday.  The agreement came after a visit to Goma, in the eastern part of that country, by a group of Kinshasa–based ambassadors from States with a permanent seat at the UN Security Council.

We have a press release issued in Kinshasa today by the United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC), in which the Special Representative of the Secretary-General, Kamel Morjane, expresses gratitude to the ambassadors for their timely initiative, which helped lift all obstacles to the deployment to Kisangani.  It says the agreement will strengthen the cooperation already existing between the rebel group RCD, and the mission in the interest of the Congolese population, who are the first victims of the conflict.

Morjane once again called on all the parties to meet their obligations and support the UN mission’s efforts in the execution of its mandate.

**Kosovo

Another UN mission, this time the United Nations Interim Administration in Kosovo (UNMIK), today reiterated its outrage at yesterday’s bomb attack against members of the Serb community in Pristina.

The briefing notes from Pristina contain information on an international Kosovo Force (KFOR) operation launched at dawn today to clear roadblocks in Mitrovica set up to protest tax collection centres set up by the UN administration.  KFOR says that the operation was mounted to re-establish freedom of movement for all people of Kosovo.

**Human Rights

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, today told the Commission on Human Rights in Geneva that about a third of the more than 26,000 cases of abduction recorded in Uganda involved children under the age of 18.

Robinson, who informed the Commission about the work of her Office's mission to Uganda, Sudan and Kenya over the past month to deal with the abduction of children in northern Uganda, said that hundreds of children are abducted each year by the rebel Lord's Resistance Army.

Many of those who are kidnapped, she said, "will ultimately perish in the bush, either as a result of the harsh living conditions or at the hands of other captives".  She noted cases where children had been beaten to death for trying to escape, and where girls had been taken to serve as "wives" for the Army's commanders and sometimes killed if they refused.

Copies of her statement to the Commission are available in our office.

And, still on the Commission:  Last night, the Commission on Human Rights voted in favour of a resolution calling on Cuba's Government to ensure respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.  The vote passed, with 22 countries in favour, 20 against and 10 abstentions.

**Somali Refugees

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) today reports that more than 10,000 Somali refugees have arrived in the Kenyan border town of Mandera in the past two weeks.

A week-long UNHCR mission to the town reported yesterday that the flow of new arrivals has decreased significantly this week, with only a few dozen refugees crossing in the past few days.

There’s a press release with more information.

**Secretary-General -- Brundtland Speech

World Health Organization Director-General Gro Harlem Brundtland will receive the Global Leadership Award from the United Nations Association of the United States tonight, at 7:30 at the University Club on West 54th Street.

The Secretary-General will attend, and he will deliver remarks praising Dr. Brundtland's visionary approach to global interdependence and to the inextricable link between health and development.  We have embargoed copies of the Secretary-General's remarks available in the Spokesman's Office.

**Signings

A short while ago, Canada became the eighty-eighth country to sign the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety to the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity.

And this afternoon Tunisia will become the eighty-ninth to sign the same Protocol.

**Press Conferences

Beldric Moldan, Chair of the ninth session of the Commission on Sustainable Development, is giving a press conference tomorrow, 20 April, at 1:30 in the afternoon here in room 226.

He will be joined by the Vice-Chairs, David Stuart of Australia and Alison Drayton of Guyana, and JoAnne DiSano, Director of the Sustainable Development Division of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA).

They will discuss what has been going on so far at the meeting and there will be a summary of the multi-stakeholder dialogue and high-level segment, which is happening today and ending tomorrow. 

And I have just received a note here.  With our apologies, the Deputy Secretary-General, who had scheduled a briefing for you following this briefing, has been held up and cannot come for the briefing.  We'll reschedule it to a day closer to the Abuja summit next week, where the Secretary-General will make a statement on HIV/AIDS and outline priorities in making a major call to action.

**Questions and Answers

Serge?

Question: There is a summit in Quebec tomorrow.  Is the Secretary-General scheduled to be there?

Deputy Spokesman: No, he's not.  He will be in New York tomorrow.  Edie?

Question: The Russian media is reporting that the Secretary-General will be in Moscow in mid-May.  Can you confirm this?

Deputy Spokesman: I'm not in a position to confirm that, at this time.

Question: Did the Secretary-General get involved this week in the AIDS drugs case in South Africa?

Deputy Spokesman: In the Amsterdam meeting that he had with the six major pharmaceutical companies -- that meeting was on 5 April, if I'm not mistaken -- this issue came up.  He urged the pharmaceuticals not to prolong that case.  In his view, it was not in the interest, certainly, of people living with HIV/AIDS, but not in the interest of the companies, either.  Since that meeting, the Secretary-General had contacts on this issue with the pharmaceuticals and with the South Africans.

Yes, Betsy?

Question: Can you update the case of the alleged Rwandan war criminal who turned up in Kosovo, working for the United Nations? 

Deputy Spokesman: I don't think we have any new information beyond that which we reported a few days ago.  But I'll check after the briefing.  If there had been anything new at all, we would have informed you.  But I'll check if there's anything, just to be sure. 

[He later confirmed that there were no new developments in that case.  Following the murder allegations, he said, the UN was awaiting further information from the Government of Rwanda, which had asked for his extradition to stand trial there.  A judge in Kosovo would have to decide whether to grant that extradition once the relevant information was presented.  For now, the accused man, Callixte Mbarushimana, was at Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo.]

Question: I think last week, a woman who had millions, or hundreds of thousands, accidentally placed in her bank account from a UN agency, was convicted.  Could you check what the status of the money is and what the involvement of the UN still is in this case?

Deputy Spokesman: I'll check.  [He later said that the woman, Susan Madakor, a Brooklyn resident who had received wire transfers mistakenly credited by Chase Manhattan Bank that were intended for the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP), was convicted of bank larceny and bank fraud.  Last week she was sentenced to two years in prison.  United States District Judge Shirley Kram ordered her to begin serving her sentence by May 16, and also ordered her to pay restitution to Chase for more than $700,000.] 

Thank you very much, and again apologies for the change in programme regarding the briefings.  We'll reschedule the Deputy Secretary-General's briefing. 

Have a good afternoon.  Thank you.

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