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.  Thank you for coming.

**Secretary-General’s Trip to the United Kingdom

Let me start with the Secretary-General, who is in the United Kingdom, as you know.

This morning he left London for Oxford where, as we speak, he should be starting to deliver the Cyril Foster Lecture on “why democracy is an international issue”.

The Secretary-General says democracy is an international issue for three reasons:  democratic countries are less likely to make war on each other than undemocratic ones; democracy is essential to resolve, and where possible prevent, the kind of civil conflicts the United Nations has had to deal with in the last

10 years; and democracy is needed on the global level, to give small, poor and weak countries more of a say in decisions that affect them.

After noting that democracy is spreading, the Secretary-General concluded by suggesting that the General Assembly would have greater authority if all the governments represented in it were themselves “clearly and unmistakably representative of the world’s peoples.”

The Secretary-General and Mrs. Annan will remain in Oxford until tomorrow, when he will receive an honorary degree of Doctor of Civil Law.

**World Refugee Day

In his speech, the Secretary-General also drew attention to World Refugee Day, which will take place tomorrow, and recalled the poster showing Albert Einstein with a bundle of clothes on his back and a caption reading, "A bundle of belongings isn't the only thing a refugee brings to his new country."

The Secretary-General cautioned, "Europe today seems almost to have forgotten that message."  He noted that in some countries now, immigrants are being portrayed as a threat, and procedures aimed at discouraging bogus asylum seekers result in the harassment or detention of bona fide refugees.

There will be a series of events around the world to mark World Refugee Day tomorrow, including a ceremony hosted by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), here at Ellis Island, where four newly-arrived refugee families will be symbolically welcomed to the United States.  The ceremony begins at Ellis Island at 3 o’clock tomorrow afternoon.

**Global AIDS and Health Fund

I now have a statement attributable to the Spokesman, and that is on the contribution this morning by the Gates Foundation to the Global AIDS and Health Fund:

“The Secretary-General is delighted to welcome the $100-million contribution of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to the Global AIDS and Health Fund.  This groundbreaking commitment is the largest private contribution to the Fund so far. It will form a cornerstone of the emerging global effort to reverse the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

“HIV/AIDS is a global crisis that has already killed nearly 22 million people, including more than four million children.  It is unique in its social, demographic and economic devastation.  We are not powerless against this disease

-- but our response so far is still only a fraction of what it needs to be.

“It is only through a truly global partnership, bringing together Governments, corporations, foundations, civil society and individuals, that we can hope to pool the leadership and raise the resources needed to defeat this scourge. The leadership shown by Bill and Melinda Gates today will not only serve as a powerful example to other private donors and to Governments; in its own right, it will probably also save millions of lives.”

Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) has also issued a statement, and a number of the co-sponsors of UNAIDS, such as the World Health Organization (WHO), United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) and United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), have also issued statements reacting to this very positive contribution.  All these statements are available in our office upstairs.

Still on AIDS, I’d like to bring to your attention that tomorrow, here in this room 226, at 11 o’clock, the Deputy Secretary-General, Louise Fréchette, will be briefing you on the Special Session of the General Assembly on HIV/AIDS, which, as you know, begins here in New York this coming Monday.

**Security Council

The 15-member Security Council delegation returned from its mission to Kosovo and Belgrade last night.

Their report is being finalized this morning and it will be presented this afternoon at 4 o’clock by the President of the Council and leader of the mission, Ambassador Anwarul Chowdhury of Bangladesh.

**Kosovo/former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM)

Still on Kosovo:  The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) reports today that the flow of refugees from the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) into Kosovo has dwindled to a trickle, with just over 500 persons arriving in Kosovo on Monday.

The arrivals started to decrease last Friday when an estimated 1,600 persons arrived at the main border crossing at Blace, down from over 2,000 the day before. The arrivals from FYROM in southern Serbia have also gone down dramatically with few new arrivals reported this week.

Some of the refugees arriving in Blace said the drop in the number of those leaving was linked to the most recent ceasefire.  A total of 48,000 people have fled from FYROM to Kosovo since last February, with 39,000 arriving since the fighting resumed at the beginning of May.  You can find more details in today's briefing notes from UNHCR.

The WFP, meanwhile, is tapping contingency stockpiles and mobilizing extra staff to assist refugees in Kosovo.  We have a press release from the United Nations Mission in Kosovo with more information.

**Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)

The United Nations mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC) reports the arrival of the first MONUC fuel barge in Kisangani, the DRC’s third largest city.  Up to now, supplies had to be flown in.

The United Nations Force Commander, General Mountaga Diallo, and thousands of local residents were on hand to greet the barge as well as thousands of local residents.

Also travelling on the barge are three United Nations observers whose task was to assess the navigability and the security conditions on the river.  During this trip, which began 7 June in Mbandaka, the observers said they received a warm welcome from the population and very good cooperation from local authorities along the way.

In a related item, the mission also reports the arrival in Mbandaka over the weekend of two Uruguayan patrol boats which are an integral part of the United Nations riverine unit stationed in Mbandaka.

**Iraq:  Oil-for-Food Programme

I have a note here on Oil-for-Food:  The Office of the Iraq Programme, in its weekly update, notes that Iraq’s suspension of its oil exports under the United Nations oil-for-food programme continues in its second week.

There was a further welcome development with regard to “holds” last week.  The Security Council’s 661 Sanctions Committee approved four contracts worth

$10.4 million for several types of human vaccines on the condition that United Nations observers in Iraq closely monitor the end-use of those supplies.  Some of the approved vaccines are on the “1051 list” and had been put on hold by the Committee.  Once delivered to Iraq, the supplies are expected to meet the reported shortages of human vaccines in the country.

Similarly, contracts for steel, generator sets and pesticides, some containing “1051” items, were approved by the Committee on condition of close end-use monitoring by the United Nations observers in Iraq.  This welcome development is also indicative of an increasing confidence by the 661 Committee in the ability of the United Nations observation mechanism to verify that supplies and materials delivered to Iraq under the programme are indeed being utilized for approved purposes.

The United Nations Secretary-General and the Executive Director of the Iraq Programme have repeatedly appealed to both the Security Council and its

661 Committee to place greater confidence in the work of the United Nations observation mechanism in Iraq to release contracts from hold and expedite the approval and delivery of needed humanitarian supplies to Iraq.

The full text of the note of the Office in Iraq is available upstairs.

**East Timor

Moving all the way to East Timor:  the United Nations Transitional Administration in East Timor (UNTAET) has extended the deadline for the registration process by two days, to allow the registration of a large number of people still arriving in Dili.  This, as you know, is the civil registration which will, among other things, provide data for the list of voters.  Registration was due to end tomorrow but has been extended until Friday.

King Abdullah II of Jordan will make a short visit to East Timor on Friday.  He will spend the entire time in Baucau and Oecussi, where he will meet Jordanian peacekeepers.

International observers monitoring the Indonesian Government’s registration of East Timorese refugees in West Timor handed in their report on Friday.  They did this to the Government of Indonesia.  The 12 observers, including one from the United Nations Mission, visited 120 of the 507 registration points and were not able to validate the final number of those registering to return.  The report also said that the choices expressed on the day of registration should not be taken as final.

More news from East Timor in the briefing note from the mission, which is available upstairs.

**UNHCR

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) learned today that a ship carrying about 150 Liberians left Benin after being denied permission to dock.  UNHCR had been waiting for authorization to board the ship to interview passengers and assess their status and possible claims for asylum, but the ship had left Benin waters by the time authorization was granted.  The ship is reportedly headed for Nigeria.

For the first time, Somali refugees in Eritrea will be repatriated to Somalia.  UNHCR has registered more than 1,200 refugees who have indicated that they wish to be repatriated, and the first 57 will leave Eritrea for Mogadishu on a UNHCR-chartered flight tomorrow.

More details in the briefing note from UNHCR.

**Press Releases

We have one upstairs from the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM).  Today they called on world leaders to include women in every strategy to fight HIV/AIDS.  Executive Director Noeleen Heyzer said that the epidemic continues to spread because the inequality between men and women is “pervasive and persistent”.

The United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS), which provides project-management services in every field where the United Nations has a mandate, will be co-sponsoring a conference beginning tomorrow at the Jacob Javits Convention Center, on the “International Aid and Trade 2001 Conference”.

The purpose of the two-day conference is to find buyers in the United Nations and make it easier for the United Nations to find goods and services in the global market.  A press release is available with more details upstairs.

**Press Conferences

At 10 o’clock, the Office of UNHCR will be sponsoring a press conference by the United States Committee for Refugees, which is launching the “World Refugee Survey 2001”.  And this will be tomorrow, which will be “World Refugee Day”.  At 11 o’clock, also tomorrow in this room, as I have mentioned earlier, we have the press conference by Deputy Secretary-General Louise Fréchette on the upcoming Special Session of the General Assembly on HIV/AIDS.

At 12:45, following our briefing here, Andy Bearpark, Deputy Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Reconstruction and European Union (EU) Representative in Kosovo, will be here to discuss the EU’s role in Kosovo’s economic development.  A media advisory with further information is available on the third floor racks.

**Questions and Answers

Question:  Outside of the $100 million the Gates Foundation has given to the Global Aids Fund, the Foundation has given a great deal more to the United Nations.  Do we have the total amount?

Deputy Spokesman:  I don’t have it right here with me, but we can easily get that for you.

Question:  How many countries and Heads of State will be participating in the Special Session on HIV/AIDS?

Deputy Spokesman:  You know, that is the kind of question for which the answer is always difficult to obtain.  There is always the sensitivity that these numbers should only be released very close to the date of the actual beginning of the session.  I think there is a rough number of around 20 Heads of State.  But we have to get closer to the date in order to have some formal figures.

Question:  Do you think you can have them on Friday?

Deputy Spokesman:  I hope so.  Let us talk to the General Assembly people and our Protocol Office to see what we can do about it.

Question:  Will there be increased security?

Deputy Spokesman:  Most likely yes.  Our United Nations Security Office is drawing up security plans for the Special Session.  They are taking into consideration the concerns of journalists based on previous experiences.  This morning, Security were having a meeting with other security officials who will be involved in this.  We hope that by tomorrow, they will have concluded their security plan, and sometime between tomorrow and Friday we would have very clear guidance for you on that.

Thank you so much.  Have a pleasant lunch and a very good afternoon.

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