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

DAILY PRESS BREIFING OF THE OFFICE OF THE SPOKESMAN FOR THE SECRETARY-GENERAL

Following is a near verbatim transcript of today's noon briefing by Fred Eckhard, Spokesman for the Secretary-General, and Jan Fischer, Spokesman for the President of the General Assembly:

Briefing by the Spokesman for the Secretary-General

I'd like to welcome the visiting journalists from Asia to the briefing. It's nice to have you here.

Good Afternoon.  Our guest today at the briefing will once again be Carolyn McAskie, the Deputy Emergency Relief Coordinator, to give you a periodic update on the United Nations humanitarian efforts in Afghanistan.  (See separate briefing notes.)

**Afghanistan

After having visited Washington, D.C., on Friday for official meetings through the weekend where he had some press meetings, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Afghanistan, Lakhdar Brahimi, has returned to New York.  We do have the transcript of the press briefing he gave at the National Press Club Saturday.

Among his meetings today is one with the ambassadors of the Organization of the Islamic Conference.

Meanwhile, United Nations humanitarian agencies are proceeding with their work on the ground.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) reported from Islamabad that its teams near the Chaman border crossing could see many people scaling the nearby Khojack hills on foot to avoid the main border crossing points that remain officially closed.

On Sunday, some 10,000 to 15,000 people from the Kandahar region were gathered at the Chaman crossing in very difficult conditions, and late in the day the UNHCR said it was their understanding that some 5,000 to 6,000 persons had forced their way across.  From Friday to Sunday, more than 13,000 persons have crossed at Chaman.  But this crossing point and all others remain officially closed.

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) estimates that among the Afghan civilians comprising the influx at the Chaman border crossing point, as many as 6,000 may be children who are in urgent need of food, water, shelter, and medicine.

The World Food Programme (WFP) said it is moving enough food to the area to feed the new arrivals, and at the same time distributing food inside Afghanistan despite increasingly difficult conditions.

Kenzo Oshima, the Emergency Relief Coordinator, arrived in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, for the first part of his mission to Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.  The purpose of his mission is to discuss ways to enhance cooperation with those countries in delivering humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan.

**Security Council

The Security Council is holding consultations this morning on a number of issues.

First, Hedi Annabi, the Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, updated Council members on the latest developments related to the United Nations Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea.

Following that, Ambassador Kishore Mahbubani of Singapore introduced a paper on the shape and format of the annual report of the Security Council to the General Assembly.  The Council’s working group on procedures and documentation will be taking up this matter in a meeting to be held tomorrow afternoon.  You'll recall that in the General Assembly's debate on that report there was considerable criticism of it being voluminous and not user-friendly.

The last item on the agenda today was Guinea-Bissau.  Ibrahima Fall, Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs, did the regular biannual briefing on developments in the country and on the work of the UN Political Office in Guinea-Bissau.

The President of the Council, Ambassador Richard Ryan of Ireland, is expected to talk to the press at the end of consultations.

The Council also scheduled a public meeting on the general issues relating to sanctions to follow this morning’s consultations.  Council members will hear the results of the “Interlaken Process” and the “Bonn-Berlin Process” which brought together civil society and government experts to review and make proposals on targeted sanctions, in particular arms embargoes, travel and aviation, as well as financial sanctions.

In addition to Council members, the representatives of Germany, Switzerland and Sweden will take the floor during today’s public meeting.  These Governments have played a key role in the discussion regarding sanctions and how to improve the sanctions mechanism.

**Middle East

This morning, the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Terje Roed-Larsen, along with senior officials from the United States, Russia and the European Union, met with Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat in Gaza.

Following that meeting, the officials who had met Arafat issued a statement saying that they had urged him to make a vigorous effort to combat terrorism and to enforce the Palestinian Authority's ceasefire orders.  They added that such steps should be matched by the Israelis in full compliance with existing agreements, including the immediate withdrawal of Israeli forces and security personnel from “Area A” zones that are under full Palestinian control.

Yesterday, the Secretary-General met at his residence with the Foreign Minister of Israel, Shimon Peres, and we issued a statement, actually a read-out of that meeting, saying that they had reviewed the grave situation in the Middle East.  The Foreign Minister explained the demands that Israel was making of the Palestinian Authority, and the Secretary-General emphasized the need to find a way to return to the negotiating table, on the basis of the Mitchell report, and to break out of the current deadlock.

Foreign Minister Peres also raised the concerns of the families of three Israeli soldiers kidnapped on the Blue Line last year, and the Secretary-General promised to look into the outstanding issues sympathetically.

**East Timor

The President of the East Timor Constituent Assembly, Francisco Guterres, today signed a resolution adopting an Assembly recommendation that the United Nations Mission hand over sovereignty to the elected Timorese Government on 20 May 2002.

The resolution was adopted last Friday by 73 of the 88 Assembly members.

The Special Representative of the Secretary-General in East Timor, Sergio Vieira de Mello, will formally inform the Security Council of the Assembly’s resolution during the meeting of the Council on East Timor to be held next week.

Still on East Timor.  Out on the racks today is the latest report of the Secretary-General on East Timor.  It is on the transition to independence and provides details of the plan for the mission, which will succeed the current United Nations Transitional Administration.  The Secretary-General notes that the “responsibility to establish a viable State in East Timor clearly belongs to its people” and that they have demonstrated the depth of their commitment through sacrifice, imagination and determination.  He urges the Security Council “to ensure that these foundations are not undermined and to consolidate the remarkable contribution it has already made to this historic undertaking”.

**Rwanda

The former prefect of Rwanda’s Kigali-Rural prefecture, François Karera, was arrested on Saturday in Kenya and was immediately transferred to the detention facility of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, in Arusha, United Republic of Tanzania.

Karera has been indicted by the Tribunal on four counts of genocide and crimes against humanity.  He is accused of having spearheaded the campaign of murders against Tutsis in the prefecture.

We have further details on Karera’s arrest in a press release from the Tribunal.

**Iraq

The latest report on human rights in Iraq, by Special Rapporteur Andreas Mavrommatis, is out on the racks today, and, in it, Mavrommatis once again urges Iraq’s Government to allow him to visit the country, which it has so far refused to do.

He continues to be concerned about the unintended human rights consequences of the international embargo against Iraq.  He also highlights continued reports concerning the violation of women’s rights and the persecution of religious minorities in Iraq.

**Liberia

Available on the racks today is an exchange of letters between the Secretary-General and the President of the Security Council, in which the Secretary-General recommended that the mandate of the United Nations Office in Liberia be extended by one year, until the end of December 2002.  He says that the Office has made worthwhile contributions to national reconciliation, respect for human rights and the rule of law.

The Council took note of his recommendation, extending the United Nations Office’s mandate.

**Reports and Press Releases

A few reports and press releases to signal for you today.  The Secretary-General’s report on the improvement of the status of women in the United Nations system is on the racks.  It reports a slight improvement in women’s representation in posts subject to geographic distribution, which, for the first time, has reached 40 per cent in the professional and higher categories.  However, among professional and higher category posts, in general, there has been a decline by

2 percentage points to 34.6 per cent.  The report also notes that men continue to dominate the staff of peacekeeping and other special missions, accounting for about 75 per cent of mission staff.

Also on the racks are two other reports.  The first is the annual report of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, covering his activities for the period October 2000 to September 2001.  The second is the report of the Secretary-General on Assistance to Refugees, Returnees and Displaced Persons in Africa, which says that the main refugee groups continue to originate in Burundi, Sudan, Somalia, Angola, Sierra Leone and Eritrea.

We have two press releases to highlight for you today.  In the first, the World Food Programme says it is rushing some 1,850 tonnes of wheat to 145,000 of the worst affected people in the areas in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea affected by freak rains.  The rains, earlier this month, caused large-scale damage to crops, homes and infrastructure.

And finally, the International Labour Organization is holding a crisis meeting on the effects on the tourism industry of the terrorist attacks of

11 September.  The meeting will take place 25-26 October and will look for ways to ease the impact on the industry worldwide.

**Signings

Bangladesh deposited the instrument of accession to the Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, becoming the forty-second country to do so. 

That’s all I have for you.  Any questions?

**Questions and Answers

Question:  There was an OIC request for a Security Council meeting over the weekend.  What are the prospects for a Security Council meeting on Israel, Palestine?

Spokesman:  I don't think it was a formal request and if my Office misled you on that I have to apologize.  Security Council representatives tell me that there was no formal request, although there was some informal discussion, and I think a public statement made as well.  But there was no formal request for a meeting and that’s where things stand now.

Question:  Could you comment on the report from the Observer newspaper in London that the United Nations was going to ask for a bombing halt to deliver humanitarian aid?

Spokesman:  We hear from NGOs a lot of talk of a bombing halt, but there has so far not been any request from any of the heads of the United Nations agencies.  Carolyn McAskie may want to.  Do you want to say anything about that?

Carolyn McAskie:  Yes, I heard of that this morning, as well, and it's unsubstantiated.  There has been no call from any of the United Nations humanitarian agencies.

Question:  You mentioned that the Special Representative of the Secretary-General is in Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan.  Can you give a little bit more detail?  What exactly is on his agenda?

Spokesman:  We announced that visit last week.  I'll let Carolyn address that later.

If there are no more questions for me, we'll go to Jan Fischer.

Briefing by the Spokesman for the President of the General Assembly

Good afternoon.

**General Assembly Today

Today, a few things for you.  You may have noticed that today the General Assembly has taken some action to fill vacancies in some United Nations organs.  All of these vacancies will be from 1 January 2002.

Elected to the Committee on Conferences were Austria, Ethiopia, Jamaica, Jordan, Nepal, Tunisia and the United States.  And there were also seven members elected to serve on the Committee for Programme and Coordination.  They were: China, Ethiopia, Japan, Nigeria, Republic of Korea, Tunisia and Uruguay.

There was also the election of 29 members for the Governing Council of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), but I’m not going to mention them here.  If you are interested in the names of those countries, I can give them to you afterwards.

The General Assembly also considered agenda item 34 “University for Peace’ and agenda item 28 “Culture of Peace”.

In the afternoon, the Assembly will take up the report of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA.  So far, there are 18 speakers on the list.

A plenary on the Olympic ideal, scheduled for Thursday, has been postponed to 2 November, which leaves elections for the Economic and Social Council as the only plenary this week.  That meeting will take place Friday.

Do you have any questions for me before we go to Ms. McAskie?

Question:  Is there a timeframe for the withdrawal from East Timor?

Spokesman:  That is one of the items that the Security Council will begin considering because there is a plan for a successor mission to the transitional administration, and so that discussion is just beginning now.  We’re talking about 20 May for the handover to the independent government by the transitional administration.

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