DAILY PRESS BRIEFING BY 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

Welcome back from, what was for many of you, a long weekend.  We’ll start with a consolidated appeal.

**Consolidated Appeals

This morning, the Secretary-General launched the 2002 Consolidated Inter-Agency Appeals.  The appeals call for $2.5 billion for assistance to more than

33 million people in 18 countries from Afghanistan to Uganda.  The Secretary-General said that although the eyes of the world were on Afghanistan at this time, there were 17 other complex humanitarian crises, and he urged donors not to forget any of them.

He pointed out that this year, the appeals received about half of the amount required and said we must do better next year.  “The international community has a duty", he said, “to provide life-saving assistance not only on the basis of which situation draws media attention, but also on the basis of agreed, definable minimum needs, as outlined in today’s appeals.”

The Secretary-General also appealed to Member States to support the United Nations efforts to strengthen its security regime.  He said that attacks against convoys and humanitarian workers must stop.  Since 1992 more than 200 United Nations civilian staff have been killed and many were kidnapped or taken hostage.  The Secretary-General appealed for an end to the culture of impunity.

The President of the Security Council, Ambassador Patricia Durrant of Jamaica, supported the appeal of the Secretary-General.  “The investment you make today”, she said, “will not only help save lives, it will set the basis for self-sufficiency for people and their communities”.

The full text of both statements is available upstairs, along with press kits with a complete breakdown of the appeals.

**Afghanistan -- Bonn

Lakhdar Brahimi, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Afghanistan, his deputy Francesc Vendrell and the eight other members of the official UN delegation are preparing for talks on Afghanistan scheduled to begin tomorrow in Petersberg, near Bonn, Germany.  The objective is to form a fully representative, broad-based, multi-ethnic government for Afghanistan.

Expected to arrive shortly is the United Front, as the last of the four groups taking part in the talks.

A list of 28 principals -- 11 from the United Front, 11 from the Rome group and three each from the Peshawar and Cyprus groups –- has been made available in the form of a provisional list of participants.  Three women are among those listed.

In addition to the Afghan participants, 18 countries and the European Union have requested accreditation as observers to the talks.

Lakhdar Brahimi is holding bilateral meetings with the participants on the format of the talks, the opening ceremony and the agenda.  The Afghan groups have also been talking to each other.

The opening session is expected to begin at 10 a.m. with a speech by the German Foreign Minister, Joschka Fischer, followed by Mr. Brahimi.  The Afghan parties will decide whether there will be statement in that session by the Afghan side.

A meeting of Afghan civil society is also expected to take place concurrently in Bonn.  The meeting of NGOs, academics, journalists, professionals, women’s organizations, and members of the diaspora are expected to attend the meeting, which is starting on Thursday.

The lists of the Afghan participants, observers and the UN delegation are available upstairs.  And a transcript of the briefing on the talks is expected shortly.

**Afghanistan -- Other

In Islamabad, Pakistan, meanwhile, a three-day conference on Afghanistan's reconstruction sponsored by the United Nations Development Programme, the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank is expected to start tomorrow.

In New York today, the UN humanitarian appeals launched just an hour ago includes an update on the emergency appeal for Afghanistan.  It says that revised requirements amounting to $662 million still need $319 million.  It also flags a 30-day emergency assistance plan (www.hic.org.pk).  The plan sets out estimated emergency needs by region and sector, including food, shelter, health, water and sanitation, education and mine action.

The humanitarian agencies on the ground are reporting that the overall security situation inside Afghanistan is in flux.  Some improvement in access in certain areas was reported, making it possible for the UN system and its NGO partners to transport much-needed humanitarian supplies.  The Torkham-Jalalabad-Kabul road, which was blocked for several weeks, has been reopened.  The Dogharun border crossing between Iran and Afghanistan is also open.

Due to the prevailing insecurity in the north, however, UN missions scheduled to leave for Mazar-i-Sharif from Termez over the weekend had to be postponed.  The situation in Kunduz is also unstable.  No independent confirmation of the situation there could be obtained.

The security situation in displaced persons camps in Mazar-i-Sharif also remains a cause for concern.  The Regional Humanitarian Coordinator has drawn the attention of the local authorities to the alleged presence of armed elements and to allegations about reported violence against women in the Sakhi camp in Mazar.

The UNHCR expressed its extreme concern about the plight of thousands of civilians in southern Afghanistan following reports of renewed fighting there.

The UNHCR also says it is increasingly alarmed by the humanitarian situation on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border at Chaman, following a decision by the Pakistani authorities on Monday to halt pre-registration of new Afghan refugees.

A UN security assessment team was this morning waiting at the border crossing at Dogharun for clearance from the Iranian authorities to enable them to proceed with an evaluation of security in the western Afghanistan town of Herat and surrounding areas

**New York, 26 November 2001 -- on the Situation in Nepal

The following statement is attributable to the Spokesman on the subject of Nepal:

“The Secretary-General is deeply concerned at the flare-up of violence in Nepal after the rebels belonging to the Communist Party (Maoist) of Nepal broke a four-month long ceasefire and resumed armed actions in more than one third of the Kingdom's districts.  This has led to the declaration today of a state of emergency throughout the country.

“The Secretary-General regrets that the insurgents abandoned peace talks with the Government that started last August.  He will continue to follow closely the developments in Nepal.”

**Security Council

The Council will be meeting in closed consultations today at 3 p.m. to discuss the Secretary-General’s recent reports on the UN mission in Western Sahara and the UN mission in the Golan Heights.

Council members will also be briefed on the Oil-for-Food Programme by the Director of the Iraq Programme, Benon Sevan.

As you’ll recall, the Secretary-General’s 150-day report on Phase X of the Oil-for-Food Programme was issued last week.  This current phase ends on

30 November.

**Somalia

Available on the racks today is a letter from the Secretary-General to the President of the Security Council, declaring his intention to continue the activities of the UN Political Office for Somalia for another two years, through the end of 2003.

If there is an improvement in the security situation in that country, he says, he may then submit a proposal to establish a peace-building office in Somalia, but for now he could not recommend the deployment of such an office.

The Security Council took note of the Secretary-General’s recommendations in a letter that is also out on the racks today.

**UNIFEM

We have upstairs a press release from the United Nations Development Fund for Women announcing the visit by two independent experts to Colombia.

Elizabeth Rehn, the former United Nations representative in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, a member of the Organization for African Unity’s panel to investigate the genocide in Rwanda, will spend a week in Colombia to assess the impact of the conflict on women and women’s role in peace-building.

The findings will be published by the Fund, known as UNIFEM, in a report early next year as a follow-up to Security Council resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security.

UNIFEM experts have travelled to countries affected by conflict in Africa, the former Soviet Union, Asia and Latin America.

**ICTY

Last Friday afternoon, the Judges of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia re-elected Judge Claude Jorda of France by acclamation as their president, for another two-year mandate.  Judge Mohamed Shahabuddeen of Guyana was elected the Tribunal’s Vice-President.  We have a full list of the members of the Tribunal’s Trial Chambers and Appeals Chamber in my office.

By the way, Judge Jorda and his counterpart on the Rwanda Tribunal, Judge Navenethem Pillay, along with Prosecutor Carla Del Ponte, will brief the Security Council tomorrow on their work in a public meeting.  Del Ponte will also be the guest at the noon briefing.

**Least Developed Countries

In his report to the General Assembly on a mechanism to follow up the Programme of Action for the Least Developed Countries over the coming decade, the Secretary-General recommends the establishment of an Office of the High Representative to deal with such countries, as well as with landlocked developing countries and small island States.

The High Representative, who would be an Under-Secretary-General, would assist the Secretary-General in follow-up to the Programme of Action and would work in New York.

**Press Releases

The World Health Organization (WHO) today urged the international community to support the health sector in Afghanistan.  Director-General Gro Harlem Brundtland said that what was important was to save and improve the lives of Afghans.  The WHO says health care facilities need to be restored and health posts established in chronically under-served areas.  We have a press release with more information on that.

**World Chronicle Programme

There’ll be a World Chronicle programme aired today with Christopher Patten, the External Relations Commissioner of the European Union.  And that will be seen at 3:30 p.m. in-house television channels 3 or 31.

That’s all I have for you.  Any questions before we go to Jan?

**Questions and Answers

Question: .You said the consolidated appeals for this year were only half subscribed.  Is there a reason for that?

Spokesman:  I don’t think these appeals are ever 100 per cent met.  The

2001 appeal had only 50 per cent.  I think that should be singled out as a failing by the major donors, and I think that’s why the Secretary-General mentioned it.

Question:  Are there any other reasons for the shortcomings other than failings on the part of the major donors, particularly in the light of

11 September?

Spokesman:  You would have to ask the donors their reasons for only paying half of the amount called for.  I don’t even want to speculate why it might be.

Question:  What is the impact of the fact that only 50 per cent was paid?

Spokesman:  I don’t think you need much imagination to figure out what would happen if you only got half your salary this month.  You can only do half the things that you normally do.  I think these appeals are based on our best estimates of the minimum that’s needed in the way of humanitarian assistance.  If you get only half that amount then you have to assume that either half the people go unaided, or all of the people get half the aid they need.

Question:  Is Brahimi in a way in charge of forming the new government in Afghanistan?

Spokesman:  He is convening and will chair a meeting of four groups of Afghan representatives that will start tomorrow morning.  But I don’t think the United Nations or Mr. Brahimi personally wants to assume that he is in charge of forming a government.

Question:  Will the Taliban be barred from negotiations about the future in Afghanistan?

Spokesman:  We’ve not taken a position on that.  Mr. Brahimi said that he does not want to exclude any responsible Afghans from the process, but for this opening phase he’s invited these four groups.  He hopes that these groups could form a transitional administration and that that could then move to the formation of a larger representative government.  Its starting small, expanding outwards, and I don’t think he would close the door on any responsible Afghan that wanted to be part of the process.

Question:  What is the position on the notion that Taliban and non-Taliban prisoners of war will be handed over to the United Nations?  Is the United Nations willing to take them over?

Spokesman:  Have you seen what’s involved over this past weekend?  Trying to provide a place for hundreds and hundreds of prisoners of war?  Taking responsibility for disarming them, feeding them, screening them?  We have a handful of humanitarian workers in Afghanistan.  We’re not in a position to undertake a huge operation like this.  And that’s why for the last 10 days I’ve been saying that the Secretary-General has been talking first to the coalition forces who have people on the ground, can they help in some way, and to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), which intercedes in the matter of prisoners of war or their turning over.  But even the ICRC doesn’t set up camps.  So you would have to expect that the warring parties, in this case the victorious party, the Northern Alliance, would provide the housing and the care of these people.  The ICRC, I have to assume, would go in to observe these conditions, and there really isn’t a role as I can see for the United Nations.  Both in terms of our mandate, or in terms of the resources we have in Afghanistan.  It’s too big a job.

Question:  Isn’t the situation complicated by the fact that people who appear to be surrendering are not really surrendering?  There might be a void here in terms of the coalition forces appearing (at least in terms of the prisoners) not objective and the ICRC not being able to accomplish its two biggest tasks.  The situation is not resolved.  Could not the UN intercede in this case?

Spokesman:  With what army?  You would need I would think a substantial infrastructure to accept these people, house them, feed them, process them.  We don’t have that.  And for us to try to go in there and establish it -- it’s just unrealistic.  And the complication you mentioned.  There’s this cultural phenomenon of crossing the line, shaking hands with someone who, an hour ago, was your enemy.  Yes, that’s a cultural complication, but the main complication is logistic.

Question:  Looking at the background, how can you expect the winning party to act in a responsible way to the captives?

Spokesman:  In all situations of war and armed conflict there are international guidelines.  And any victor can find out what they are by just looking them up on the Internet or consulting an international lawyer.  And there is an international mechanism for monitoring compliance with these things, the ICRC would have a major role, but in this case you have a war situation with a very limited international presence.  So it’s not tidy, as we saw over the weekend, when there was a revolt in one of the prisons.  We still don’t know what the casualty rate was but the numbers reported were rather high.  You can’t just turn to the UN every time you have a difficult situation and say, “do something”.  You need infrastructure to do something.  And we don’t have it in Afghanistan today.

Question:  What is the realistic outcome of the meeting that will be starting tomorrow?  How big a step is it, and are you satisfied that the parties taking part are significantly representative of the Afghan people?

Spokesman:  Mr Brahimi has said that each of the four claims to represent all Afghans, so by asking all of the four he feels he’s got a pretty good shot at covering the waterfront.  He hopes to set in motion a process that would result in the forming of a broad-based government.  He changed his original formula from what he presented to the Security Council, where he initially thought of bringing together a very large number of people and then narrowing it down to something smaller.  He’s now going to try to get agreement on a small interim administration.  If they can conclude that in Bonn, that’s probably his best-case scenario.  If they can make substantial progress and then move on to another meeting in Kabul or somewhere else to complete the process then that’s good too.  A little less good because it’s going to take a little more time, but he knows the situation is complicated and so tomorrow they start.  We’ll see how far they get in Bonn.

Question:  Is there a deadline for that meeting?

Spokesman:  There isn’t, although Mr. Brahimi said that if they could accomplish it in a week then he’d be quite happy.  Does that mean that at the end of the week they’ll all go home?  That’s something that the parties themselves, as well as Mr. Brahimi, would have to decide.

Question:  With regard to what you said about least developed countries.   Was the initiative to have a High Representative an initiative of the Secretary-General?

Spokesman:  My understanding is that it is an initiative of the Secretary-General.  I don’t have the history of it, but I can look into it for you and give you more details at the end of the briefing.  [He later said that a conference on least developed countries in Brussels last May had supported the Secretary-General’s proposal.]

Question:  How large a concern is security at this meeting?  Is the UN funding this entirely?

Spokesman:  The German Government, God bless them, are providing the location, security, the food, the lodging, the works, so we really appreciate their efforts.  The location as you may have heard, or even seen on television, is a hilltop facility, so I think it’s rather easy to seal off and guard, both for security and for the privacy we feel the parties will need to get some work accomplished there.

Question:  Does the Secretary-General think that the BMW is a better car than the Volvo, with regard to his promotion of the former car?

Spokesman:  He’s not promoting any car.  He is kindly accepting the offer of a car from BMW.  There is to be no promotional aspect for this.  We are grateful for the donation.  I guess we have received the keys today.  And thank you very much.

Question:  The Secretary-General will be travelling to Oslo to pick up the Nobel Peace Prize, I believe on the 10^th.  Will he be stopping anywhere on the way?

Spokesman:  We haven’t announced the programme but at present there is no plan to stop anywhere on the way.  There’ll be a short additional visit in the area to a neighbouring country before he comes back.  Basically it’s a two-country trip.

Question:  Regarding the surrender of Kunduz.  Is the UN in a position to demand of either the Northern Alliance, the victors or the coalition, the troops on the ground, to proceed in disarming the combatants in a certain way?

Spokesman:  I have already appealed, I did so last week on behalf of the Secretary-General, to all parties to respect the international conventions, the Geneva conventions that apply to armed conflict.

Question:  I think we should say that we are very grateful for the job done on the third floor.  In my 40 years here, it’s the first time that I have seen it do something for the press, and so we are very grateful for the job done on the third floor.

Spokesman:  Thanks very much.

Jan?

Briefing by the Spokesman for the President of the General Assembly

Good afternoon.

**General Assembly

The General Assembly has quite a varied agenda today.  First it took up the reports of the Yugoslavia and Rwanda Tribunals.  The reports are quite long,

47 and 31 pages respectively, but they come with a summary or an introduction.  As of this morning, there were two speakers on the list for Rwanda and nine for Yugoslavia.

The Assembly will also deal with appointments of members of the following five bodies:

The Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions;

The Committee on Contributions;

The Board of Auditors;

The Investments Committee;

The International Civil Service Commission.

The appointments follow recommendations by the Fifth Committee, and for all five bodies the number of candidates corresponds to the number of vacancies, so we will not see any elections.

The item entitled the Question of the Falkland Islands (Malvinas) is also on the agenda today, but it is usually deferred to the next session.

In the afternoon, the plenary will discuss strengthening of the coordination of humanitarian and disaster relief assistance.  As of this morning, there were

24 speakers plus three international organizations on the speakers list.  The Assembly is expected to take action on three draft resolutions:  A/56/L.14 would request the Secretary-General to continue the work on utilization of the standby disaster relief unit of the United Nations system; A/56/L.15 would call upon the Secretary-General to continue to re-evaluate the United Nations humanitarian assistance activities in Tajikistan; and A/56/L.16 would urge Member States to contribute to the relief, rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts of Belize.

**Tribunal Budget Cycles

And then I got a question about having a two-year budget cycle for the Tribunals.  I will have to check that for you, but I just want to point out that the regular budget of the United Nations follows a two-year cycle.  It saves time if you only do it every other year.

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