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, and Jan Fischer, Spokesman for the President of the General Assembly.

Deputy Spokesman’s Briefing

Hello, good afternoon.  I’ll start with a statement attributable to the Spokesman, and that’s on the Middle East.  We have just released it a few moments ago.

**Middle East

The Secretary-General is deeply disturbed by the recent upsurge of violence in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory.  He sends his condolences to the families of those who lost their lives and reiterates that the targeting of civilians is unacceptable.  The Secretary-General again calls on Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat to take decisive action against those responsible for such terrible acts.

Recent events have caused further serious damage to mutual confidence, and have deepened bitterness and despair.  Yet, even at this most difficult of times, the Secretary-General would wish to remind Israelis and Palestinians that lasting peace and security for both can be achieved only through a negotiated settlement of their differences.  The Secretary-General urges both parties to take the steps necessary to move away from violent confrontation and back to the negotiating table.

**Secretary-General in Sweden

This afternoon in Stockholm, following a meeting with about two dozen representatives of non-governmental organizations that was convened by the United Nations Association of Sweden, the Secretary-General spoke with the press.  He was asked his views on the latest violence in the Middle East and he said, “I am distressed about what’s going on in the region . . . what is happening is serious, and we need to continue and redouble our efforts to try and contain it before it gets completely out of hand.”  The transcript of that press encounter is available in the Spokesman’s Office.

Earlier today, on the Swedish feast of Santa Lucia, the Secretary-General was awakened by a dozen young people, dressed in white robes and carrying candles, who sang traditional songs of the day, a festival of light during the darkest time of the year.  At midday, he and his wife, Nane, had lunch with Their Majesties the King and Queen of Sweden.  After that, this afternoon, he met with his Special Representative for Kosovo, Hans Haekkerup.  The Secretary-General is scheduled to be back in New York tomorrow.

**Terrorist Attack in India

I now have another statement attributable to the Spokesman, and that is on India:  The Secretary-General expresses outrage at the terrorist attack today on the Indian Parliament in New Delhi in which at least 13 people were killed.  He condemns, in the strongest possible terms, this unprecedented act of senseless violence against an institution representing the largest parliamentary democracy in the world.  The Secretary-General conveys his heartfelt condolences to the Government and people of India and to the families of the victims.

**Afghanistan -- Political

Lakhdar Brahimi, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Afghanistan, is on his way back to New York.  He is expected to brief the Security Council tomorrow afternoon at 4 o'clock.  The Secretary-General, who will have arrived from Sweden shortly before that time, is also expected to come and attend that consultation session of the Council.

Deputy Representative Francesc Vendrell is in Kabul today.  Among his scheduled meetings is one with Hamid Karzai who arrived in the Afghan capital for the first time since the Bonn meeting chose him to head the new interim administration of Afghanistan, to be installed on 22 December.  (In a 1 p.m. update, it was announced that Mr. Vendrell and Mr. Karzai had met in what was believed to be the first face-to-face meeting between the Special Representative’s Office and the new transitional government.  They discussed the transfer of power, the multinational force and the situation in the country.)

**Afghanistan -- Humanitarian

Still on Afghanistan, on humanitarian news, a few highlights of what we received today from our offices in Kabul and Islamabad.  Hundreds of families are reported displaced from the Tora Bora area due to the bombing campaign.  In the Kunduz area, the number of internally displaced people has grown to between

4,000 and 5,000 in three camps.  Armed groups operating north of Kunduz and on the road between Kunduz and Kabul make it difficult for relief operations to be carried out.  In the border town of Spin Boldak in the south-east, there are reports that a volatile situation there is preventing access to those in need.  Following the departure of the Taliban from Kandahar there has been wide-scale looting.  Several violent incidents have taken place on the road from Kandahar to Herat.

Return movements to Afghanistan rose during the week, with nearly

4,000 Afghans spontaneously repatriating on Wednesday, in a trend that may be linked to their desire to celebrate Eid with relatives rather than being a sustained repatriation movement.  In southern Afghanistan, small numbers of refugees are still leaving Kandahar Province’s Spin Boldak region and they’re going into Pakistan.  For more details, please see the briefing notes we have from our offices in Kabul and Islamabad.

**Security Council

Here in New York, the Security Council is meeting in closed consultations to discuss a draft resolution on a six-month extension of the United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP).  As part of its morning programme, the Council was also briefed on the peace process in Bougainville by the head of the United Nations political office there, Noel Sinclair.  Council members are also expected to discuss the Sierra Leone sanctions regime.  Council President, Moctar Ouane of Mali, is expected to speak to journalists once consultations have ended.

**Kosovo

In Pristina today, the Kosovo Assembly failed to elect a President for Kosovo when the sole candidate being voted on, Ibrahim Rugova of the Democratic League of Kosovo, failed to get the required approval of two thirds of the 120-member Assembly.  That was reported today by the United Nations Interim Administration in Kosovo (UNMIK).  Mr. Rugova got 49 of the 70 votes that were cast, but 50 Assembly members did not vote.  The Assembly did not schedule a date for another round of voting.

**Compensation Commission

The Governing Council of the United Nations Compensation Commission, under the Presidency of Sverre Bergh Johansen of Norway, today approved awards of over $132 million for compensation.  Representatives of Kuwait, Iraq, Sudan, Turkey, and Palestine addressed the 15-member Governing Council at its opening plenary meeting.  The Council decided to hold its next regular session from 12 to 14 March 2002.  There’s a press release with full details on that.

**Special Coordinator on Mideast Report

Going back to the Middle East, this morning the Office of the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East released a summary of a report it had commissioned from the Norwegian Research institute (FAFO).  It was on the effect of the Israeli-imposed closures on two Palestinian towns, Jericho and Gaza City, and two Palestinian villages, Beit Furik and Rantis.  The purpose of these studies was to improve understanding of how the closure impinges upon the economy and daily life of people, how they are affected by the closure and how they cope with the situation. 

One of the key conclusions of this report is that, while the direct economic effects of closure on the daily life of people are clearly identifiable, the longer lasting structural problems faced by the Palestinian private sector, and health-related effects, are only now beginning to emerge.  Even larger problems may await the Palestinian population if the crisis and closure persist.  The report is available in the Spokesman’s Office.

**Cyprus Force Command

Major-General Jin Ha Hwang of the Republic of Korea has been named by the Secretary-General as the new Force Commander for UNFICYP, again in Cyprus.  Major-General Hwang will succeed Major-General Victory Rana of Nepal on 15 December.  A full press release with background information on the new Force Commander is available in the office upstairs.

Still on Cyprus, there is on the racks an exchange of letters, between the President of the Security Council and the Secretary-General, on the extension of the mission of the Special Advisor on Cyprus, Alvaro de Soto, through 2002.

**More Appointments

Also on the racks today, there is a letter by the Secretary-General, informing the Security Council of his intention to appoint David Stephen, Chief of the United Nations Political Office in Somalia, as his Special Representative for Guinea-Bissau, effective next 1 February.  Stephen will replace Samuel Nana-Sinkam.

In another letter, the Secretary-General told the Council that he had decided to extend the appointment of his Special Adviser in Africa, Ibrahim Gambari, until 28 February, 2003.  He told the Council that Mr. Gambari’s efforts to promote peace in Angola have had a positive impact, but many issues, including getting the parties to agree to negotiations under the Lusaka Protocol, remain to be addressed.

**UNHCR Consultation on African Refugees

Delegates from 48 African countries will meet in Geneva on Friday to discuss a common strategy aimed at easing the negative effects of protracted refugee situations, on a continent where tens of thousands of people remain in exile for decades.  These informal consultations were called by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

**Press Releases

I’m approaching the end of this briefing with news highlighting some press releases that are available.  The World Heritage Committee of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has added two new sites to its list of World Heritage in Danger.  The Danger list now has 31 sites from around the world, which are threatened by natural or human causes.  The Committee has also added six natural and two cultural sites to the World Heritage list.  The press releases are available upstairs on these two issues.

Also, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has said that, although the food situation in sub-Saharan Africa is improving generally, many countries are sill facing serious food shortages.  The new issue of “Food Supply Situation and Crop Prospects in sub-Saharan Africa” notes that the situation in Somalia is still of great concern, with some 800,000 people experiencing food shortage and 300,000 in the southern regions threatened by starvation.

Still on the question of food, the World Food Programme today made an urgent appeal for $54 million to feed more than half a million people in Zimbabwe.  These press releases are all available upstairs.

**Democratic Republic of the Congo

And finally, I wish to bring to your attention a briefing at 1:15 today in this room, 226.  Pierre Okongo Lumbi, the Coordinator of the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s “Commission of the National Expert Group on the Illegal Exploitation of the Natural Resources of the Democratic Republic”, will be here to discuss the Commission’s work.

This is all I have.  Any questions before we move on?  No?  Jan, please. 

Briefing by the Spokesman for the General Assembly President

As you will have noticed from the Daily Journal, the General Assembly is not meeting in plenary today.  Tomorrow, it’ll conclude several items, most of which were discussed early on but not acted upon.  The Assembly will deal with draft resolutions on the report of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the report of the Economic and Social Council, on the Millennium Summit, on new or restored democracies and on the return of cultural property.  Also, on cooperation between the United Nations and the Latin American Economic System, and on humanitarian and disaster relief assistance.

Although the work programme is likely to change again, I’ll just give you what I have for next week.  Tuesday morning, the Assembly will take up the item entitled “the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina”.  It has been on the agenda since 1991.  Wednesday morning, it will be the reports of the Third Committee.  That is on social, humanitarian, human rights and cultural issues.  And then on Thursday, 20 December, two items on Afghanistan will be discussed.

One of those deals with emergency assistance, humanitarian law, the security of United Nations and humanitarian personnel, discrimination and so on.  The other is on “the situation in Afghanistan and its implications for international peace and security”.  It’s more political in nature, dealing with the role to be played by the Afghan parties in the search for a solution to the conflict, with foreign military support and supply of arms, and urging protection of the country’s cultural heritage.

That’s what I have on the work programme now, but I really advise you to keep a close eye on the Journal, because we still have a number of items that remain to be scheduled, including the reports, of course, of the Second and Fifth Committees.

Yesterday in Geneva, General Assembly President Han Seung-soo participated in the meeting of States Parties to the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees.  In his statement, he said among other things that the refugee issue has become more complex and multi-dimensional, ranging from individual asylum seekers to the mass influx of refugees and other persons with mixed political, economic or other motivations.  The plight of the refugees and their host countries stands now as a global concern of the first magnitude, together with terrorism, human rights and illicit drug trafficking.  That’s what I have for you.

**Questions and Answers

Question:  The two Afghan items.  Are those resolutions expected to be voted on when they’re taken up on Thursday, or is this something that’ll have a hundred speakers?

Spokesman for General Assembly President:  These are not new items that came up because of developments in Afghanistan.  I think one of them has been on the agenda since 1980.  Of course, in view of developments, there may be more speakers than normal, but it is an annual event.  And those two items are usually discussed together as well.  But at the moment they have scheduled only those two items for that day, so they may be expecting quite a few speakers.  But then again, depending on the number of speakers, they may lump items in the afternoon and so

on because at the moment we have limited time before the recess date and there are still items that need to be dealt with.

Deputy Spokesman:  If there are no more questions, I thank you all and wish you all a very pleasant afternoon.

* *** *