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

Following is a near-verbatim transcript of today’s noon briefing by Hua Jiang, Deputy Spokesman for the Secretary-General.

Good Afternoon.

**DRC

This morning, the Security Council unanimously adopted resolution 1484, authorizing, under Chapter VII of the Charter of the UN, the deployment until 1 September of an Interim Emergency Multinational Force in Bunia, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.  The resolution stresses that this force is to be deployed on a strictly temporary basis to allow the Secretary-General time to reinforce the UN Mission’s presence in Bunia.

The resolution demands that all parties to the conflict in Ituri cease hostilities immediately.  It also calls on all Member States and in particular those in the Great Lakes region to provide all necessary support to facilitate the swift deployment of the force.

On the ground, no fighting has been reported today in Bunia.  The UN Mission is continuing its efforts to re-start negotiations between the militia groups. 

In the meantime, general humanitarian activity continues.  War-wounded patients at the UN clinic in Bunia town have been transferred to the medical facility at the airport.  There have been no new war-wounded patients since Tuesday.

The number of dead bodies collected so far by the local Red Cross working together with the UN Mission now stands at 415.

**Security Council

The Security Council this morning also approved a resolution to extend the mandate of the Mission in Western Sahara by two months.

After that, the Council began an open meeting to wrap up the Council Presidency of Pakistan during the month of May, in which speakers focused on conflicts in Africa.  Ibrahim Gambari, Special Advisor to the Secretary-General on Africa, was among the speakers.

He noted that upcoming Security Council missions to both Central Africa and West Africa are particularly timely, because they would provide the Council an opportunity to learn first-hand and thus make informed judgement on a host of issues.  He also said Security Council missions to Africa are a clear demonstration of continuing interest in and engagement with, crises and conflicts on the continent.  Beyond that, however, they need to be effective instruments for conflict prevention, management and resolution.

In addition, he flagged that the failure of the international community to engage in serious efforts to consolidate peace in the Central African Republic, Liberia and Guinea-Bissau after the end of the earlier peacekeeping operations in these countries can largely be attributed to the relapse to conflict there.  Hence, greater and more creative efforts by the international community are essential for successful peace-building, he said.

Russia will take over from Pakistan as Security Council President for June.  Ambassador Sergey Lavrov of Russia is expected to brief you on the June programme of work for the Security Council following consultations on Tuesday, 3 June.

**Iraq

On 24 June, a planning meeting on reconstruction and recovery in Iraq will be held at the United Nations.  For those of you who missed it yesterday, the UN Development Programme Administrator Mark Malloch Brown, in his capacity as chair of the UN Development Group, mentioned this upcoming meeting.  UN agencies, international financial institutions and Iraqi technical experts will participate in the meeting, which will focus on information sharing about reconstruction efforts, needs assessment and resources.

**Iraq

In Baghdad today, a delegation from the International Olympic Committee (IOC) met with over 200 athletes, coaches and sports administrators and told them that the IOC was committed to having Iraqi athletes participate in the

2004 Athens Olympic Games.

With the active support of the UN Development Programme (UNDP), the IOC said it would work with local sports federations on training programmes to prepare athletes for the games.  The IOC and UNDP encouraged the members of the Iraqi sports community to organize elections for a national Olympic committee.  They also stressed the need for women to participate at all levels of sports.

**Statement attributable to the Spokesman

      The following is a statement attributable to the Spokesman for the Secretary-General:

“The Secretary-General welcomes the agreement signed yesterday –- that’s 29 May -- between the Government of Venezuela and the opposition Coordinadora Democrática.  He urges all Venezuelans to take advantage of the opportunity that this agreement provides to advance in the search for a peaceful, constitutional and electoral solution to the problems of their country. 

“He would also like to commend the international facilitators, in particular Mr. César Gaviria, Secretary General of the Organization of American States for his untiring efforts in helping to conclude this agreement.

“The Secretary-General emphasizes that the United Nations will continue to be engaged in supporting Venezuelans as they seek peaceful solutions to resolving their differences.”

**Tibetans in Nepal

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees is extremely concerned about the fate of 18 Tibetans detained by Nepalese authorities since 17 April, amid indications that Chinese authorities are demanding that they be returned to China.  You can read more about this in today’s briefing notes from UNHCR.

**UNICEF

The Executive Director of the United Nations Children's Fund, Carol Bellamy, today challenged the leaders of the Group of Eight, G-8, to turn the tide in the global AIDS crisis or risk being held accountable for the deaths of millions of people, increasingly children and young people.  We have a press release with more details.

**G-8/WFP

The World Food Programme has also prepared for the Group of Eight summit in Evian, by putting together a white paper on preventing and mitigating food crises in sub-Saharan Africa for G-8 leaders to consider.

The white paper says that some 196 million Africans are undernourished, and 40 million now suffer from severe food shortages, and WFP suggests specific steps that G-8 nations can take to make emergency responses to food crises more effective.

**ICTY

Franko Simatovic, a former official in Yugoslavia’s State Security Service, was transferred today to the Detention Unit of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, where he has been indicted for war crimes and crimes against humanity for participating in the forcible removal of the majority of non-Serbs from large areas of Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina.  We have a press release with more details on that.

**Vaccination week

The first-ever Vaccination Week in the Americas will be launched this Sunday, with 19 countries mobilizing to immunize more than 15 million children under 5 years of age and 2.7 million women of childbearing age.  The ultimate goal is to achieve a vaccination rate of 95 per cent throughout the continent.  And we have a press release with more details.

**FAO

The Food and Agriculture Organization has launched a $400,000 project to help drought-affected farmers in Eritrea through the distribution of cereal and legume seeds and through providing technical assistance for the 2003 cropping season.  Again, we have a press release on that.

**DSG –- Staff day

And today is UN Staff Day.  In her remarks at Memorial Ceremony held at the UN Headquarters, the Deputy Secretary-General Louis Fréchette paid respect to colleagues who have lost their lives, and the unsung heroes –- those who continue to work in the most difficult of conditions.

She said that tremendous progress had been made over the past year in the area of staff security:  “Most of the recommendations made by the Secretary-General to the General Assembly in 2001 to enhance security of staff in the field have been implemented, or are in the process of being implemented”, she said.

And we have the full text of her remarks available upstairs.

**The Week Ahead at the United Nations

And we also have the Week Ahead for you to pick up in the Office of the Spokesman.

That’s all I have for you.  Have a nice weekend.

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