DAILY PRESS BRIEFING BY THE OFFICE OF THE SPOKESMAN FOR THE SECRETARY-GENERAL
| Press Briefing |
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.
**Liberia
The Secretary-General’s Representative for Liberia, Abou Moussa, has reported that a ceasefire and cessation of hostilities agreement has been signed between the Government of Liberia and the two rebel movements, Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy, LURD, and the Movement for Democracy and Elections in Liberia, MODEL. The 12-point agreement was signed in Accra, Ghana.
According to the agreement, the signing “shall be followed immediately by the engagement of the Government of Liberia, LURD and MODEL with all other Liberian political parties and stakeholders in dialogue, to seek, within a period of 30 days, a comprehensive peace agreement”.
The agreement calls for the formation of a transitional government, which will not include the current President in accordance with his 4 June 2003 declaration in Accra, made at the inauguration of the Liberian peace talks.
The United Nations is expected to provide logistical and military personnel support to the Joint Verification Team led by the Economic Community of West African States, which is to identify the locations of the parties on the ground, and the Joint Monitoring Committee, which will supervise and monitor the ceasefire.
**Iraq - Vieira de Mello
In Baghdad today, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative, Sergio Vieira de Mello, met with Jalal Talabani, the Iraqi Kurdish leader and Head of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.
Talabani told Vieira de Mello that he believed the United Nations should play an important role in the current transitional phase in Iraq, by providing advice and assistance in matters such as the constitutional and electoral processes, financial, monetary and budgetary matters, as well as in the longer term construction of democratic institutions in Iraq.
Vieira de Mello underlined the importance of promoting and protecting the human rights of all Iraqis, and of assuring an equal place for Iraqi women in all walks of life. After the meeting, the two men spoke to the press.
Vieira de Mello was asked if he saw any common ground emerge from his various meetings with Iraqi political leaders. Vieira de Mello answered that he was discovering by the day a convergence of opinions of Iraqi leaders, and the need to move swiftly to new transitional institutions that will embody the Iraqi sovereignty in this phase leading to the elaboration and the adoption of the new constitution and democratic elections. The full transcript is available upstairs.
On the humanitarian front, we have a press release from the UN Children’s Fund on their efforts to increase security for school children.
**Security Council
In an open meeting this morning, Jean-Marie Guéhenno, Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, briefed the Security Council on Afghanistan, noting such positive developments as President Hamid Karzai’s resolute action towards establishing the Government’s authority over the provinces and the beginning of public consultations on the Constitution. But he underscored, “The security situation is a serious impediment to progress, and is a major risk to the entire process.”
Guéhenno warned that it is difficult to gauge whether regional commanders and powerful governors are genuinely committed to the nation-building process, or whether they seek to undermine it.
Antonio Maria Costa, Executive Director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, also addressed the Council, saying that, according to the Office’s recent assessment, opium cultivation in Afghanistan appears to have spread to new areas, while a decrease has taken place in the provinces where it is traditionally grown. On balance, opium cultivation levels are likely to remain unchanged.
He also drew the Council’s attention to other consequences of the Afghan drug trade, including violence, corruption, the spread of HIV/AIDS and the risk to the economic and social stability of neighbouring countries.
We have copies of both speeches upstairs. Security Council members are also considering the text of a draft presidential statement on Afghanistan, although it is not clear whether it will be ready by the end of today’s meeting.
After this morning’s session, Costa will come to the Security Council stakeout to talk to you about Afghanistan. Then, tomorrow, he will be the guest at the noon briefing, to launch the 2003 Opium Surveys for Lao People’s Democratic Republic and Myanmar. We have embargoed copies of those two surveys available in my office.
**Somalia
The Secretary-General, in his latest report to the Security Council on Somalia, which is available as a document today, notes that the Somalia National Reconciliation Conference is about to enter its final phase in Kenya but also points to divisions between Somali leaders, including emerging disagreements between the President and Prime Minister of the Transitional National Government.
The Secretary-General deplores the frequent violations by the Somali parties of their commitments to cease hostilities, and he calls on all parties to refrain from hostilities and from any acts likely to increase tension during the national reconciliation process.
**Human Rights
Yesterday afternoon, we put out a press release announcing the Secretary-General’s appointment of five independent experts to follow up, along with the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the implementation of the Declaration and Programme of Action of the 2001 World Conference against Racism.
The five experts are former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari; Prince El Hassan bin Talal of Jordan; the Rapporteur-General of the World Conference, Edna Maria Santos Roland of Brazil; former Organization of African Unity Secretary General Salim Ahmed Salim, of Tanzania; and former Polish Prime Minister Hanna Suchocka. The press release, with biographical details of the five experts, is available upstairs.
**International Court of Justice - Congo
Today in The Hague, the International Court of Justice rejected the request submitted by the Republic of Congo, seeking the annulment of the investigation and prosecution measures taken by French judicial authorities following a complaint for crimes against humanity and torture allegedly committed in the Congo. That case was filed in France by various human rights groups against Congolese President Denis Sassou Nguesso and other senior officials. And we have a press release available upstairs.
**Deputy Secretary-General
The Deputy Secretary-General Louise Fréchette is this week in Loch Lomond, Scotland, attending the thirty-eighth Conference on the United Nations of the Next Decade sponsored by the Stanley Foundation. The theme of the Conference is "Who Rebuilds After Conflict". She will be back in the office on Monday, 23 June.
**SARS
The World Health Organization (WHO) today has removed Taiwan from its list of areas to which travellers are advised to avoid all but essential travel due to the outbreak of SARS. WHO continues to recommend that persons planning to travel to Beijing, China, consider postponing all but essential travel.
In other news, the WHO Global Conference on SARS started today in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. We have a press release available upstairs with more details.
**World Food Programme
The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has extended its emergency appeal for food aid in Madagascar until the end of 2003 because of the country’s prevailing drought and recent cyclones that destroyed large areas of infrastructure and affected thousands of people. And we have a press release on that.
**Budget
Liechtenstein became the eighty-seventh Member State to pay its regular budget dues in full for 2003, completing its payment of more than $93,000. Also today, France contributed more than $5.2 million to the peacekeeping budget.
**UNEP
Today is World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought. In a message of the Secretary-General, he said desertification and drought pose an ever-increasing global threat, such as in Australia and India, where millions of tons of productive soil are blown away in dust storms and millions of hectares turn into wasteland.
**Press Conference Tomorrow
And at 11 a.m. tomorrow in this room, Thoraya Ahmed Obaid, Executive Director of the UN Population Fund, together with Amy Pollack, President of EngenderHealth, will be launching the first-ever report on obstetric fistula in sub-Sahara Africa. The report highlights the profiles of women living with fistula, the capacity of hospitals to treat patients, and the barriers that prevent women from seeking medical care.
Interested journalists may obtain copies of the report online by requesting a password from Micol Zarb of United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) at 212-297-5042. In case you don’t know what this obstetric fistula is: it’s when a woman needs a caesarian section, but can’t get one.
That’s all I have for you. Yes, Richard?
Questions and Answers
Question: What’s the Secretary-General’s response to the peace accord in Liberia, then?
Deputy Spokesman: I haven’t got anything new on that one yet; because we just got the news that this has been signed. So I am waiting for a response from him on this. [She later said that a statement by the Secretary-General was expected.]
Question: What is the UN role in Liberia, how many people over the last few years, what departments..?
Deputy Spokesman: I don’t have the details with me now; but what I can say is that the UN is expected to provide logistical and military personnel supporting the whole process. But as regard to the precise figures of that, I have to come back to you afterwards. [She later said that the United Nations had a political and humanitarian role in Liberia with Abou Moussa, the Secretary-General’s Representative, heading the United Nations political office.]
Question: When... Go ahead.
Question: When was the time of the agreement -- I mean, between the rebels and the Government of Liberia -- this morning or yesterday?
Deputy Spokesman: What I have here is just, its ... the agreement was signed today, but what I have here, it doesn’t give the precise time of that signing. Yes?
Question: What’s the latest date for the arrival of Razali Ismail here at Headquarters?
Deputy Spokesman: What is the latest?
Question: ...date of his arrival of his planned visit?
Deputy Spokesman: Well, he did say that he planned to be here before the end of the month to see the Secretary-General. However, the Secretary-General, as you know, is going to take a trip fairly soon. So, then, he will have to change his original plan, and I don’t have the precise date of his latest itinerary. Yeah?
Question: I saw your quote in the Wall Street Journal yesterday. What is the UN’s opinion -- the Secretary-General’s opinion -- about Mr. Razali Ismail’s business ties through his company with the Government in Rangoon, while he is conducting discussions and negotiations abroad on Aung San Suu Kyi?
Deputy Spokesman: Well, as I said when I was asked this question by the author of the article, he is not a UN staff. He is only paid when he travels on UN business and he also comes under UN regulations when he undertakes UN business. So, what he does in his spare time is, you know, like running a business. It’s his own business.
Question: But how can you have somebody negotiating for the UN there? That means they’re there for the United Nations. The UN is saying “it’s okay, we want you there, but we know that you have a profit-making venture with the country you’re there talking to”.
Deputy Spokesman: But his company is dealing with many countries and that particular contract with the Myanmar Government was signed before he joined the company, so...
Question: But, still, considering the UN view on conflict of interest, it doesn’t look good, does it? It would be as if you’d sent someone to negotiate regarding Charles Taylor in Liberia and their company sold arms there.
Deputy Spokesman: Well, as we said, you know, he’s not a UN staff. He is...
Question: But it’s the UN that sent him there. When he’s working, he says he’s working for the UN. That doesn’t look good for the UN.
Deputy Spokesman: Yes. But, the thing is, first of all that’s not his company. Second, as I have said earlier, that deal was signed before he joined the company and that company is having deals, business deals, with many countries.
Question: But, it’s still beyond perception. I mean, just because he joined there after, it still exists. The business ties still exist. I mean, someone could become a leader in Serbia and whatever, some other country, and say “Oh, that happened before my time”, but...
Deputy Spokesman: I think that’s different. But, apart from what I have already said, we have nothing new to add on that.
Question: Has Mr. Correl looked into this?
Deputy Spokesman: I think this matter has been... he, Mr. Razali has never tried to hide his business interest from the UN and he informed the UN of his business deals, if he considered it could be a conflict of interest. So, we’re aware of what’s going on.
All right, have a good afternoon.
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