DAILY PRESS BRIEFING BY THE OFFICES OF THE SPOKESMAN FOR THE SECRETARY-GENERAL AND THE SPOKESWOMAN FOR THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY PRESIDENT

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

AND THE SPOKESWOMAN FOR THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY PRESIDENT

Following is a near-verbatim transcript of today’s noon briefing by Fred Eckhard, Spokesman for the Secretary-General, and Michele Montas, Spokeswoman for the General Assembly President.

Spokesman for Secretary-General

Good Afternoon.

**Secretary-General in Los Angeles

The Secretary-General will address the Los Angeles World Affairs Council on the US role in the United Nations, and the importance of multilateralism, this evening.  He flew to Los Angeles from New York this morning, and he should be arriving there later this afternoon.

His speech to the World Affairs Council contrasts the work done by the United Nations, with US support, over the second half of the twentieth century with the horrors of the first half, when humanity suffered two world wars.  We have embargoed copies of the speech upstairs.

We will also be turning off these cameras at the end of this briefing to bring in a senior official to give you a quick overview of the speech and take any questions you might have, and then we’ll be turning the cameras back on for the press conference of the President of the General Assembly at 12:30.

**Security Council

The Security Council this morning is holding consultations on its programme of work for December, under the Council Presidency of Ambassador Stefan Tafrov of Bulgaria.

Ambassador Tafrov will come to speak to you at about 1:15 in this room this afternoon, to discuss the work the Council will do this month.

**United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)

The UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR, today reported a rise in asylum applications from Russians, the great majority of whom are believed to be Chechens, from this past July through September.  More than 23,000 Russians applied for asylum in that period, compared to more than 21,000 Iraqis.

In its asylum statistics for that three-month period, UNHCR reports a slight increase in asylum applications, by 9 per cent, from the period lasting from April until June.

Overall, asylum applications for the first nine months of this year is 21 per cent lower in the European Union than during that same period in 2002.

UNHCR, in its briefing notes today, also draws attention to the grave difficulties that non-governmental organizations have faced in their refugee work in Iran.

**Sierra Leone:  Repatriations

Repatriation to Sierra Leone resumed this weekend from Guinea after a three-month interruption due to the rainy season.  A small convoy carrying 84 refugees is currently in transit towards the Kono district in eastern Sierra Leone.

The UN refugee agency is planning four more convoys of about 250 people each in the next two weeks, and many more in 2004 before the planned June cut-off date for official repatriations.  Young people are being encouraged to take advantage of the current convoys to be in time for the beginning of the school year in Sierra Leone.

However, the UN notes that some 73,000 Sierra Leoneans are still scattered across West Africa, two and a half years after the official end of their civil war.  We have more information upstairs.

**Cameroon-Nigeria

The Cameroon-Nigeria Mixed Commission is set to adopt its plan for the withdrawal and transfer of authority in the Lake Chad area and to address further cooperation between those two countries.

The Commission, which the Secretary-General set up to bring about the peaceful implementation of the International Court of Justice’s ruling on the border dispute between the two countries, is meeting today and tomorrow in Yaoundé, Cameroon.  It is chaired by the Secretary-General’s Special Representative, Ahmedou Ould Abdallah.

We have a press release in English and in French with more details upstairs.

**Côte d’Ivoire

The UN Emergency Relief Coordinator, Jan Egeland, today expressed concern about the rising tensions in Côte d’Ivoire and warned that if that country lapses back into war, “it will only compound the suffering of civilians”.  He urged all parties to bring an end to fighting immediately, to prevent a humanitarian crisis from worsening.

Meanwhile, a breakdown in law and order, particularly in the north, could jeopardize people’s ability to feed themselves.  Egeland said that crops are being grown, but farmers can’t bring their goods to market and their customers have become too poor to buy them.

We have a press release with more.

**Liberia

The UN Mission in Liberia formally launched its disarmament program yesterday with a ceremony in the capital, Monrovia, at which weapons were destroyed.  Jacques Klein, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative, cut up the first weapon in the presence of government and former rebel officials.  Quoting from the Book of Isaiah, Klein said, “They shall beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks”.

**Rwanda

A former mayor (or bourgmestre) of Mukingo, in Rwanda, was convicted yesterday by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda for genocide and crimes against humanity, and sentenced to life in prison.

Details of the conviction are available in a press release in my Office.

**Africities Summit

The Secretary-General says that UN statistics showing that between 40 and 70 per cent of the urban population in Africa lives in slums should alarm us all.  In a message to the “Africities Summit”, which is taking place in Yaoundé, Cameroon, today, he urges leaders to do their utmost to make African towns and cities places of opportunity and prosperity for all.

Copies of the message are available upstairs.

**Horn of Africa

The Secretary-General recently informed the Security Council of the work his Special Adviser, Mohamed Sahnoun, has been doing in the Horn of Africa, especially in Somalia and Sudan.  The Secretary-General, in an exchange of letters with the Council, has extended Sahnoun’s appointment until the end of December 2004.

**Abolition of Slavery

Slavery and slavery-like practices continue to be among the greatest human rights challenges facing the international community.  According to a note issued by United Nations human rights bodies on the occasion of the International Day for the Abolition of Slavery, profits are still being made from the buying and selling of human beings, and millions of people languish in conditions of servitude, serfdom or enforced prostitution.

A press release on the work of the working group on contemporary forms of slavery is available upstairs.

**Environment

The latest round of talks on the Climate Change Convention and its Kyoto Protocol are into their second day in Milan, Italy.

Meanwhile, nearby in Turin, the World Conference on Sport and Environment, organized by the International Olympic Committee and the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), got under way today.

Coinciding with the opening, the UN Environment Programme has launched a study which concludes that due to global warming, the levels of snow falling in lower-lying mountain areas are expected to decrease over the coming decades, which in turn is expected to make many of the world’s ski areas unviable.  Speaking at the Conference, Klaus Toepfer, Executive Director of UNEP, stressed that while clearly it is the poorest countries that are at greatest risk due to the effects of climate change, rich nations will also undergo economic and social problems if global warming is not tackled.

And that didn’t stop snow from falling in New York City this morning.

**Budget

Budget news, Belize today paid more than $13,000 and became the 123rd Member State to pay its regular budget dues in full for this year.

**World Chronicle

The Information Department asked me to announce that World Chronicle programme no. 921, featuring Khalid Malik, the principal author of the UNDP Development Effectiveness Report, will be shown today at 3:30 on in-house television channels 3 or 31.

**Press Conferences

Press Conferences, as I’ve already mentioned, at 12:30, the General Assembly President Julian Hunte, will be here to announce the Human Rights Awards winners.  And then at 1:15, Ambassador Stefan Tafrov on the work of the Security Council for this month.

At noon tomorrow, our guest at this briefing will be Martin Barber, the Director of the Mine Action Service in the Department of Peacekeeping Operations.  He’ll be joining us to launch the report, “Portfolio of Mine Action Projects 2004”.

That’s all I have for you.  Any questions before we go to Michelle.  Easy.  Michelle.

Spokeswoman for General Assembly President

Thank you, Fred.  Good Afternoon.

**Emergency Session on Palestine

President Julian Hunte received last night a letter from the Chairman of the Arab Group, Mr. Mansour Ayyad Al-Otaibi of the Permanent Mission of Kuwait asking for a resumption of the Tenth Emergency Session on Palestine.  It has been decided that the Emergency Session will be resumed on Monday morning, 8 December.  The meeting is to continue to address the issue of the wall being built by Israel in the occupied Palestinian territory, after the report of the Secretary-General.  The last meeting on 21 October that dealt with the construction of the wall had requested the Secretary-General’s report.

**General Assembly meeting on Palestine

The Assembly continues to meet today on the Question of Palestine.  Thirty-three speakers are listed to address the Assembly, and six resolutions on the Question of Palestine are expected to be voted on by tonight.

**Human Rights Awards

President Julian Hunte, as Fred said, will be with us in this room at 12:30 to announce the recipients of this year’s United Nations prize in the field of human rights.  Such an occasion comes only once every five years.  Since its creation in 1966, the prize has been awarded five times, the last in 1998.  The prize will be awarded at the plenary meeting of the General Assembly at UN Headquarters in New York on Human Rights Day on 10 December 2003.

**President Hunte’s trip to Geneva

President Hunte is to leave tonight for Geneva, where he will be the keynote speaker at the Twenty-second General Assembly of the Conference on Non-Governmental Organizations in consultation relationship with the United Nations, better known as CONGO.

He will use his visit in Geneva to meet with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, with the Director-General of the World Trade Organization and the acting United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

**International Day for Abolition of Slavery

This morning the President of the General Assembly deplored, in a statement to mark the International Day for the Abolition of Slavery, the fact that today some 27 million persons are enslaved or working in forced labour.  We must work steadfastly to eradicate slavery worldwide, says President Hunte.  The statement will be available this afternoon on the Web site.

This is all I have for you.  Thank you.

Questions and Answers

Question:  You said the resumed special session on Palestine will be on Monday, the eighth.  According to the original schedule, the resolutions from Committee 1 and Committee 6 were supposed to be on the eighth.  What’s going to happen to those?

Spokeswoman:  They are going to be postponed.

Question:  Until when?

Spokeswoman:  The session is only supposed to last for the morning, so we assume that in the afternoon, they will start considering the reports of the Committees.  I will know more about this later on, how they are going to reschedule the others.

Spokesman for the Secretary-General:  Okay, if there are no further questions, I’ll say thank you very much.  We’ll give our colleagues in UN Television a couple of minutes to shut down the system and then I’ll ask the anonymous official to come up to this desk to brief you on the Secretary-General’s Los Angeles speech.

Thank you very much.

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