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 Marie Okabe, Associate Spokesperson for the Secretary-General.

Good afternoon.

**Guest at Noon

Our guest today will be Ms. Ayse Feride Acar, Chairperson of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW).  She will be talking to you about the themes and outcomes of the Committee’s current session.

**SG – Colin Powell

And, just to alert you for this afternoon, the Secretary-General and the United States Secretary of State, Colin Powell, are scheduled to hold a joint press encounter at the Security Council stakeout area at around 5.30 p.m. this afternoon.

**Security Council

The Security Council has no meetings or consultations as a whole scheduled for today.

Council President, Romanian Ambassador Mihnea Ioam Motoc, will host the monthly Security Council luncheon today with the Secretary-General.

**Sudan

Turning to Sudan, eight human rights observers from the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights have been granted visas to travel to Sudan.  They plan to head to Darfur to start monitoring human rights violations.

And, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs reports that new non-governmental organizations continue to arrive in Darfur.

On the political side, starting tomorrow in Geneva, consultations with the two rebel movements of Darfur are expected to commence to prepare for a new round of substantive talks on Darfur, which are led by the African Union.  The Secretary-General’s Special Adviser Mohammad Sahnoun will lead the UN team.

Meanwhile, arrangements are being made for a joint verification mission to assess the security situation in Darfur next week.  As you’ll recall, both the Secretary-General and his Special Representative Jan Pronk, mentioned this mission in their various press encounters with you yesterday.  The mission has been organized under the auspices of the Joint Implementation Mechanism (JIM), the body set up after the United Nations and Sudan issued a communiqué on 3 July outlining their commitments to alleviate the humanitarian crisis in that region of Sudan.

**SG - Qazi

Turning to Iraq, the Secretary-General, a short while ago, introduced to the press his new Special Representative for Iraq, Ashraf Qazi, in his conference room, following their meeting at 11:30 a.m.  That encounter should be played on UN television shortly, if not now.

**Iraq

And a number of you have been asking about the United Nations presence in Baghdad.  Currently we do have a small UN team of technical experts in Baghdad to "assist in the convening of a national conference to select a consultative assembly".

SG’s Remarks on Water/Sanitation Board

The costs of unsafe drinking water and poor sanitation in our world today are unacceptable, said the Secretary-General at the opening this morning of the first session of the Advisory Board on Water and Sanitation.  He noted that today, one person in six will drink unclean water.  One person in three will not have access to proper sanitation.  And around 10,000 people will die today as a result of this preventable situation.

While noting that much good work is being done at the local and international levels, the Secretary-General reminded the Board that greater focus is required to meet Millennium Declaration commitments, namely:  To halve by 2015 the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation, and to develop integrated water resources management and water efficiency plans by 2005.

The name of the game is not to come up with new plans, he said, but to help step up efforts to implement existing plans and meet agreed targets.

The full text of the message is available upstairs.

**SG’s Report on Abkhazia, Georgia

In his latest report on the situation in Abkhazia, Georgia, which is out on the racks today, the Secretary-General, says that while the Georgian and Abkhaz sides continue with practical cooperation activities, a substantive dialogue on the key issues of the conflict is still lacking.

The Secretary-General welcomes the discussions that have taken place between the parties on security guarantees and the return of refugees, but he urges them to pursue more actively the related recommendations made by assessments in 2000 and 2002.  He also reiterates his appeal to the Abkhaz side to facilitate, as agreed, the deployment of United Nations civilian police on its side of the ceasefire line.

In the absence of a political settlement, the Secretary-General notes the important role played by the United Nations Mission in Georgia in preventing the resumption of hostilities and pursuing a lasting solution.  He, therefore, recommends that the Security Council extend the mandate of the Mission for a further six months.

**Louise Arbour – First Press Conference in Geneva

Louise Arbour, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, met the Geneva press corps this morning for the first time in her new capacity since taking up her post on 1 July. 

Speaking of her priorities, the High Commissioner said she intends to focus on the most vulnerable -- the very poor, the imprisoned, the disenfranchised, the targets of intolerance and hatred, and that she intends to come to their assistance through the most effective legal means at her disposal.

She noted that, after 60 years of work, we have built a solid legal and institutional framework of human rights protection and promotion, a framework which is accepted almost universally.  Now we have the opportunity to actually put that framework to work for people, for each individual right holder, she said. 

According to Ms. Arbour, the challenges are numerous, and perhaps the most obvious and the most insidious is the magnitude of extreme poverty.

The High Commissioner answered questions on a number of subjects:  on the Middle East, on Iraq, on Sudan, on Kosovo, detainees in Guantanamo Bay, the Commission on Human Rights and human rights enforcement.  And, we have a summary of her press conference upstairs in the Spokesman’s Office.

**Afghanistan

I just want to flag a couple of items from Afghanistan.

Almost 80 per cent of Afghanistan’s estimated voter population has registered to vote in the upcoming polls.  The United Nations mission there, however, expressed major concern at what it described as “unbalanced registration”, such as in the southern part of the country.  A mission has been dispatched to the south where key problems have been identified as lack of security, and insufficient numbers of educated women to take part in the process.

And, in central and northern Afghanistan, emergency assistance continues to be dispatched to drought and flood affected areas.

**Kenya

We also have a press release on how United Nations agencies will soon be appealing for international aid on behalf of the Kenyan Government, which has requested assistance to help overcome poor rainfall and severe crop failure.

**Press Conference Tomorrow

And finally, at 1:30 tomorrow, Charlotte Abaka, the United Nations Commission on Human Rights independent expert on Liberia, will be here to brief you on the human rights situation in that country.

Before I turn the floor over to our guest today, does anybody have any questions for me?  Yes?

**Questions and Answers

Question:   On the meeting between the SG and his Special Representative to Iraq, Mr. Qazi, I am wondering, do you have more information for us on that meeting?  What kind of subject they discussed?  Will there be a chance for the media to talk to the Special Representative after they’ve finished?

Associate Spokesperson:The meeting did take place between the Special Representative and the Secretary-General at 11:30 this morning.  There was a press opportunity in the conference room following the meeting.  I think it was just starting when I had left.  So, that will be played again for you, I am sure, on UN television and I’ll try to see if I can get a read out.  But, the read out probably will be the press encounter.  Yes?

Question:   There was talk from London that Prime Minister Blair will be in touch with Kofi Annan today.  Has that happened, or is that happening?

Associate Spokesperson:Let me follow up on that after the briefing.  [The spokeswoman later announced that the Secretary-General had spoken by phone with Prime Minister Blair after the noon briefing.]    

Question:   And the other thing was on the joint verification mission.  Can we know who is or going on it yet?

Associate Spokesperson:It will be a joint mission comprised of UN officials I believe, ambassadors in Sudan and the Sudanese Government as well, because it is an outgrowth of the body set up by the joint communiqué, which was signed by the United Nations and the Sudanese Government, as you recall, right before the Secretary-General left Khartoum on 3 July.

Question:   Do you have any specifics on who will actually be on it?

Associate Spokesperson:The final arrangements are being made on that, but generally the grouping will be UN officials, ambassadors from concerned areas and the Sudanese Government finally.

If there are no more questions, Ms. Acar?

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