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 Fred Eckhard, Spokesman for the Secretary-General.

Good afternoon.

**Iraq –- Secretary-General Statement

We put a statement out on Saturday, saying that the Secretary-General is extremely concerned at the widespread fighting that has broken out in Iraq over the last several days, especially in the holy city of Najaf.  He is particularly troubled by the high toll of dead and wounded, including civilian casualties.

He believes that, in such a situation, force should be a last resort.  He calls for every effort to be made, even at this late hour, he said, to work out a ceasefire and peaceful solution.

The United Nations is helping with the preparations for the National Conference, due to begin in mid-August.  In the Secretary-General’s view, the Conference can be an important step in a peaceful and inclusive political transition, by promoting national reconciliation and dialogue.  The United Nations is ready to extend its facilitating role to the current crisis, the Secretary-General said, if this would be helpful.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Allawi’s offer over the weekend of a limited amnesty and wider participation in the political process are steps in the right direction, the statement went on.

Also on Iraq, the Secretary-General’s report on the UN Mission in Iraq (UNAMI) is out on the racks today.

**Iraq-IAEA

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has completed its annual inventory of declared nuclear material in Iraq, and is returning to Vienna.

The Agency’s Director-General, Mohamed ElBaradei, said, “This week’s mission was a good first step.”  Now, he said, the Agency hopes it will be in a position to complete the mandate entrusted to it by the Security Council, to complete the verification process required of the Agency and the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC).

That verification mission is different from the work the IAEA did this past week, which was to inspect all declared nuclear materials, in line with Iraq’s safeguards agreement.  We have a press release with more information on that upstairs.

**Sudan

For the record, I’d like to refer to a statement issued last Friday afternoon, in which the Secretary-General welcomed the agreement between his Special Representative for Sudan, Jan Pronk, and the Government of Sudan on an Action Plan for Darfur.

In this statement, the Secretary-General said he attaches great importance to substantive and verifiable progress being made during the next 30 days towards restoring full security for the Darfur region.  The full text of the statement is available upstairs.

Regarding Mr. Pronk’s activities over the weekend, on Friday, 6 August, he travelled to southern Sudan and met with senior leadership of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM).  The focus of the discussions was the next round of the peace talks with the Sudanese Government.  On Saturday, the Special Representative met John Garang, the Chairman of the SPLM, and yesterday, Mr. Pronk attended the Arab Foreign Ministers' extraordinary meeting held in Cairo to consider the situation in Darfur.

In a separate meeting with the Foreign Minister of Egypt, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, Mr. Pronk provided him with an overview of the Plan of Action agreed upon with the Sudanese Government.  They also discussed the provisions of Security Council resolution 1556 (2004), the needs of the internally displaced persons, the resources required for Darfur, and progress so far in deploying monitors to the region.

Regarding humanitarian developments, the UN in Khartoum announced today that representatives of the rebel movements in Darfur have agreed to allow the vaccination of an estimated half a million children cut off from regular health services in the region.  Agreement was reached with the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) after a UN team met their representatives in the Eritrean capital of Asmara last Friday.  The Sudanese Health Ministry endorsed the initiative.

Special Representative Jan Pronk welcomed this development saying that this is a good example of the kind of cooperation needed from both sides to deliver the relief that is urgently needed.  The full text of the press release is available upstairs.

The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reports that the security situation in Darfur remains tenuous, with more violence directed at, and displacing, civilians in North and South Darfur.  Militia men suspected to be Janjaweed attacked some 35 families in Tawilla, North Darfur, on Saturday.  Meanwhile, reports continue of attacks by armed men on horses and camels, supported by uniformed men and military vehicles, in South Darfur.

In North Darfur, there have also been reports of Sudanese authorities offering up to 100,000 Sudanese dinars, or nearly $400, to leaders of groups of internally displaced persons, to get them to persuade the displaced people to return voluntarily to their areas of origin. Despite pressure, the internally displaced persons are choosing to stay put, because of security concerns.

Humanitarian agencies, meanwhile, have been travelling to rebel-held areas in North Darfur that had previously been off-limits, to assess the needs of the population.  The latest assessment team completed its mission to three sites last Friday and said that humanitarian assistance was urgently needed for some 50,000 displaced persons there.

**Afghanistan

The head of the UN Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), Jean Arnault, condemned in the strongest terms the murderous attack that claimed the lives of two Afghan electoral workers in Uruzgan last Friday.  He expressed his sincere hope that one member of the convoy that was attacked in Uruzgan will be found soon, and alive.

In that attack, four vehicles of a convoy from the Joint Electoral Management Body were attacked.  Police managed to capture one of the attackers, and investigations into the incident continue.

We have more details in yesterday’s briefing notes from Kabul, which also mentions that the number of Afghans registered to vote has now passed the nine million mark.

**Security Council

There are no Security Council meetings or consultations scheduled for today, or for tomorrow, for that matter.  The Council’s next scheduled meeting is on Wednesday morning, when it expects to hold an open briefing, followed by consultations, on the Middle East.

**Cote d’Ivoire

We have just received word from the UN Mission in Cote d’Ivoire (MINUCI) that a meeting of the Council of Ministers has taken place in that country, in keeping with the timetable agreed to at the summit co-chaired by the Secretary-General in Accra, Ghana.

The Secretary-General’s Special Representative, Albert Tevoedjre, reported that three Cabinet ministers who had been earlier dismissed from the Government did in fact participate in today’s Cabinet meeting, including ministers from the Forces Nouvelles in the North.

**Burundi

The Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Burundi, Carolyn McAskie, has commended the progress made at the talks on post-transitional power-sharing held in Pretoria, South Africa, among 31 Burundian political parties last week.

In a statement issued in Bujumbura, the Special Representative hails the efforts exerted by the President of South Africa, Thabo Mbeki, and by the Facilitator, Deputy President Jacob Zuma, to narrow the gap between the parties with a view to brokering an agreement acceptable to all.  She urges all parties concerned to redouble their efforts to reach the required consensus around that agreement in the coming few days.

**Democratic Republic of Congo

Out on the racks today is a report to the Security Council recording the human rights abuses which occurred in Ituri, in the north-eastern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), from January 2002 until December 2003.

The report, drafted by the Human Rights and Child Protection Sections of the UN Mission in the DRC (MONUC), examines the background to the conflict and provides information about massacres and other abuses committed in Ituri over two years.  This is a valuable file-item, I think, for you on events in the DRC.

**World Food Programme

The World Food Programme (WFP) and the League of Arab States will now be working together more closely.  The two signed in Cairo yesterday their first Memorandum of Understanding for future cooperation.

The agreement underlines the common interests of the pair – in addition to exchanging information and expertise in different fields, they’ll work together towards identifying problems and coordinating intervention relating to food insecurity and malnutrition, particularly among women and children.  There is a press release on that upstairs.

**Food and Agriculture Organization

The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) warns that over-fishing in the Asia-Pacific region is on the rise, while the abundance of more valuable fish species has declined.  FAO’s report, presented to the Asia-Pacific Fishery Commission in Thailand last week, calls for improved management of fishing resources in order to secure the sector’s future.  We have more out on this in a press release, which you can get in my office.

**International Day of the World’s Indigenous People

Today is International Day of the World’s Indigenous People and it’s also the tenth anniversary of the occasion.  The Secretary-General marked the day with a call for governments, intergovernmental organizations and civil society to work towards empowering indigenous peoples and ensuring that they take part in decisions that affect their lives.

In addition, the Special Rapporteur on the human rights situation of indigenous peoples has issued a statement where he expresses his concern about continuing reports of gross human rights violations against indigenous peoples in many parts of the world.

Here at UN Headquarters, the UN will observe the Day with a ceremony and a cultural presentation at 1:15 p.m. in the General Assembly lobby.  We have copies of the Secretary-General’s full message, as well as the Special Rapporteur’s statement, available upstairs.

**Middle East

And finally, in order to contribute to a project of peace and friendship among nations, the United Nations Office in Vienna has invited 110 members of Israeli and Palestinian youth organizations for an hour-long guided tour through the United Nations headquarters in Vienna tomorrow.  We will have a press release from the Vienna office with more details for out.

That is all I have for you.

**Questions and Answers

Question:  Can you give us an update on what the Special Representative for Iraq’s schedule is in the near term?  And in the beginning of the briefing, you referred to the UN offering its facilitating role to the crisis in Iraq.  Can you elaborate a little on what is being offered?

Spokesman:  Taking your second question first.  In the Secretary-General’s statement, there is an offer of his “good offices”, should that be requested by both sides in this ongoing fighting in Iraq.

As for Mr. Qazi, the Special Representative, he has left New York.  We will not give you any details of his travel to Iraq.  He is on his way there.  And we won’t announce his arrival until he has reached Baghdad.

Question:  Could you tell us what the status is of the signing of the Sudan agreement that was supposed to be signed Monday by Mr. Pronk and the Foreign Minister of Sudan?  Was it actually signed?

Spokesman:  I believe that the text was signed by Mr. Pronk and the Sudanese Foreign Minister last Thursday.  What will be signed now, we understand, are cover letters to the Secretary-General and the President of Sudan, officially transmitting the Plan of Action to them.  I think that is a slight change in what we told you on Friday we expected to happen today.  But we are told that the Cabinet approval is there.  A signature, apparently, is not required, and what is going to be signed today are these two cover letters.  So, the agreement is official.

Question:  Just to clear it up, was the agreement in force on Thursday?

Spokesman:  That is my understanding from talking to Mr. Pronk this morning.  It was his sense that the agreement was final last week.  There may have been some misunderstanding between his office and Headquarters here on Friday.

Question:  Given that then, is there any concern on behalf of the UN in Sudan that, as you said, there seems to be some ongoing support for the violence in Darfur by the Sudanese military?  It seems that they are saying one thing and doing another.

Spokesman:  I think all we can say is that we expect the Government to make substantial progress in these 30 days in getting the various armed elements under control.  We certainly would not expect any support for these armed elements to be coming from the Government side.

Question:  First, are we going to get a copy of the agreement signed by the Foreign Minister on Thursday?  The second thing is, that same Foreign Minister made a statement saying that they are going to reject the 2,000 African Union (AU) troops. I was wondering if the Secretary-General has a statement on that.

Spokesman:  On the first matter, I believe that the Secretary-General will be forwarding the text of the agreement to the Security Council.  I believe that his intention is to make that available as a Security Council document, so you will be seeing the text.

I don’t have a reaction from the Secretary-General.  All we did see was the press reports of the statement by the Foreign Minister.  This is a matter between the AU and the Sudanese Government, but, of course, the Secretary-General has been in close contact with the African Union and encouraging their work in Sudan.  As we told you last week, he even sent from the Peacekeeping Department a group of advisers to the African Union to help them in preparing for their expanded mission in the Sudan.  But he went on vacation, as you know, over the weekend, and I don’t have anything directly from him today.

Question:  The Arab League met with the Sudanese Foreign Minister late last week, and the Foreign Minister of Egypt, Mr. Gheit, came out with a statement saying that he didn’t believe that 30 days was enough for the Sudanese Government to get the situation in Darfur under control humanitarian-wise.  Does the Secretary-General have a reaction to his statement, because the Egyptian Foreign Minister said something more like a 120 days would be necessary?

Spokesman:  Not specifically to that statement, but he did tell you last week that he feels that the Security Council demand is not that the disarmament be completed within 30 days, but that Sudan show a real commitment and real progress towards that goal.  I don’t think he would disagree with the thrust of the statement you said.  As for whether the Security Council would be willing to wait 120 days before seeing this job completed or not, you would have to ask them.

Question:  Regarding the continuing and escalating tensions in Iraq, does the Secretary-General still firmly hold to the date of 15 August for the beginning of the National Reconciliation Conference?

Spokesman:  I think he was pleased that they took the extra two weeks to plan the National Conference.  His hope is that those two weeks will be used to make that event more inclusive than it would have been had it been held at the end of July, as originally scheduled.  I don’t think he has any recommendation at this point to postpone it further because of the security situation.

Thank you very much.

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