PRESS CONFERENCE ON MYANMAR BY EMERGENCY RELIEF COORDINATOR

Following is a near-verbatim transcript of today’s press conference on Myanmar by Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, John Holmes:

Thank you very much for being here this morning.  Let me just add to what the Secretary-General said in terms what’s actually happening on the ground in the various areas we’ve been discussing in the last few days.  (See Press Release SG/SM/11562)

First of all, on the assessment side, many assessments are still under way, and there are national and increasingly international teams in the area.  Obviously, the damage is extremely severe in many areas.  I don’t have anything to add on that really, or on the casualty figures, or the numbers of those affected, beyond what the Secretary-General already said to you.

I think the needs in general are clear, and again, they’re not new: it is food, particularly high-energy biscuits, for example; it is clean water, for example through water purification tablets, which are a huge need; it is shelter; and it is medical supplies.

Obviously, everybody’s focusing very much on the health issues to see what the risk of major infections, major epidemics is.  I think we’re all conscious that heavy rain is forecast for the area in the next few days.  I hope it doesn’t come, but it may.  The position at the moment, as I am watching it very carefully, is that there are some isolated cases of diarrhoea and of malaria, but, so far, nothing to provoke a huge alarm at this stage, but we’re not quite at the stage where we’d expect that in this kind of crisis.

One other point -- just to draw attention to perhaps -- is that there is a tendency for people to begin to concentrate now in different places; they’re moving away from the flooded areas in the delta towards the higher ground, towards some of the towns and villages which are less affected.  I think that’s mainly a spontaneous movement, there could be some camps set up at some stage there.  This has good and bad sides to it.  It’s good in the sense that it’s easier to reach people if they’re concentrated in that way for aid delivery, but, obviously, it can increase the risks of infections if we’re not careful.

On the personnel and visa sides, there has been some slight improvement, again, in the last few days, particularly in the last 24 hours.  Our Acting Resident Coordinator was in the capital, Naypyidaw, earlier today, I should say, because obviously they’re many hours behind -- and it was confirmed that 34 visas for United Nations relief staff and from the different agencies would now be granted, or are being granted -- I thought there’s a willingness to look positively at visa applications for other UN relief personnel.  This is welcome, but clearly, nothing like enough for the scale of the problem we’re trying to deal with.

And the visa position for international NGOs is a little bit less clear and less satisfactory, I fear, but we don’t have a total picture of that, but there’s some limited good news on that front, but clearly more is needed.

On the relief delivery itself, it’s clear that the activity levels are rising in terms of flights arriving in Yangon and elsewhere -- that’s good news -- even if it makes it a little bit more difficult to identify particular bits of activity.  We know there’s been at least eight special flights from [inaudible] actual countries; from Bangladesh, China, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Thailand, India, Singapore, Spain, Italy and, of course, the US this morning, and more flights are promised, including two more at least, I think from the United States.  UN flights have been arriving in relatively large numbers, and those numbers are increasing too, from the World Food Programme, UNHCR, UNICEF, and a flight which landed early today from OCHA itself.  And those cargoes, when they’re unloaded, are being handed over to the agencies for distribution in the normal way.  So that the issue which was there, I think on Friday morning in particular, seems to have been resolved.  And I hope it will stay resolved.

Obviously, other transport methods are being using.  Boats, very unfortunately as you have seen, a Red Cross boat on its way down to the delta, sank.  There were a lot of aid on board, but happily the people themselves were spared.  But a Save the Children barge did get through to the tip of the delta and was able to start handing out relief goods, which is extremely welcome.

And over land, there is some movement, too.  As you may have seen, some convoy, UNHCR trucks carrying shelter materials was able to cross from Thailand, and that is -- I think it’s still on the way to the affected area at the moment -- but that’s another useful addition to the things we can do.

Onward movement into the delta for relief goods is still difficult, but I think that it is gradually increasing, and we are planning to set up local distribution hubs in some of the towns in the area, particularly Pathein and Labutta, which were less affected by the actual cyclone itself and the tidal wave.

On the appeal front, the flash appeal, which we launched last Friday, I think there’s been a positive response so far to that, including a $10 million from Australia, which was announced over the weekend.  Just to say that we have now made allocations from the Central Emergency Response Fund -- from CERF -- for $20.3 million to cover the areas of food and nutrition, health, shelter, water and sanitation, and logistics.

Perhaps one final point to make is that, obviously, we’re focusing very much on the emergency life-saving activities, but we also need to be looking at the longer term.  It’s clear that one of the biggest concerns there will be agriculture, the rice harvest and the difficulties of making the neighbouring, the local farmers, to farm their lands, to plant their next crops, because if they’re not able to do that, then the food and nutrition problems in the medium term will of course be much worse.  So that will be an increasing focus, I think, as time goes on.  I’ll stop there.

**Question and Answers

Question: Why is it that the Burmese Government isn’t cooperating as you’d like them to cooperate?  And you said on Friday you hoped there would be a turning point in the attitude of the Burmese Government, and the Ambassador said they were now ready to receive aid from all quarters.  Has that turning point been reached?

Relief Coordinator:  Well, I think we’ve seen some progress.  I think the readiness to accept the US flights, and the first one arrived today, was unloaded satisfactorily.  I think that’s a good sign.  The visa news we had over the weekend and this morning is a good sign.  Again, clearly not enough, but moving in the right direction.  And the unloading of flights is now easier.  We still need to get more freedom of movement for relief staff around the delta area.  There has been some possibility of that, but it’s not entirely free at the moment.

Question:  …accompanied by [inaudible]?

Relief Coordinator:  That seems to be not the problem at the moment; it’s more actual permission to go in there for individuals.  It’s being granted, but again, it’s a slightly slow and tortuous process, which we don’t regard as necessary.  We need to establish, as I mentioned, the logistical hubs in the area.  We’re still working with the local government to get permission for that.  So, there’s some progress in those areas, but I think a lot more to do in all of them.

The one area where I think we would really want to see a change of attitude now -- a major change of attitude -- is the possibility of outside military help, in the sense that we believe it is going to be very difficult for us to reach everybody and to tackle the crisis as we would like without some outside military, as well as civilian, assets.  That’s why the Secretary-General was talking about the possibility of extra assets, for example, from neighbouring countries -- and we recognize there are sensitivities about this on the part of the Myanmar authorities, but they could be more acceptable from ASEAN neighbours or from India, or from other neighbours -- that’s what we’re exploring.  That’s what we’d like agreement for from the Myanmar authorities, and that has not been forthcoming.

Question:  Mr. Holmes, can you sort of just update us on what’s happening with things like the distribution of WFP food?  Are they able to, is the UN able to monitor distribution?  How much is the Government just basically taking the stuff and distributing it itself -- just some sense of how that’s going?

Relief Coordinator:  I think the position now is that the WFP food is being distributed by WFP and their local partners, particularly the Myanmar Red Cross; it is not being distributed directly by the Government.  So, it is a relatively normal and satisfactory operation.  I mean, the issue is not that at the moment.  It’s more the speed with which you can get the food that’s arriving at the airport down into the delta and distributed to the people who need it most.  It’s happening, but we want to accelerate it further.

Question:  Mr. Holmes, just a quick one on visas – you said 34 had been granted.  How many have been applied for, and how many people, both military and civilian, do you think are needed in Myanmar to make this aid distribution effective?

Relief Coordinator:  To be honest with you, I don’t think I can give you a very precise answer on either of those points.  Certainly more than 34 have been applied for.  I mean, just to give you an indication of the scale of things, I know WFP were looking for 16 visas.  To date, they’ve been granted 5.  That’s clearly inadequate.  But the indication was that other applications would be considered favourably.  So, it’s moving, it’s moving.  But I can’t give you an exact figure at this stage of how many have been applied for, because, as I’ve said before, they’re applied for at all sorts of different places all over the world.  I think that probably the total -- I’m just looking at my colleagues to see if they can help -- is probably approaching 100 or something like that -- but I can’t be much more precise than that.

How many more experts do we need?  I mean, how long is a piece of string?  But clearly, a lot more than we’ve got now, is the answer [talkover].  Hundreds, not thousands.

Question:  How do you explain this big difference in the estimates of the death toll between the Myanmar authorities and the UN officials?  They talk about, the Secretary-General just said it’s almost 31,000 people killed, while the number in, I believe your statement, you mentioned it can reach 100,000.  Thank you.

Relief Coordinator:  The official figures, they’re based on the reports they’re getting from the local authorities, from the civilian authorities, no doubt, the military authorities in the affected areas.  The impression that many, many people who visited, and so on, have got of much higher counts from their visual evidence of bodies and devastation from the accounts of survivors, the number of people in their village or their town who were swept away.  It comes also from looking at the numbers missing, which are also rising very high, because, if you assume that most of the missing at least are dead, which may not be the case, and let’s hope not, then the figure starts to get towards 100,000 anyway.  And if you add up some of the numbers of missing from different parts of the area, you start to get sort of quite large figures, as well.  That’s why we’ve been trying to avoid a numbers game, but simply to say that our impression is that the figures of dead may rise very considerably from where they are now.  It is possible we may never have a very exact figure, given how many people were actually washed away by the tidal surge.

Question:  I hear from the Secretary-General’s opening remarks that the General whom he has written to and actually tried to telephone has been hiding from him and not wanting to talk with him or something, but how do you read what’s going on with that General, and what sort of impact is that having on this whole attempt to bring relief to the country?  And also, I was trying to understand how much the emergency services in Burma itself, the Burmese Government, what have they done?  Have they been active, have they been effective, at least to a certain extent, or are they showing no lack of interest in trying to resolve the crisis, as well?

Relief Coordinator:  Well on your first question, you’re asking me to delve into the psychology of leaders of countries, and I’m not sure that’s going to be very productive.  What is true is that we have been trying to get hold of him, and I think we’re not the only people to do that; I think neighbours have been trying to speak to him, as well.  He’s simply not been taking those calls.  I think he has not been very visible since the crisis struck.  But you can speculate as well as I can as to what the psychological or other reasons for that might be.

On your second questions; yes, clearly, there is a local relief effort, through the local Red Cross, through the military, through local authorities.  In any crisis of this kind, the biggest response almost always come from local response -- they’re on the spot already -- it inevitably takes time for the international teams and international effort to get there.  I don’t want to minimize the effort that’s being made.  I have the impression that it could have been more, particularly through the military -- that’s a point that many local residents have made in the comments they’ve made to the media.  But there has been a significant effort going on, obviously.

Question:  Are you able now to get as many planes in as you want, as many trucks as you want, and did you get the simplified clearance procedures for customs that you were requesting?

Relief Coordinator:  The simple answer to that, I think, is yes.  Planes have to be cleared, but 24 hours in advance is okay.  Flights that are being requested are being cleared at the moment, so there doesn’t seem to be a problem about that, and we haven’t had problems with customs, taxes or procedures in the last few days, so I think that’s much improved.

Question:  And the numbers, you can send as many as you want, or it’s still difficult?

Relief Coordinator:  I’m not aware there’s a problem.  I don’t think there’s a backlog of flights, as far as I know, but I know a lot of people are trying to get flights in.  Of course, it is not a large airport; there are limitations on it, which is why we’ve talked about the possibility of a logistics base outside the country, maybe in Thailand, and we’re talking to Thai authorities about that, which could channel out aid and then channel it in a more systematic and orderly way to the airport.  But, at the moment, there’s not, as far as I’m aware, a huge constraint from lack of permission for flights to land.

Question:  There’s one thing in the last 10 or 11 days -- have you been able to talk to any officials in the Yangon or in the Government there, or have any of them called you in addition to what the Secretary-General has been doing -- sending letters?  Has there been any confirmation that Than Swe, the head of the military Government, has received those letters, and has he called you to ask for help?

Relief Coordinator:  I have not had direct contact myself with ministers in Yangon, although I have tried, but the UN representatives on the spot, particularly the Acting Resident Coordinator, has had many of his colleagues from UN agencies and, of course from NGOs as well, meet ministers and senior officials, both in Yangon, and of course, the Acting Resident Coordinator was in the capital, Naypyidaw, this morning to talk to more senior ministers, as well.  So a lot of the contacts have been done through those local people, through physical meetings.  Telephone calls are not, don’t seem to be much of a feature of life, perhaps you could say, in current-day Myanmar.  So those are the kinds of contacts we’ve had.  I’ve kept in close touch with the Permanent Representative of Myanmar here in New York; we’ve done that elsewhere in other capitals too, and that’s been the main personal channel, but there is quite a lot of dialogue and discussion going on in one way or another.

Question:  This is a follow up on the same question actually.  Can you give us at least a name of the highest person they’re talking to down there, and what is your read on how exactly the decision-making over there is happening?  Is the person you’re talking to making a decision, or is he referring it upstairs, as you said earlier, there was the case with the visas?  I mean, is there a decision-making mechanism there?  It’s a bit of “Kremlinology”, as they used to call it in the cold war.

Relief Coordinator:  Again, you’re asking me to delve into… I wouldn’t claim any expertise on the working methods of the Myanmar Government.  Clearly, it is the kind of Government where decisions come from the top, and maybe that’s one of the reasons why some of the decisions have been slow -- because you need to go to the top, maybe right to the top -- but that’s only speculation on my part.  The main contact we have had has been the Deputy Foreign Minister, whose name I don’t have right in front of me, but he is publicly known, he was named fairly early on as coordinating the relief effort on behalf of the Government.

Question:  …efforts been made to talk to the Foreign Minister?

Relief Coordinator:  Efforts have been made to talk to all sorts of people at all sorts of levels, but they’ve not been very successful.

Question:  I understand that today was the first meeting of this food crisis task force that the Secretary-General has appointed.  If you could just give us a run-down of that, like if anything concrete came out of that -- I think you were also part of that as well?  And also, was there any discussion on the impact on the rice harvest in Myanmar [inaudible] in that discussion at all, to future projections of where prices will be headed because of that?

Relief Coordinator:  On the task force itself, I think we’re about to issue, or already have issued, a press release just giving you a brief account of the meeting and its purposes.  And this is essentially the first meeting of the task force to endorse the kind of objective of producing a comprehensive and integrated action plan to tackle the food crisis with the aim of having at least the elements of that in place before the Rome meeting of the Food and Agricultural Organization, which starts on 3 June.  So I won’t go over all the press release, but there was a particular appeal to countries around the world to make sure their policies didn’t make the price problems worse through, for example, export policies, and a particular appeal again to all countries to allow food supplies that are needed for humanitarian reasons to be exported without hindrance, because there has been a bit of a problem in some areas about that.

And to answer your further question, yes, the issue of rice in Myanmar was touched upon, but it was not a major feature of it.

Question:  Since the flash appeal was made on Friday, are you, is the Secretary-General satisfied with the reaction coming out of Governments, not NGOs, and besides the number of countries you and the Secretary-General have mentioned, what other countries can you cite that have been forthcoming?  And finally, have you heard from the European Union and ASEAN?

Relief Coordinator:  The response to the flash appeal so far, I mean, let’s face it, it was launched on Friday -- people have quite a long, complicated document, which I warned you it would be, which came out -- Governments, they need to look at that and decide where they want to apply their resources.  It’s not usually an instant reaction; it’s normally a few days need to pass.  The echoes we have had so far were positive.  There was a particular response, I mentioned already, from Australia, adding to the money they’d already promised, another $10 million, which is extremely welcome.  So I think the response so far sounds good.  I mean, we don’t really mind in some ways whether people respond bilaterally or through the appeal.  The important thing is that the aid reaches there.  A lot of Governments are responding in different ways, as we heard during the launch of the flash appeal on Friday.  I’m not quite sure what your question meant about which other countries are engaged, but we have of course been in touch with ASEAN, both the individual members and ASEAN as an organization, and with the European Union, not least through their ECHO humanitarian arm, who announced a contribution some days ago.

Question:  [inaudible] particularly difficult to speak with the Myanmar Embassy in Bangkok, and they’ve been closed several times.  Have you spoken to them, for them to remain open, given the situation with the visas, and so on?

Relief Coordinator:  That is something we have said.  I haven’t spoken to them personally, but we have a regional office -- many of the other UN organizations have their regional offices in Bangkok -- and we have appealed to them to be flexible and open, including physically open, for visas.  They seem to have rather greater respect for local holidays than might seem appropriate in the circumstances.  But one of the issues in Bangkok is that, because so many organizations and teams are based there, they have been a bit overwhelmed by the number of applications and so on they’ve received, and they’re not used to it probably, and that hasn’t helped.  So, it’s been slightly easier in some other places around the world than in Bangkok, I think partly for that reason.

Question:  Two brief ones, and then something at the end.  I think Friday, the Myanmar representative told the UN gathering on the flash appeal, I’ll get back to you, I’ve heard you.  How would you rate what the member countries told him, and then Myanmar’s Government here on Monday morning, and then I’ll follow up very briefly?

Relief Coordinator: Well, he heard the plea for more cooperation.  And as I’ve suggested, there is a little bit more cooperation around today than there was on Friday, in terms of the visas that have been granted and, I mean allowing in the US flight, which he mentioned himself on Friday; that’s happened, more flights are welcome.  So there is some movement forward, but it’s clearly unsatisfactory, as we’ve [talkover].

Question:  …report about rice, with locals wanting to give rice and other things, and it was confiscated by the military.  Have you heard reports…?

Relief Coordinator:  I haven’t heard those reports.

Question:  And the third thing, have you, in the dark of night, as this crisis unfolded, thought about resigning for various reasons, but for making a statement, for the lack of cooperation by member countries -- I mean this is a major humanitarian disaster, you’re the top man -- sometimes it takes a symbol or a signal action, and you’re not getting cooperation throughout the UN system, 100,000 may be dead, and I’ve wondered if you thought about it?  Your predecessor, right or wrong, said the certain series of words that helped spark action on the tsunami, when he said some countries had been stingy.  Why stay when you’re not getting any proper assistance?  You know, what’s the purpose?  With the next few years, there’ll be other crises, there’ll be other panels, there’ll be other seminars about preventive diplomacy in action -- I mean, has the quiet way worked?

Relief Coordinator:  Thank you for the question.  No, I haven’t thought about resigning.  I don’t think it would help in present circumstances, and I don’t think the response from countries has been stingy or ungenerous so far, so the logic of your question escapes me.

Question:  With China and other countries not even willing to have a statement at the Security Council, and South Africa… [talkover]

Relief Coordinator:  That’s a political issue.  China has been helpful in sending aid and in talking to the Myanmar authorities and in urging them to be more cooperative.  So, the political point is a slightly different one, and is not one that would cause me to resign.

Question:  There are these reports of some of the generals and lieutenant generals in Myanmar putting their names on boxes of aid and essentially using it to raise their own profiles.  I’m wondering, as the Humanitarian Coordinator, what you have to say about that kind of practice?  And then, I also wanted to ask you some follow-up of something I asked you Friday about corporations.  It turns out there are a number of corporations that are members of even the UN Global Compact, which have been doing business in Myanmar, but it’s been unclear what the response, if any, has been [inaudible] Siemens, Pasco Steel of South Korea.  Do you have any, again as Humanitarian Coordinator, do you have any guidance to corporate interests that have done business in Myanmar -- should they be part of the solution or of the flash appeal?  Thanks.

Relief Coordinator:  On your first question, clearly, if people are putting labels on boxes and pretending it’s from them, when it actually comes from somewhere else, that’s completely to be condemned and it would be totally hypocritical.  I’ve seen those reports myself, but I can’t confirm how widespread a practice that is.  It seemed to me from the reports I saw that it was somewhat undermined by the fact that the label of the original person who dispatched the aid was still clearly visible.  So that may have helped to undermine the practice, if that’s what it was.

On the companies, yes, we would hope that companies, any kinds of companies or foundations would be willing to contribute to what is a major catastrophe generously, and if there are companies which are heavily involved in Myanmar, that would seem particularly appropriate.

Question:  Mr. Holmes, I wanted to touch on two subjects, because, besides what Matthew is saying, the involvement of the multinationals, which when President Bush and President Clinton were involved in the tsunami effort, all these corporations did come out and help in big numbers -- having said that, are you taking into account the bilateral help from countries like Pakistan, which has sent two C-130s, on its own, have they coordinated that particular effort with you?  Besides Pakistan, there must be other countries doing the same thing, like India or some other countries.  And my other question is about China.  Has China asked you for any assistance at all in the earthquake tragedy?

Relief Coordinator:  On the question of the tsunami effort, it’s hard to make comparisons with the tsunami effort at the moment, but clearly, it was much more widespread, and maybe it was slightly easier for a lot of people to get involved in it than has been so far in the case of Myanmar.  But, as I said, company efforts would be welcome, as well, particularly as we move forward and as things become a little bit more open.  Bilateral flights, such as those from Pakistan and India -- we are aware of them, we are notified about them, we try to help, make sure that they are unloaded and cleared, insofar as we have any role in that.  One of the problems we have, of course, is that we haven’t had enough people on the ground to do the normal coordination job we would be doing.  Some of the visas, which have now been doing, are for our own coordination office, which we would normally set up very quickly to be established there, and that may make it easier to start to do that kind of basic coordination job, which is now bread and butter, if you like.

On China, no assistance has been requested at this stage, but it is, of course, very early in the day, and I think the practice is they would not normally request assistance from outside, although we would certainly offer it.

Question:  [inaudible] passports, now we have a global food crisis, you mentioned about the international community keeping prices down, but was anything discussed that was considered the most important thing necessary to address this crisis by the UN?

Relief Coordinator:  I don’t want to single out any one thing.  I think a number of things were talked about.  There’s obviously a humanitarian aspect to making sure we can go on feeding the most vulnerable groups, and the World Food Programme appeal has been out there for some time now and has been responded to reasonably well.  But new groups may be becoming hungry as well, so we need to make sure we have the resources for that.  There is a particularly urgent requirement to make sure that, for example, small farmers in the developing world have the inputs they need for this year’s harvest, in terms of fertilizers, or credit or seeds, or whatever it might be, or advice, to make sure that those harvests this year are as good as they can be, because that could make an enormous contribution.  You might imagine that farmers in the developed world will respond to the price signals, but it doesn’t work the same way in many developing countries.  There’s clearly a problem about trade, with some countries for understandable national reasons, no doubt, put on export barriers or export tariffs, but the effect of that on the overall price situation can clearly be negative.  So that’s why there’s been an appeal, not only today, but from beforehand, from institutions like the ones around the table today, and to try to avoid that kind of counterproductive activity.  And there was a particular plea, as I mentioned, to make sure that export barriers did not apply to food which is being procured, for example, by the World Food Programme in one country for a humanitarian crisis in another.

Question:  Last week you indicated you might be going out to Burma, and what have you decided on that?  And secondly, the SG was very clear in his comment in speaking to the Government in Burma, but what would you like to say to the people?

Relief Coordinator:  As far as myself is concerned, at the moment, I don’t think that would be particularly helpful, but it’s something we’ve got under constant review.  My Deputy is out in the region, particularly talking to the ASEAN countries about how we can best work together, but, obviously, if I feel at any stage it would be useful for me to go there, then I certainly will do that very quickly.  I forgot your second question already.

Question:  What would you like to say to the people in Burma?  You’re the Humanitarian Coordinator.

Relief Coordinator:  I would say that we are doing our absolute best to help them and to reach them, and we recognize the fragility of their situation, and we are focusing on the survivors, not the victims, obviously not those who are dead already who we cannot help, unfortunately.  We are doing our best and we will try to reach all of you, if we possibly can.

Question:  This is along the lines of Richard’s question earlier.  What regrets do you have in terms of your Office’s handling of the crisis so far in terms of perhaps bearing pressure in some areas where some sort of action that could have been taken?  And how are we as journalists supposed to look at any future crisis, that if it’s a closed society in which a natural disaster happens, it could be perhaps as long as two weeks until real effective help comes from the United Nations?

Relief Coordinator:  I’m sure we haven’t responded perfectly in this situation, but I’m not going to go into what we may and may not have done as well as we could have done; I think we’ll learn lessons in the longer term when we look back at it, as we always do in these crises.  Clearly, for dealing with a closed society, as you say, this poses particular challenges.  It’s not the first time ever.  Many of the long-running complex emergencies where we’re trying to deliver aid are also extremely complicated from this point of view, because Governments are not always cooperative.  So this is not, as I’ve said before, a totally unprecedented situation; it’s just a particularly difficult example of it.

Question:  How do you compare the [inaudible] you are facing in Myanmar with those in Gaza, especially that the situation there is not getting any better than before?

Relief Coordinator:  It’s very hard to make comparisons between one crisis and another.  We are trying to make sure that we do not forget all the other crises, and Gaza is certainly one of them, and it got worse in the last few days when fuel ran out for the power station in Gaza.  And we are doing our level best to urge the Israeli authorities to keep the flow of basic material, including fuel, food and other supplies, going into Gaza, and working closely with them to make sure that at least the minimum gets through.  And, of course, what we really want is the crossing points open.  But to say is it worse than that, or is that worse than this or more important…

Question:  [inaudible] done so far in that respect?

Relief Coordinator:  We’re working as hard as we can through UNRWA, through the World Food Programme, through all the contacts we have, the Israeli authorities to press them very hard, and that’s being done also through mechanisms like the Quartet meeting, to push as hard as we can on the Israeli authorities.  But also we keep up pressure, for example, on Hamas, not, in particular, to attack the crossing points, as they have been doing regularly, which seems to me to be particularly cynical or unhelpful behaviour.

Question:  Mr. Holmes, if the 2005 document concerning the responsibility to protect had specifically included victims of natural disasters, would that have made your job easier?

Relief Coordinator:  I’m not sure that it would in the sense, obviously that issue -- what the responsibility to protect covers and does not cover is being looked at, it applies to very specific situations, including crimes against humanity -- but also the responsibility to protect is not just, as I was trying to say last week, instant decisions about whether you intervene militarily in a situation or do you not.  It’s a much more graduated response.  We believe that the appropriate response at the moment is to do all we can to get the aid in there and to do all we can to persuade and to put pressure on the Government of Myanmar to be more cooperative.  We’ve seen a bit of movement; we need a lot more.

Question:  Something briefly on Myanmar, and then another one on the task force.  On Myanmar, do you have any sense that the referendum, that there’s been something of a breakthrough, or that the activity on the visas, that this is somehow related to greater openness on the referendum?

Relief Coordinator:  I think it is the case that, since the referendum, some things have become slightly easier.  And I think, as I said before, holding up aid because of the referendum would have been, would be, was particularly unjustifiable, but if things have become a bit easier now, obviously that’s welcome.

Question:  [inaudible] referendum for the hard-hit areas, so does that affect the situation because it’s not over yet?

Relief Coordinator:  I believe the Government has said they want to hold a referendum in two weeks in the affected areas.  That strikes me as completely unrealistic and unhelpful.

Question:  On the task force, can you give us another sense that there is any other agreement -- you talked about making sure there’d be enough fertilizer and seed for small-scale farmers -- any other agreements on ramping up production more generally, any discussions of biofuels, genetically-modified production?  And also, is there still a sense that the crisis is so serious that you may not even be able to respond to it, that it’s sort of over your head and that you’re all overwhelmed by it?

Relief Coordinator:  All the issues you mentioned were part of the action, and let’s be clear also, the various institutions also -- the World Food Programme, FAO, the World Bank, in fact -- they’re not waiting around while this task force discusses it; they’re trying to address these problems right now.  What we’re trying to do is make sure that whatever they’re doing -- their policies, their activities -- are all aligned in the same sort of direction and are coordinated with each other, and that the task force has that effect itself, but is also designed to produce a more comprehensive plan at the same time.

In answer to your second question, no, I don’t think -- it’s a very large issue, it has many complex facets to it, it’s both short-term and long-term -- but it seems to me these are problems which are fixable; they’re not easily fixable perhaps, but they are fixable in terms of increasing agricultural production in the world, tackling issues like biofuels, trying to get a more sensible agricultural trade regime in place -- these are things that can be done.

Question:  There’s been no other agreement on increasing production today, I mean, that would sort of ramp up production beyond what you mentioned earlier?

Relief Coordinator:  The whole trend is towards long-term increase in production; that’s what’s going to be needed.  The World Bank has said the world will need 50 per cent more food by 2030 to feed up to 9 billion people.  That’s a massive challenge.  It can be done, but it’s going to take a lot of doing and take a lot of work by national Governments, apart from anything else, as well as the international community.

Question:  Just a clarification on some of the numbers coming out of Bangkok this weekend.  I think your people in Bangkok initially said 220,000 people were missing, and then later on, it was corrected to dead or missing combined, 100,000.  Can you give us the updated number as of today, and probably explain a little about the confusion please?

Relief Coordinator:  I’m not quite sure where that confusion came from.  There are the updated numbers as you say -- 100,000 plus is the best we can do.  I wish I had a more accurate figure to give you, but that’s the best we can do on the basis of the information we have.

Question:  Did you get a report about the confusion of the numbers?

Relief Coordinator:  I was aware of it, yes, I was aware of it.  I think it may have come from adding up figures in different ways, but I’ve had other things to think about.

* *** *

For information media • not an official record