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 Stéphane Dujarric, Associate Spokesman for the Secretary-General.

Good afternoon.

If I can ask whoever had their cell phone on to switch it off, please.

**Guest at Noon

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 Stephane Dujarric, Associate Spokesperson 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 Stéphane Dujarric, Associate Spokesperson for the Secretary-General.

**Independent Inquiry Committee

Some comments on the internal audits that were released yesterday by the Volcker panel:

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.

**Guests at Noon

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.

**Tsunami Update – Egeland

Starting the briefing for us today is Jan Egeland, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, here to give us our daily update on the tsunami assistance.

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.

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 and a Happy New Year to you all.

**Guest at Noon

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 –- Electoral Update

In Iraq, the list of candidates for the upcoming elections is still being processed.  So far, the names of almost 19,000 candidates have been presented.

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,

Vacation started early.  Sorry, I am a little bit late.  We’ll start with Iraq.

**Iraq

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,

**Statement Attributable to Spokesman for Secretary-General

We’ll start with a statement attributable to the Spokesman on the subject of Iraq: