The following is a near-verbatim transcript of todays noon briefing by Fred Eckhard, Spokesman for the Secretary-General.
**Lebanon
Following month-long exhausting negotiations, agreement had been reached on the final document of the 2000 Review Conference of Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), Conference President Abdallah Baali (Algeria) told correspondents at a Headquarters press conference this morning.
In the end, actions would mean much more than the words that countries had been fighting over for the last four weeks, correspondents were told at a Headquarters press conference this morning, sponsored by the Department for Disarmament Affairs.
The implementation of the Secretary-General's proposal for land reform in Zimbabwe by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) was expected to produce a political solution through a development and technical approach, UNDP Administrator Mark Malloch Brown told correspondents during a briefing today.
Peggy Mason of Canada, the Chairperson of the Group of Governmental Experts appointed by the Secretary-General to carry out a study on the feasibility of restricting the manufacture and trade of small arms and light weapons, briefed correspondents this afternoon at Headquarters on the Groups aims. The 20-member Group is holding the first of three sessions from 15 to 19 May at Headquarters.
Having successfully implemented its mandate, the United Nations Mission of Observers in Tajikistan (UNMOT) had come to a close after seven years of United Nations involvement there, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Tajikistan, Ivo Petrov, told correspondents at a Headquarters press briefing this afternoon.
