United Nations Daily Highlights, 98-05-08

United Nations Daily Highlights Directory - Previous Article - Next Article

From: The United Nations Home Page at <http://www.un.org> - email: unnews@un.org

DAILY HIGHLIGHTS

Friday, 8 May, 1998

HEADLINES

• UN Secretary-General says Africa could be the next economic frontier.
• Sri Lankan separatist Tamil Tigers agree not to use children under 18 years in armed conflict.
• World Food Programme welcomes Taliban's decision to allow food delivery to Hazarajat region in Afghanistan.
• Denmark and Sweden contribute more than $6 million for United Nations refugee agency's operations in Liberia and Angola.
• High Commissioner for Refugees and Secretary-General of Organization of African Unity open conference on refugees.
• Approximately half of the 20,000 Cambodians arriving in Thailand this week are children.
• For the first time in seven years, a food convoy crosses the border from Liberia to Guinea.
• Democratic People's Republic of Korea stresses importance of a new and equitable world information and communication order.

The Secretary-General was speaking at a CNN press conference, broadcast via satellite from Kampala, Uganda, where he is visiting as part of his official 8-nation African tour.

Mr. Annan said the focus should be on resolving conflicts which are casting a shadow over the entire continent. Many African countries are doing very well economically, have introduced democratic regimes and are beginning to strengthen the basis for good governance, based on the rule of law, he added.

There are many investment opportunities in Africa and it could be the next frontier economically, the Secretary-General said. "The resources are there, the men are there and there are incredible prospects for good regional projects." Given the stable environment that was being created, given the fact that the generals were returning to barracks, in the next five or ten years, he said, Africa would be like Latin America, with democracy flourishing and the will of the people being respected.

In reply to questions about his trip to Rwanda on Thursday, Secretary- General Annan said the international community should be in the country with a "Marshall Plan" to help the Rwandan people rebuild their nation.

He described his discussions with Rwandan leaders as "frank, but good". Obviously, he said, there was a lot of anger in Rwanda against the international community, personified by the United Nations and "myself as Secretary-General". There was the sense that the international community should have been there before the genocide and should have come in early to stop it, he added.

Secretary-General Annan said Rwanda now has a dynamic, competent and able leadership which is committed to the country's development. He believed the international community was prepared to work with them to build a society of tolerance, based on the rule of law.

Olara Otunnu, the Secretary-General's Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict, met on Thursday with leaders of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and secured a commitment from them on a number of issues. He said they had agreed not to use children below the age of 18 years in combat, nor to recruit children below 17 years. They had also agreed not to interfere with the distribution of humanitarian supplies.

According to the statement, the leadership promised not to prevent displaced persons from returning to government-controlled areas, nor to stop Muslims who wanted to return to their homes. Mr. Otunnu said they accepted that there should be a framework to monitor those commitments.

During the meeting, Mr. Otunnu urged the LTTE leaders to make a public commitment to respect the Convention on the Rights of the Child. He said they indicated their willingness to allow their cadres to receive information and instruction on the Convention's principles and provisions. They also acknowledged Mr. Otunnu's serious concerns about the targeting of civilians and said they would review their strategies and tactics.

Mr. Otunnu urged them to translate the commitments into action which, he said, would be a significant step in promoting the protection, rights and welfare of children in Sri Lanka.

WFP said that the announcement on Wednesday by the Taliban ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Hakim Mujahid, was an important first step. However, the United Nations food agency noted that the Taliban ambassador had put the condition that 800 tonnes of food could be delivered to Hazarajat if 200 tonnes of food were delivered to the Taliban-controlled Ghorbund valley. Ghorbund, north of Kabul, is a front-line "notoriously dangerous and difficult to reach for security reasons," said WFP.

The United Nations agency added that it must first do an assessment of the Ghorbund area to determine the needs of the affected people, how to reach the area, and negotiate with the warring factions a guarantee of security for the assessment team and eventual food convoy.

WFP officials caution that the 800 tonnes of food which the Taliban officials have said they will allow into Hazarajat is not enough to meet the needs of the affected population. According to the food agency, at least 10,000 tonnes of food are needed.

The Taliban forces have blockaded Hazarajat, which includes Bamyan and parts of four other provinces, since last May. WFP provided food to maintain life through the winter and in recent weeks, sent five missions to the mountainous region to determine the extent of hunger. Although the reports of the missions have not been compiled, WFP says the early indications are that at least tens of thousands of people are at risk.

UNHCR announced on Friday that following its urgent plea in late April, Denmark has contributed $3.7 million and Sweden $3.2 million. The United Nations refugee agency said that the programmes in Angola and Liberia cost more than $62 million. The contributions by Denmark and Sweden will allow the programmes to continue while UNHCR seeks the additional funding needed.

There are currently 480,000 Liberian refugees in west Africa, mainly in Guinea and Cote d'Ivoire, and 260,000 Angolans in Zambia, Congo- Brazzaville, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Namibia.

So far, 10,000 refugees have returned to Angola, bringing the total number of returnees since 1996 to 140,000. In Liberia approximately 100,000 refugees have returned home since the elections in August 1997. Some 30,000 of them were assisted by UNHCR.

UNHCR says that programmes to build shattered infrastructure in the Liberian countryside, including schools, clinics, and the provision of seeds and agricultural tools are crucial to the reintegration process.

The two-day meeting, held in Kampala, is hosted by Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni. United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan is expected to address the meeting on Saturday.

The meeting will discuss practical measures that the United Nations and governments can take to ensure that refugee camps retain their civilian nature. It will also consider adherence to the 1969 OAU Refugee Convention in treating all persons seeking asylum.

The Kampala gathering follows the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata's February trip to Central Africa. During that visit, she met with leaders of nine nations who agreed on the need to work out ways to ensure respect for the principles of refugee protection. They also agreed to address the impact of large refugee concentrations on host countries, in particular on their security.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said that the refugees are at two makeshift camps at Huay Samran in Surin province and Phu Noi in Sisaket province.

Food distribution to the new arrivals started on Wednesday with the provision of 48 metric tonnes of rice. UNHCR said that distribution of tinned fish, beans and oil, as well as sawdust for use as cooking fuel was proceeding. In the absence of water resources at the Phu Noi site, water continued to be trucked to the refugees from the reservoir at Huay Samran, the agency added. The United Nations agency also announced that a mass measles vaccination campaign will be carried out soon.

According to UNHCR, although arrivals of Cambodian refugees in Thailand have slowed, there are reports that several thousand remain in the hills on the Cambodian side of the border following the fighting at Anlong Veng.

WFP announced on Friday that it has stepped up food deliveries to the town of Gueckedou in Guinea to cope with the influx of the refugees. According to WFP, more than 150,000 Sierra Leoneans arrived in Guinea in March and April.

The United Nations food agency said that it has positioned 3,000 metric tonnes of food in Gueckedou, enough to feed 250,000 people for one month. The agency said that it was bringing food from the Guinean capital Conakry and neighbouring Liberia and Cote d'Ivoire before the start of the rainy season which will render most roads impassable.

WFP said in the past five days its chartered trucks delivered more than 970 tonnes of various food commodities to Gueckedou. Four of the trucks which were dispatched from the Liberian town of Voinjama carried 40 metric tonnes of blended corn and soya flours, the food agency said. It added that this high protein food was vital for the therapeutic feeding centres where hundreds of severely malnourished children have been admitted.

"We are very grateful to the authorities of Guinea, the Ivory Coast and Liberia who made possible these cross-border deliveries of food," said Paul Ares, WFP Regional Manager for coastal West Africa.

Sierra Leonean refugees said that the little food they had was stolen by combatants who burned down their villages and went on a killing spree. After fleeing their homes, many of the refugees survived by eating berries and leaves before reaching the Guinean border, WFP said.

Ambassador Hong Je Ryong was addressing the United Nations Committee on Information, which is holding its current session in New York. Some countries, he said, were taking advantage of their monopoly over modern communication equipment to impose their ideas and cultural values on others. It was important to establish a new and equitable world information and communication order, he added.

The representative of the United States, Tania Chomiak-Salvi, said her delegation was looking forward to a feasibility study on a proposed UN international radio network. However, she said, the UN should consider making better use of existing media networks, by providing fast, accurate information, rather than trying to compete with them.

On the same question, the representative of the Solomon Islands, Harold Fruchtbaum, said the argument for concentrating on established media, instead of setting up a direct UN broadcasting capability, "disintegrated" in the face of editorial realities. Editors who received stories from the UN press corps were not interested unless the subject was dramatic or significant, he said. Direct radio would allow the UN to tell its own story daily and put a human face on its endeavours.

From the United Nations home page at <http://www.un.org> - email: unnews@un.org

United Nations Daily Highlights Directory - Previous Article - Next Article