United Nations Daily Highlights, 99-08-02

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

Monday, 2 August, 1999

HEADLINES

• UN mission in Kosovo takes steps to restore customs service, reopens post and telecommunications building.
• Head of UN in Kosovo condemns attack on Serb cathedral in Pristina, appeals for end to violence.
• Reported numbers of bodies in mass graves in Kosovo based on as yet unconfirmed data -- UNMIK.
• Secretary-General recommends expanded UN mission in Sierra Leone.
• UN mission reports substantial number of East Timorese registered to vote on territory's future.
• UN Economic and Social Council agrees to series of measures to eradicate poverty.
• Secretary-General urges parties to engage in peace talks after "worrisome" escalation of violence in Colombia.
• Prosecutor of UN tribunal for Yugoslavia welcomes arrest of Bosnian Serb military police leader.
• New head of UN operations in Bosnia and Herzegovina takes up post in Sarajevo.

Dr. Kouchner, who leads the UN Interim Administrative Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK), greeted some 400 PTT workers there to begin restoring services that have been largely dysfunctional since the start of NATO bobming campaign.

Welcoming their return in a spirit of reconciliation, Dr. Kouchner said, "with you, we are building democracy." Former PTT employees had been encouraged by UNMIK and the local telecommunication commission to return regardless of their ethnic or religious backgrounds.

UNMIK and KFOR, the international security force in Kosovo, have already begun drafting plans, with the help of former PTT workers, to quickly restore minimal services.

UNMIK, which now maintains civil authority in Kosovo, will chair the Joint Coordinating Commission on Telecommunication and will administer the Kosovo assets of PTT Serbia, 51 per cent of which is State-owned.

In another important move towards restoring normality to the war-torn province, UNMIK supervised the deployment of international police officers at four border crossings with Albania and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia -- the first step towards restoring fully operational customs service in Kosovo.

UNMIK stressed that the restoration of customs services is an essential part in the economic recovery process of the province, noting that commercial traffic was now being requested to provide relevant information on trade flows into Kosovo. This data will eventually serve as a basis for determining how future customs duties will be levied.

The UN mission emphasized that a fully operational customs service would contribute to the generation of revenue and prevent the proliferation of the black market. In addition, customs services will contribute to the protection of public health and safety and ensure the control of hazardous goods, UNMIK said.

Dr. Kouchner visited the cathedral on Sunday morning where a bomb had exploded the night before, causing structural damage to the cathedral and shaking buildings in central Pristina.

Also on Sunday, Dr. Kouchner, who heads the UN Interim Administrative Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK), met with the visiting Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Tony Blair, at UNMIK's headquarters in Pristina.

Dr. Kouchner and Mr. Blair later met with commanders of KFOR, the international security force in Kosovo, and representatives of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), to review progress in efforts to demilitarize the KLA.

On Saturday, Dr. Kouchner met with Ibrahim Rugova, leader of the Democratic League of Kosovo (LDK), who had just returned to Kosovo.

During the meeting, joined by other LDK members, the two men reviewed the situation in Kosovo and discussed the LDK participation in the Kosovo Transitional Council. The Transitional Council is open to all groups in Kosovo and will serve as the highest political body in the province.

The spokeswoman for the Special Representative of the Secretary-General, Dr. Bernard Kouchner, said that Dr. Kouchner's statement in a Reuters interview on Sunday that mass graves in Kosovo could contain as many as 11, 000 bodies reflected what many people believed to be the potential number of victims.

According to the spokeswoman, the estimate mentioned by Dr. Kouchner was based on reports of mass graves in Kosovo received to date from all sources and that most of those reports were, as yet, unconfirmed by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).

"He did not intend to imply that ICTY itself had provided these figures, or that ICTY had completed its investigations in Kosovo," the spokeswoman said in a statement released in Pristina.

In a report submitted to the Security Council on Monday, Mr. Annan says the Lome Peace Agreement, signed on 7 July, requires UNOMSIL to perform significantly expanded as well as new tasks, in close coordination with ECOMOG, the military monitoring group of West African States.

The Secretary-General says that in addition to the major disarmament and demobilization effort, implementation of the Lome agreement will require substantial numbers of peacekeepers throughout the country and the deployment of additional UN military observers.

ECOMOG's mandate will need to be revised by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) in consultation with the United Nations, says Mr. Annan. Once there is an understanding on ECOMOG and the UN's respective tasks, strengths and mandates, he will submit a more comprehensive report to the Security Council. In the interim, the Secretary-General recommends increasing the number of military observers from the current authorized strength of 70 to 210 and sending additional civilian political, civil affairs and human rights staff.

Because of the many "necessary compromises" in the Lome peace agreement, Mr. Annan says his Special Representative entered a reservation when signing the agreement, "explicitly stating that, for the United Nations, the amnesty cannot cover international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and other serious violations of international law."

At the same time, the agreement is a unique opportunity to end a conflict that caused untold suffering and registered deeply in the world's conscience, Mr. Annan says.

A UNAMET spokesman said that as of the end of July, more than 378,000 of the estimated 400,000 eligible voters have registered to vote on the autonomy proposal.

Spokesman David Wimhurst told a press briefing in Dili that while the figures were preliminary, they were encouraging. "We are on target with the numbers," he said. "The upward curve has now tapered off and is now dropping, which means that most people have registered."

In response to a reporter's question, Mr. Wimhurst said that all registration centres are open and that some of them are staffed with additional personnel to handle internally displaced persons (IDPs) who are coming in to register. He said UNAMET had reinforced certain centres in anticipation of where many of the estimated 40,000 to 60,000 IDPs were expected to turn up.

ECOSOC suspended its substantive session Friday following four weeks of debate and announced that it would address the remaining items on its agenda in New York when the Council reconvenes on 16 September.

Among the agreements adopted by the 54-member Council was a resolution on a long-term programme of support for Haiti. ECOSOC President Ambassador Francesco Paolo Fulci of Italy said in his closing statement that the new measure illustrated how the Council could produce results as it demonstrated its unique capability to convoke as a truly global forum.

Following a three-day high-level segment, the Council adopted a Ministerial Communiqu‚ on "The role of employment and work in poverty eradication: the empowerment and advancement of women." The Council noted that the international community should encourage longer-term capital flows to support development objectives and that the social dimensions of development should be integrated into the policy objectives of the new international financial architecture.

After reviewing United Nations operational activities aimed at poverty eradication, the Council stressed that the UN system should continue to support national efforts to empower people living in poverty, in particular women.

The Council also focused its attention on enhancing coordination of the UN system's efforts to promote lasting development in Africa and to combat poverty on the continent.

In a statement released at UN Headquarters in New York by his spokesman, the Secretary-General encouraged the parties to respect international humanitarian law and protect the civilian population. Since Friday, bomb attacks have led to numerous civilian deaths, with several children killed.

"The people of Colombia, and with them the international community and the United Nations, had harboured hope and expectation at the prospect that negotiations might finally ensue," said Secretary-General's Spokesman Fred Eckhard. "The Secretary- General urges parties to the conflict to pursue dialogue and negotiation."

Mr. Kovac, a sub-commander of the military police and paramilitary leader in Foca, is charged on the basis of individual criminal responsibility with two counts of enslavement and rape. He is one of the individuals indicted in the "Gagovic and others" case concerning crimes allegedly committed by Bosnian Serb soldiers, policemen and members of paramilitary groups in south- eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1992 and 1993.

In a statement issued by the office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague, Justice Louise Arbour said the arrests in the last seven weeks of three alleged war criminals by NATO forces in Bosnia (SFOR) "has sent a clear signal to all remaining indictees that the failure of the relevant local authorities to arrest them and to transfer them to The Hague will not disrupt the course of justice."

According to a UN spokesman, Jacques Klein, the new Special Representative, will have the rank of Under-Secretary-General.

Mr. Klein was previously Principal Deputy High Representative in Sarajevo and previously headed the UN Transitional Administration for Eastern Slavonia (UNTAES) for 18 months.

The new Special Representative joined the United States diplomatic service in 1971 and presently holds the rank of Minister-Counselor with the US State Department. He has also had a distinguished military career and retired in 1998 as a Major General in the US airforce.

Mr. Klein succeeds Elizabeth Rehn, who served as the Secretary-General's Special Representative from January 1998 to last month.

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

United Nations Daily Highlights Directory - Previous Article - Next Article