United Nations Daily Highlights, 02-10-29

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

OF THE NOON BRIEFING

BY FRED ECKHARD

SPOKESMAN FOR THE SECRETARY-GENERAL OF THE UNITED NATIONS

UN

HEADQUARTERS, NEW YORK

Tuesday, October 29, 2002

ANNAN: PEACEKEEPERS NEED ACHIEVABLE MANDATE AND RESOURCES TO MATCH

This morning, the Secretary-General and Deputy Secretary-General attended a seminar sponsored jointly by the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations and the International Peace Academy.

In his opening remarks at the seminar, which is entitled Past, Present and Future Challenges in Peacekeeping, the Secretary-General recalled his experience as Under Secretary-General for the young Peacekeeping Department when resources were very limited.

He said that the lessons learned proved useful for later operations.What is important is that there is a realization all round that the peacekeepers have to be given a mandate which is achievable, commence resources, he said.

The days are gone when member states can pass a resolution and tell us to deploy 15,000 soldiers with no idea of where they are coming from, and leaving us to go around begging government who are not prepared to take risks, he added.

The Secretary-General also shared his personal thoughts with the new staff in peacekeeping: I walked into the Peacekeeping Department with the accepted conventional wisdom that the declaration of war was too serious of a matter to be left to the generals, he said. After a couple of years in peacekeeping, I walked away with another observation: that the declaration of war was too serious to be left with the politicians and the diplomats.

He concluded that when the conditions are right, UN peacekeeping can and does make a tremendous contribution to alleviating the suffering of people in the world.

SECURITY COUNCIL TO DISCUSS IRAQ RESOLUTION AT 5 P.M.

The Security Council is continuing its open debate on Women, Peace and Security. There are 19 speakers, including a representative of the Office of the Special Adviser on Gender Issues and the Advancement of Women.

This afternoon at 3 p.m., the Security Council is to hold back-to-back closed meetings. The first is a briefing by Judge Gilbert Guillaume, President of the International Court of Justice. The second closed meeting is with the presidents of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia, Navanethem Pillay and Claude Jorda respectively, on the work of those courts.

Then, at 5:00 p.m., the Council is planning to resume consultations on a draft resolution on Iraq.

The Security Council Committee concerning Counter-Terrorism has also scheduled a meeting today at 3:30 p.m.

TRANSFER OF FIRST BATCH OF IRAQI DOCUMENTS TO KUWAIT COMPLETED

The current operation of the transfer of the first batch of Kuwaiti documents, which commenced on October 19 at Camp Abdaly in the demilitarized zone between Iraq and Kuwait, was completed today.

The United Nations arranged the transfer while representatives of the League of Arab States witnessed the procedure.

Any questions on the substantive issues regarding the nature and content of these documents should be referred to either Iraq or Kuwait because the transfer was organized in such a way that only Iraq or Kuwait has access to the contents of the individual files. The United Nations never had custody of the documents.

Kuwaiti officials are examining the transferred documents.

Iraq is obligated to return all Kuwaiti property, including archives, in accordance with Security Council resolution 1284 (1999).

Further information on this return will be included in the forthcoming Secretary-General's report submitted in accordance with paragraph 14 of resolution 1284, due in mid-December.

UNITED NATIONS APPROVES PURCHASE OF ELECTRICAL PLANTS FOR IRAQ

In its weekly update, the Office of the Iraq Programme (OIP) notes that an important contract for the purchase of two gas turbines for the Dibis power plant in Iraq has been approved by OIP under the new set of procedures under Security Council resolution 1409. Valued at $80 million, the contract had been placed on hold by the Security Councils 661 sanctions committee in December 2000.

Once installed and commissioned, the gas turbines will produce power for the northern governorates of Erbil and Sulaymaniyah, which will be reconnected to the national electricity grid as part of an effort to increase the supply of electricity to all three northern governorates. The third governorate, Dahuk, is already connected to the national electricity grid.

As for oil exports, they plunged from the previous weeks record high of 3.03 million barrels per day to 729,000 barrels in the week ending 25 October.

This weeks exports netted approximately $123 million.

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC: REFUGEES CROSS INTO DR CONGO

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees today flagged reports that a number of Central African nationals are entering the Democratic Republic of Congo's Equateur province at Zongo, a town directly across the Ubangui River from Bangui.

The refugees are fleeing a very tense situation in Bangui, where fighting and aerial bombing continued through the weekend. Until late Monday, the tremors of bombing could be felt by UNHCR staff from Zongo, in northern DRC. The situation overnight was reported calm.

A joint UNHCR-rebel MLC (Mouvement pour la Libération du Congo) assessment mission is scheduled to travel today to two neighborhoods where the refugees have congregated.

UNHCR said it has obtained agreement from the rebel MLC authorities that they open a humanitarian corridor for a possible further influx of asylum seekers in Zongo as a result of the current developments in Bangui.

UN ENVOY DISCUSSES POWER-SHARING AGREEMENT FOR DR CONGO

The Secretary-Generals Special Envoy, Moustapha Niasse, is continuing his discussions in Pretoria, South Africa, to help the Congolese parties reach, on an informal basis, an all-inclusive transitional arrangement for the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

This morning he told journalists that the Movement for the Liberation of the Congo (MLC) had announced today that it could accept, under certain conditions, a one-plus-four scheme at the head of the DRC government. This translates as one President and Four Vice Presidents.

As a result of this development, Niasse will follow up with representatives of the MLC, the Congolese Rally for Democracy Goma (RCD- G) and the DRC government later this week.

In the meantime, starting tomorrow, the Special Envoy will be meeting separately with other Congolese groups in his effort to conclude a power-sharing agreement. These include the Mai Mai, the RCD National the RCD Kisangani/Liberation Movement as well representatives of civil society and the unarmed political opposition.

UN REFUGEE AGENCY FLAGS FIGHTING IN NORTHEASTERN DR CONGO

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees remains very concerned about the safety of tens of thousands of Sudanese refugees in the northeastern province of Ituri in the Democratic Republic of the Congo following recent fighting between various factions.

A local UNHCR partner will be trying to send a team to last week's conflict area around the village of Biringi, where UNHCR has received reports that indicate that some of the 17,000 Sudanese refugees who fled into the bush are now beginning to trickle back into the settlement.

Clashes, which began last week between supporters of the Hema and Lendu ethnic groups, is now apparently spreading to an area where there are some 75,000 Sudanese refugees.

SUDAN: ANTI-POLIO CAMPAIGN BEGINS AFTER LANDMARK ACCESS AGREEMENT

A new polio campaign is underway in Sudan and health workers hope to be able to reach children who have never been immunized under a new agreement on access reached over the weekend, according to the UNs Humanitarian Operation Lifeline Sudan.

A landmark agreement that establishes the procedures for unimpeded humanitarian aid access to hundreds of thousands of war affected people in Sudan was signed on Saturday by representatives of the Government, the main rebel movement, the SPLM/A and the United Nations.

The World Food Programme calculates that unhindered humanitarian access will enable it to provide food for an additional 585,000 people in Sudan. This comes on top of the almost 3 million already targeted.

The initial arrangement will last from 1st November and continue until the end of the year. The dates reflect the time scale of the Memorandum of Understanding under which substantive peace talks are being held as part of the Machakos process.

ANNAN SAYS MOUNTAINS VITAL TO SURVIVAL OF HUMANITY

The Secretary-General, in a message delivered today to the Global Mountain Summit that began in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, said that the challenges facing the worlds mountains are as big as the mountains themselves, and the way forward is to break those challenges down into smaller pieces and smaller issues.

More than half of humanity depends on mountains for safe water to grow food, to produce electricity, to sustain industries and, most importantly, to drink, the Secretary-General said.

The message was delivered by Johannes van Ginkel, the rector of United Nations University.

OTHER ANNOUNCEMENTS

David Horowitz, who died on Sunday, was the definition of a long-time UN correspondent, having worked as a reporter at the United Nations since 1947 in other words, when the United Nations hit the ground running, he was writing about it, and he kept it up all the way until now. He was born in 1903 in Malmo, Sweden, and, among his many distinguished career highlights, he was President of the UN Correspondents Association in 1981.

A preliminary report on the cost of natural catastrophes has been presented at the 8th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) meeting in New Delhi, India. The report says the final bill for this years natural disasters could be more than $70 billion.

In a joint press release, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the World Food Programme (WFP) urge the international community to fund the purchase of seeds and other agricultural inputs for Southern Africa to avoid a worsening crisis next year. The latest assessments of the region show that 70 percent of households in Zambia and Malawi have no cereal seeds and in Zimbabwe, 94 percent of farmers are without seeds.

The World Food Programme (WFP) announced today that it will continue to provide emergency food assistance to vulnerable people in Chechnya and Ingushetia. The operation will provide about 34,000 metric tonnes of food assistance to more than 290,000 internally displaced and vulnerable people at an estimated cost of $16 million for the year 2003. WFP has been providing emergency aid to Chechens since January 2000 and to date has distributed 90,000 metric tonnes worth $43 million. In September the school-feeding programme was doubled and hot lunches are now provided for 47,000 students in 165 schools in the areas most affected by the conflict.