United Nations Daily Highlights, 03-02-27

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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

UN

HEADQUARTERS, NEW YORK

Thursday, February 27, 2003

ANNAN MEETS CYPRIOT LEADERS, DISCUSSES PLAN

This morning, Secretary-General Kofi Annan met with Glafcos Clerides, the Greek Cypriot leader, Rauf Denktash, the Turkish Cypriot leader, and Tassos Papadopoulos, the incoming Greek Cypriot leader, for 45 minutes at the Office of his Special Adviser, Alvaro de Soto, in the UN Protected Area in Cyprus.

This was the first face-to-face meeting held between Papadopoulos and Denktash in the context of talks.

The leaders agreed to suspend the meeting so that each side could hold its own consultations, and they agreed further to meet the Secretary-General again Friday morning.

The Secretary-General then conferred with his senior advisers before he departed to the Residence of the Chief of the UN Mission in Cyprus, where he met with Dimitris Christofias, Leader of AKEL, the Progressive Party for Working People.

Later on, the Chief of the UN Mission, Zbigniew Wlosowicz, hosted a luncheon on behalf of the Secretary-General, attended by 13 leaders of the islands political parties.

This evening, he was scheduled to drop by an exhibition given by Greek and Turkish Cypriot artists, held at the hotel where he is staying.

SECURITY COUNCIL HOLDS CONSULTATIONS ON IRAQ

The Security Council is holding consultations on Iraq today.

Council members have before them two documents: A draft resolution by the United Kingdom, the United States and Spain, and a joint memorandum by France, Germany and the Russian Federation.

Asked about the status of the latest quarterly report from chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix, the Spokesman said that the report had gone to the Secretary-Generals Executive Office on Wednesday and had since gone into translation. He said that current plans were for Security Council members to receive advance copies of the report on Sunday, and for the report to be issued as a UN document next Monday.

UNMOVIC CONDUCTS AERIAL SURVEILLANCE WITH MIRAGE JETS

On Wednesday, the UN weapons inspectors used Mirage IV planes provided by France to conduct a successful surveillance operation.

Meanwhile, inspection teams from the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) continued to visit a variety of sites.

One UNMOVIC team supervised the successful drilling of eight remaining artillery shells filled with mustard gas, as well as the detoxification of mustard gas taken from the shells.

Another UNMOVIC team returned to the Al Aziziyah Airfield and Firing Range and observed further digging in search of R-400 aerial bombs and bomb fragments. Iraq claims that these bombs were filled with biological agents and destroyed at this site in 1991. Additional fragments of R-400 bombs were identified.

Meanwhile the IAEA conducted a radiation survey in industrial areas west of Baghdad.

Asked whether there were any plans to withdraw UN personnel from Iraq, the Spokesman said the United Nations has made no change in its security procedures for the country.

TRIBUNAL SENTENCES FORMER BOSNIAN SERB PRESIDENT TO 11 YEARS

Saying that no sentence can fully reflect the horror of what occurred or the terrible impact on thousands of victims in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) today sentenced the former President of the Republika Srpska, Biljana Plavsic, to 11 years in prison.

As part of the Bosnian Serb leadership, Plavsic disregarded reports of widespread ethnic cleansing and publicly rationalized and justified it, the Tribunal ruled.

The former Bosnian Serb President had pleaded guilty to one count of crimes against humanity, at a hearing last October, and the Prosecutors Office dismissed several other counts against her. The Tribunal took her guilty plea, her voluntary surrender to the Tribunal, her age and her post-conflict conduct into account when determining Plavsics sentence.

SOUTH KOREAN PRESIDENT TOLD OF UN SUPPORT FOR DIALOGUE

Maurice Strong, the Secretary-Generals Personal Envoy for the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (DPRK), has been in Seoul, South Korea, this week to attend the inauguration of the new President of the Republic of Korea, Roh Moo-hyun, with whom he met on Tuesday.

He conveyed to the President warm congratulations by the Secretary-General and a letter in which the Secretary-General pledged to continue to do everything in his power to mobilize international support for the inter-Korean dialogue, reconciliation and cooperation. He also would facilitate Korean and international efforts to keep the Korean peninsula free of weapons of mass destruction and the risks of war.

Strong reported on the mission that he is undertaking for this purpose on behalf of the Secretary-General, and the South Korean President expressed his support for this initiative.

Immediately prior to his visit to Seoul, Strong met in Tokyo with Japans Foreign Minister and other senior Japanese officials to discuss the same issues. He will now proceed to Beijing and Moscow.

OTHER ANNOUNCEMENTS

WORLD POPULATION: The UN Population Fund (UNFPA) welcomed the news that reduced fertility rates are helping to slow global population growth. World Population Prospects: the 2002 Revision. launched Wednesday, said about half of the difference in growth projections is due to lower expectations of future fertility rates. The world population projection for 2050 is 8.9 billion, an increase of 2.6 billion, instead of the increase of 3 billion projected two years ago.

AFGHANISTAN: The UN Mission in Afghanistan notes that UN missions to several areas in the northern part of the country have been suspended for the last two weeks, due to factional skirmishes in the area. The Mission also reports suspensions in the southeastern part of the country, due to instability.

TIMOR-LESTE: The UN peacekeeping force in Timor-Leste has captured one man suspected of involvement in the recent attacks in Atabae in the Bobanaro District. The man was held when Fijian troops conducting a search came across armed men trying to cross the Mota Loes River. He was wounded during an exchange of fire and was taken to hospital under guard.

UN BUDGET: Two more Member States paid their 2003 regular budget contributions in full today. The Republic of Korea paid over $24 million and Tunisia more than $405,000, to bring the number of fully paid-up Member States to 54.

UN EVACUATION DRILL: A full evacuation drill of the UN Secretariat building will take place this afternoon, sometime before 4:00 p.m., to examine UN evacuation procedures.

ELECTRICAL SHUTDOWN IN GENERAL ASSEMBLY BUILDING: There will be an electrical shutdown in the General Assembly building Friday at 7:00 p.m. until 2:00 a.m. on Saturday morning.