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United Nations Daily Highlights, 97-01-21United Nations Daily Highlights Directory - Previous Article - Next ArticleFrom: The United Nations Home Page at <http://www.un.org> - email: unnews@un.orgDAILY HIGHLIGHTSTuesday, 21 January 1997This document is prepared by the Central News Section of the Department of Public Information and is updated every week-day at approximately 6:00 PM. HEADLINES
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Tuesday briefed the Security Council on the situation in the Great Lakes Region of Africa, Acting Spokesman for the Secretary-General, Fred Eckhard said. The Secretary-General, among others, expressed his grave preoccupation with the problems of the region, according to the Acting Spokesman. Other issues discussed included prospects that Zaire would launch a counter-offensive against rebels in the eastern part of the country, the war in Burundi, the dangers and high cost of delivering aid to Rwanda, and hundreds of thousands of wandering refugees in eastern Zaire. The Secretary-General told the Council that he had agreed to the naming of a Joint United Nations/Organisation of African Unity (OAU) Special Representative who would take up residence in that region, the Acting Spokesman said. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan will leave for a two-day visit to Washington, D.C on Wednesday. The Secretary-General is expected to hold meetings with President Bill Clinton of the United States, senior United States administration officials, members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and other elected representatives in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Secretary-General will also hold meetings with senior officials of the Organisation of American States, the World Bank and African Ambassadors in Washington D.C. Secretary-General Kofi Annan has recommended that the Security Council accede to the request of the Government of Lebanon and extend the mandate of United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) for another period of six months, until 31 July 1997. In his report to the Security Council on the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), the Secretary-General said the UNIFIL mandate remained unfulfilled. He said that while the level of hostilities was somewhat lower than in the past, the situation in southern Lebanon continued to be tense and volatile. Mr. Annan added that as Israel maintained its occupation of parts of the area, Lebanese groups continued their attacks against occupying forces. On the issue of firing into populated areas, Mr. Annan said the parties exercised a measure of restraint, in accordance with the understanding of 26 April 1996. "It is hoped that they will continue to do so. However, this positive development should not obscure the fact that the inherent instability of the situation and the ever present possibility of renewed deterioration remain a cause of concern," the Secretary-General stated. He noted that although UNIFIL continued to be prevented from implementing its mandate, its contribution to stability and the protection it was able to afford the population of the area remained important. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women was an integral part of Morocco's law, according to that country's Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Ahmed Snoussi. He told the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, Monday, that the Government of Morocco was committed to implementing its provisions as long as they did not run counter to Islamic Sharia. The Representative was replying to questions posed by the Committee about Morocco's efforts to implement the Convention. Several experts had described Morocco's reservations to article 2, on legislative and constitutional protections for women's rights, and to article 16, on discrimination against women in family matters, as striking at the very heart of the Convention. The Permanent Representative said the Moroccan Government realised that legislation and constitutional change alone would not change people's thinking, adding that the reservations on the Convention were the result of a national consensus and were not simply a decision of the Government. A new database for identifying major United Nations documents, UN Info Quest (UN-I-Que), is now available on the Dag Hammarskjold Library home page on the Internet. The new database is an electronic research tool that serves as a guide to the symbols/sales numbers of tens of thousands of selected documents and new publications from 1946 to the present. Records will be updated and new entries added regularly; additional research files will be incorporated into the database. UN-I-QUE is geared towards the United Nations community and librarians in United Nations depository libraries but its usefulness will extend to researchers worldwide who would like to find shortcuts to identifying key documentation. The database was created by the Library's United Nations/Specialised Agencies Reference Desk to quickly respond to some frequently asked questions. The database is available at the following URL: http://www.un.org/Depts/dhl/unique. More than 200 representatives from governments, the United Nations system, and non-governmental organisations are meeting in Ashkhabad, Turkmenistan, to seek agreement on an aid strategy for Afghanistan, a country that had been devastated by nearly two decades of conflict. The two-day Forum, co-sponsored by the UN Department of Humanitarian Affairs and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), focuses on the international community's future role in assisting Afghanistan. The meeting is expected to rally international support for a strategy that linked urgently required humanitarian assistance with development and peacemaking efforts. Most importantly, the strategy would reinforce the efforts of the Afghans themselves to achieve peace and stability in their country. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) Director-General Federico Mayor on Monday stressed the role of education in building a "culture of prevention" for natural disaster reduction. Mr. Mayor made the remarks at the opening of a four-day meeting on the International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction (1990 - 2000) at UNESCO Headquarters. The 1994 Yokohama World Conference on Natural Disaster Reduction called for the construction of a "culture of prevention," Mr. Mayor recalled, adding that education within a context of democracy had an important role to play in the development of such a culture by ensuring a two-way flow of information between policy-makers and communities at risk. About 25 leading scientist, health experts, engineers and other specialists in disaster reduction and relief appointed by the United Nations Secretary- General are participating in the Eighth Session of the Scientific and Technical Committee on the International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction. For information purposes only - - not an official record From the United Nations home page at <http://www.un.org> - email: unnews@un.orgUnited Nations Daily Highlights Directory - Previous Article - Next Article |
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