REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE

Corinne Momal-Vanian, the Director of the United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the briefing, which was also attended by spokespersons of the Human Rights Council, the World Trade Organization, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the International Organization for Migration, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the World Food Programme, the United Nations Children's Fund and the World Health Organization.

Japan earthquake

Elisabeth Byrs of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that the Japan Meteorological Agency had reported that an 8.4-magnitude earthquake had hit North East Japan at 2.46 p.m. local time at a depth of 20 miles. There have been powerful aftershocks, including a 7-magnitude one. An emergency response team set up by the Japanese Government under the leadership of the Prime Minister had reported that the damage was “grave”. Experts from OCHA were in direct contact with their Japanese counterparts, notably with the Director General of the Secretariat of Japan disaster relief teams. Japan’s national resources were fully engaged in the response and currently evaluating the situation. The United Nations had started its usual disaster procedure, as part of which it alerted INSARAG, a global network of more than 80 countries and disaster response organizations, of which Japan was a member. Thirty-five international search and rescue teams were monitoring the situation and stood ready to assist, if Japan requested their help. For the time being, the United Nations had not deployed any teams, Ms. Byrs said, in response to a question.

Libya

Jean-Philippe Chauzy of the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said IOM was appealing for funds as migrant workers continued to arrive in the thousands each day at the Tunisian and Egyptian borders. IOM and partners, notably UNHCR, pursued the humanitarian evacuation, but their evacuation capacities were overstretched by new arrivals, especially as many long-haul flights were needed to evacuate thousands of Bangladeshis. IOM was spending about USD 3 million daily on these evacuation flights and therefore the USD 49.2 million appeal launched some time ago to assist in the evacuation of up to 65,000 migrants must be revised. Without rapidly receiving new funding, IOM may be constrained to suspend its humanitarian evacuation programme, which would have catastrophic consequences for the many people living in the camps. To date, USD 27 million had been received, but ongoing financial and logistical support was essential as the situation in Libya remained unclear and large migration flows might pick up again.

Melissa Fleming of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres and IOM Director-General William Swing had concluded a joint mission to Tunisia on Thursday in which they had received renewed assurances from the Tunisian Government that the border would remain open to all fleeing the violence in Libya. Arrivals had continued at the border at a rate of around 2,500 people daily. Meanwhile, evacuation flights were not keeping pace with arrivals, with only 800-1,200 people departing each day. Currently there were 17,000 people at the Choucha border transit camp comprising 25 nationalities, most of them Bangladeshi. All were awaiting onwards travel or other solutions. UNHCR and IOM had renewed a call for more long-haul flights to Bangladesh and other Asian and sub-Saharan African destinations, with a current estimated shortage of some 70 long-haul flights. New arrivals in Tunisia continued to describe many checkpoints between Tripoli and the Ras Adjir border crossing with Tunisia, some said in excess of 100. UNHCR had heard consistent reports that telephones, SIM cards and cash had been taken at these checkpoints. It had also heard numerous accounts of threats and discrimination on the basis of skin colour throughout the country. Intense fighting in the west was reportedly leading to limited access to hospitals with many new arrivals saying that they were too afraid to venture out of their homes for food. According to Eritrean and Somali refugees who had recently arrived in Tunisia, some of their friends and family in Tripoli were too afraid to travel to the border. UNHCR staff and partners in Tripoli continued to man a 24-hour hotline for refugees and asylum-seekers in Libya. To date UNHCR has received close to 800 calls from refugees and asylum seekers in Libya, as well as some of their relatives abroad. Many of the refugees were requesting assistance and documentation from UNHCR, which it was providing in Tripoli. Refugees continued to convey their fears of being caught up in fighting, their lack of resources and their wish to be evacuated. Earlier this week the Italian Government had evacuated 58 Eritreans from Tripoli. This included 20 families, the majority women and children. UNHCR commended the Italian government for taking this important humanitarian initiative. At the Egypt border, an estimated 4,500 people continued to be stranded, most sleeping in the open. The majority were Bangladeshi. Meanwhile the Algerian government had formally informed UNHCR that its borders were open to all people fleeing Libya. A UNHCR team would be deploying to the border shortly. Responding to a question, Ms. Fleming said that to date over 230,000 people have fled the violence in Libya, including 118,000 to Tunisia, 107,000 to Egypt, over 2000 to Niger and over 4,300 to Algeria.

Emilia Casella of the World Food Programme (WFP) said the ship carrying almost 1,200 tons of wheat flour which had been forced to turn around a week ago due to the aerial bombardments in Benghazi had now arrived in the city. Its cargo would feed up to about 94,000 people for a month. In addition, a convoy of trucks carrying fortified date bars had also arrived in Benghazi. Another convoy carrying date bars, as well as enough additional wheat flour to feed 15,000 people for a month, was currently en route from Egypt towards Benghazi. Ms. Casella also gave a reminder that the WFP had launched an USD 39 million operation to assist over a million people with food assistance. In addition, there were two special operations to provide inter-agency support in logistics and emergency telecommunications for the entire humanitarian community responding to this emergency. In regards to the food assistance, this would at the moment be aimed at about 400,000 people outside of Libya - that is, migrants returning to Tunisia and Egypt and their families- as many families now had an extra mouth to feed while losing the remittances their family members sent to help them support their families back home. The food assistance was also aimed at about 600,000 people inside Libya, if and when the WFP began to have access to them. WFP was calling for safe humanitarian access so that food and other humanitarian assistance could be provided to all people in need.

Marixie Mercado of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) said that the numbers of children and women crossing the borders were still low, but rising. Today, there were over 215 women and more than 120 children on the Tunisian side of the border, most of them Somali who would require resettlement assistance. On the Egyptian side, as of 9 March there were 70 children and 87 children. As part of the response that was being led by UNHCR and IOM, UNICEF was working with local partners to improve water, sanitation and hygiene conditions on the Tunisian and Egyptian sides of the border, and providing psychosocial support to migrant families in transit. UNICEF had pre-positioned 160 metric tons of supplies, and had a team ready to be deployed into Libya once conditions permit. With much of the country inaccessible to humanitarian agencies, UNICEF did not have concrete, comprehensive information on what was happening to children in Libya. But it knew that children as young as seven were at the forefront of some demonstrations and that many of the dead and injured in Benghazi were between 15 and 35 years old. The Secretary General's Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict had highlighted that there were unconfirmed reports of recruitment of children into the violence. UNICEF reminded all parties of their obligation to protect children and called for immediate and unimpeded humanitarian access to affected areas.

Fadéla Chaib of the World Health Organization (WHO) said yesterday that WHO had brought 5 health kits to local hospitals in Djerba, Tunisia, to treat 50,000 over 3 months. This material would be used inside Libya once the access is established, or at the border if needed. No acute disease of epidemic potential had been identified at the camps on the Libya – Tunisia border to date. However, some reports said that influenza-like illnesses, respiratory infections and diarrhoea (due to continuous crowding at the camps and hygiene conditions) were increasing. The World Health Organization and the Tunisian Ministry of Health were setting up a system for epidemic surveillance at the border and at the camps, and were monitoring medical stocks, including international donations. On 8 March WHO had also dispatched some 4,000 doses of tetanus treatments to Benghazi to prevent potential infections arising from the delayed treatment of injured people.

Responding to a question, Corinne Momal-Vanian said the United Nations was responding to the event in Libya at different levels. The Secretary-General’s Special Envoy, who was meeting with the Secretary-General today in New York, would possibly travel to Tripoli this weekend, together with the Humanitarian Coordinator.

Côte d’Ivoire

Ms. Fleming said that UNHCR was becoming increasingly concerned by the very limited response it has seen thus far to the crisis in Côte d’Ivoire. While international attention had been focused on events in North Africa, the unfolding tragedy in West Africa had gone largely overlooked. With some 370,000 people displaced internally, and 76,956 refugees registered so far in Liberia, the total displacement numbers were nearing the half million mark. On 14 January UNHCR had appealed for USD 46 million in funding, mainly to help deal with the outflow of refugees into neighbouring Liberia. So far it had received only USD 5 million of this sum and promises of a further USD 13 million. With the growing displacement, UNHCR was considering a new and increased funding appeal next week, and hoped donors would respond more positively. Currently UNHCR was seeing a further degrading of the security environment in Abidjan. From new clashes in the Abobo district on 6 March and Cocody district on 7 March, it had had reports of 30 people wounded and three deaths. Armed checkpoints were continuing to make travel around the city dangerous, affecting the entire population. UNHCR was continuing to help where it could, often working through local NGOs. So far it had identified some 20 sites around the city where large numbers of internally displaced people were concentrated. While needs assessments and numbers of internally displaced persons were still being determined in some of these locations, it was already clear that people were in urgent need of food and non-food aid including medicine. Outside Abidjan, the violence in the west appeared to be spreading to central and south-eastern parts of the country. People forced to flee were reporting attempts to stop them from moving and physical abuse, including reported rape cases. In Liberia this week, UNHCR staff spoke to a 21-year-old Ivorian refugee woman who had fled with her two-year-old son after rebels beat her for resisting rape. More and more refugees fleeing into Liberia were recounting gunfire along the way, sometimes forcing them to hide or sleep in the bush. With the growing influx UNHCR was revising its planning in Liberia and increasing the budget to respond to the needs of up to 150,000 refugees.

Ms. Casella said that the WFP was extremely concerned by the situation. It had announced the scaling up of its operations to provide food to the escalating number of people who were fleeing the violence. It was clear that as the violence continued, the situation could only get worse. The WFP had been striving to feed the hungry and displaced people and refugees, but its movements inside Côte d’Ivoire were limited by insecurity and violence, and WFP was increasingly worried about the strain that the refugee population was placing on the host communities inside Liberia who had received them. The press release at the back of the room outlined WFP’s programme ongoing in Côte d’Ivoire to assist 125,000 people over a six-month-period, and that programme was valued at USD 16 million. Inside Liberia, the WFP was now aiming to help about 186,000 people including refugees and host communities with a programme for which it was appealing for USD 35 million. WFP was particularly concerned because the rainy season starting in April would make it more difficult to reach people in need of assistance. Also, with large population movements and the current security situation it was difficult to assess who needs what kind of help, and transporters were unwilling to provide trucks to distribute food to people. In addition, food prices had been rising steadily.

Ms. Mercado said that what the international community initially thought would be a temporary political crisis in Côte d’Ivoire was now causing systemic damage to children, and to the ability of caregivers and health and education systems to protect them. In the north, central and western parts of the Côte d’Ivoire, schools had been closed in 10 out of 27 districts for over three months now, effectively wasting an entire year for 800,000 primary school children. There were severe drug shortages across the country and up to half of health workers were not at their posts, despite a cholera outbreak in Abidjan, a measles outbreak in the south west, and yellow fever in the north. Farmers – who made up around two-thirds of the economy, but could no longer sell their crops – were hurting. Food prices had been rising since the beginning of the crisis, and it was the young children in poor families who lived with the harshest impact. There had been 69 documented cases of rape and sexual violence, including 32 children. Amidst the fear and insecurity, children were also being drawn into the political violence. In Liberia, the 40,000 refugees who had fled the escalation of violence across the border in the past 10 days – and again the vast majority were children – were already in dire need of humanitarian support. Host communities – already among the poorest in one of the world’s poorest countries – were overstretched. The vast majority of refugee children were out of school; the surveillance points to critical levels of malnutrition among children and the risk of disease outbreaks was potent. UNICEF estimated that about 40,000 children, including children from host communities, urgently required food, shelter and safe water. Despite access and operational challenges, UNICEF had scaled up its humanitarian and programme capacity and was vaccinating millions of children and women and providing safe water and sanitation to displaced and conflict-affected communities, along with nutrition, health, education and child protection support. That said, the humanitarian agencies, including UNICEF, faced a severe shortage of funding for this crisis. The longer this lasts, the more destructive and enduring its impact will be on children.

Yemen

Mr. Colville said that OHCHR was very concerned by allegations of excessive use of force on the part of government security forces in Yemen. It called on the government to exercise restraint and to investigate all allegations of extrajudicial killings and human rights violations at the hands of these security forces. Some 37 protesters and at least 6 security officers were reported to have been killed so far since the start of the unrest in Yemen. OHCHR called on the Government of Yemen to investigate all the killings, including the alleged killing of two demonstrators at the University of Sana’a on 9 March. Other incidents that needed investigating included the reported killing of two or three prisoners in riots at Sana'a's central prison on 8 March, and the alleged killing of two protesters on 4 March near the town of Harf Sufyan.

Bahrain

Mr. Colville said that OHCHR had received an allegation that there had been a call in Bahrain for three human rights defenders to be "killed and liquidated". This call had been circulated on social networking websites, including Facebook. The message named Mr. Mohammed Al Masqati, president of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights, Mr. Naji Fateel, another member of the Bahrain Youth Society for Human Rights, and Mr. Abdulhadi Alkhawaja, a former director at Frontline Defenders. The message circulating called them "traitors" and "heads of sedition and incitement" and provided full personal identification details, including their names, ID card numbers, home addresses and telephone numbers; even the makes, models, years and registration plates of their cars, as well as their places of work. It also provided ID card photographs of the individuals. CHR was extremely concerned about these threats, which clearly constituted incitement, and called upon the authorities to ensure effective protection for the three named individuals.

Saudi Arabia

Mr. Colville said that OHCHR was concerned about what may happen later today in Saudi Arabia, where the situation is very tense. Live fire had reportedly been used against demonstrators in the eastern part of the country yesterday, and a number of people had been arrested. As in other such situations in the Middle East, OHCHR urged restraint on the part of the authorities and the protestors. But it also stressed that people should be allowed to exercise their internationally recognized rights to freedom of assembly and freedom of expression.

Agenda

Corinne Momal-Vanian said the Conference on Disarmament, which was currently devoting its public sessions to a debate on each of the points on its agenda, had yesterday held a plenary on negative security assurances. At its next public plenary on Tuesday, the Conference would discuss the new types and systems of weapons of mass destruction, the comprehensive programme of disarmament, and transparency in armaments.

The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination had examined all countries scheduled for consideration during its session that ended today. The concluding observations of the Committee on all the reports it had examined, as well as the roundup release, would be distributed today.

Ms. Momal-Vanian said the Food and Agriculture Organization would present its “State of Food and Agriculture 2010-11” report today at 11.30 a.m. in Room III, when it would also speak about food prices and the situation in the Middle East. Later today there would be a conference by the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief at 2.30 p.m. in Press Room I, and on Monday 14 March, at 3 p.m. in Press Room I, the Special Rapporteur on Myanmar would update the press on the human rights situation in that country.

Cédric Sapey of the Human Rights Council said the Special Rapporteur on the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and the Special Rapporteur on Myanmar would present their reports to the Human Rights Council on Monday morning. The noon meeting – currently scheduled to start at about 1 p.m. – was devoted to the follow-up to the Special Sessions on Côte d’Ivoire and Libya.

Ankai Xu of the World Trade Organization (WTO) said a Committee meeting on regional trade agreements would start on Monday and last until Tuesday. On Thursday 17 March there would be an informal negotiating group on market access for industrial goods, to be followed by a briefing (time and place to be announced).

Ms. Xu said that WTO Director General Pascal Lamy would be in Washington D.C. on Monday and Tuesday. On Monday, Mr. Lamy would meet with the National Foreign Trade Council and speak at the United States Chamber of Commerce on “Building capacity for trade in developing countries”. On Tuesday, he would attend a World Bank-organized discussion on “Access to trade finance for developing countries” and meet with several CEOs of environmental organizations. Mr. Lamy would then be back in Geneva on Thursday to speak at the University of Geneva on “Global governance and sustainable development”.

Mr. Colville said that the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, would undertake her first official mission to West Africa starting on Sunday, visiting Guinea from 13 to 15 March and Senegal from 15 to 18 March. Ms. Pillay was scheduled to meet the Presidents and senior ministers in both countries. More details will be made available in a separate media advisory later today.