REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE

Corinne Momal-Vanian, Director of the United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the briefing, which was attended by the Spokespersons for the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, the World Health Organization, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the International Labour Organization, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and the Human Rights Council.

Ebola

Fadéla Chaib, for the World Health Organization (WHO), informed about the press conference which would be held today by Dr Marie Paule Kieny, WHO Assistant Director General for Health Systems and Innovation, on Ebola candidate vaccines.

Canadian vaccines were expected to arrive in Geneva the following day, on 22 October, where they would be kept refrigerated at the Cantonal Hospital. WHO would take some pictures of the arrival of the vaccines and made them available to journalists shortly afterwards.

Ms. Chaib informed that the WHO Emergency Committee would meet the following day, for the third time since August, in order to evaluate the situation since September, given that there had been cases of Ebola in Spain and the US, while Senegal and Nigeria were now Ebola-free. The Committee would look into its earlier recommendations and consider whether there was a need to modify them. It was difficult to say how long the committee discussions would last, but likely one to two days. There would be a virtual press conference after the meeting, on either 22 or 23 October, which was to be confirmed via email.

Answering several questions on perceptions of delays in WHO ý's response to the epidemic, the role of its African regional office, and when senior management was alerted to the seriousness of the outbreak, Ms. Chaib said that the organization would conduct in due time a thorough review of its response, including the response of partner organizations and the affected countries. Right now, however, the focus was on fighting the disease and minimizing its impact on the West African population. .

A journalist suggested that it would be very useful if the WHO Director-General, Dr. Chan, addressed the Geneva press corps. Ms. Chaib said that the media had met Dr. Chan twice on Ebola. Dr. Chan was traveling a lot at this time of year, but the formal request for a press conference would nonetheless be duly passed on to the WHO Head of Communications.

Asked whether the budget cuts had impacted WHO’s response to Ebola, Ms. Chaib said that in a crisis like this, it was difficult to predict how much money was needed. WHO’s biennial budget was USD 4 billion, but for emergencies like this one, it was often necessary to find additional, parallel financing. Ms. Chaib emphasized that the WHO had put the right people in the right places and WHO was trying to pull out all of its resources in the fight against Ebola, but also activate its partners, as it was impossible for the WHO alone to address all of the challenges.

Asked how many unreported cases there could be in Liberia, Ms. Chaib stated that all three affected countries were certainly underreporting the scope of the epidemics, but it was impossible to tell to which degree.

Ms. Chaib added that the results of the missions to Mali and Côte d’Ivoire would be presented as soon as they were ready, and possibly a short briefing could be organized with the heads of the two missions.

On the question about the clear overview on who was contributing what in terms of both funding and medical personnel, Ms. Chaib said that the WHO media team was currently preparing such information. There were a lot of bilateral agreements between the affected countries and other countries, which could not be easily tracked by the WHO.

Christophe Boulierac, for United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), briefed about the training of Ebola survivors in Liberia. The Ministry of Health of Liberia, with UNICEF, had identified and trained 20 survivors, some of whom had already started helping others in the interim care centre in Monrovia and the others would be dispatched to the most affected parts of the country. Thirty other survivors had also been identified.

The first centre had opened 15 days earlier. It was the only centre managed by the state which provided psycho-social support. The fact that the survivors were no longer afraid of catching the virus and the fact that they had overcome their own sufferings and could relate to the current patients placed them in a unique position to provide care, especially to children.

Mr. Boulierac said that a survivor had shared her experience of being stigmatized and isolated by their local communities. Even her daughter was not allowed to play with other children. That was what motivated the survivor to provide care to sick children, whom nobody else would want to even touch.

Asked why the Ebola survivors were stigmatized, Mr. Boulierac said that that was likely to be connected to social and cultural norms of the affected countries. There was a rational sensitization which UNICEF was doing, while the campaign to promote hand washing in Liberia had included celebrities and was extremely successful. Ebola was creating a series of unprecedented challenges, stigmatization being one of them, and there was a need to understand the cultural environment.

Syria

Mr. Boulierac stated that for the first time in several months, UNICEF had been able to cross the line in Aleppo for an extended period of time and reach children displaced by the fighting in Ain Al Arab/Kobane. Two days earlier, five trucks had left western, Government-controlled Aleppo City and reached Afrin, which was under Kurdish control.

Lifesaving UNICEF supplies including hygiene kits, blankets, water and high energy biscuits had been delivered to an area of northern Aleppo where thousands of children from the besieged Syrian border city of Ain Al Arab/Kobane had taken refuge.

Mr. Boulierac specified that volunteer teams from the Syrian Arab Red Crescent would shortly begin distribution of the supplies in the Aleppo suburb of Afrin where an estimated 1,000 families from Ain Al Arab were sheltering.

That was a small but significant breakthrough in UNICEF’s efforts to reach children who had been among the hardest to reach due to the conflict. Prior to the current battle for control of Ain Al Arab/Kobane, the city had not received any assistance for at least 12 months.

Later in the week, UNICEF would be part of a UN convoy taking similar assistance to Afrin and other towns in north-western Syria which had been beyond the reach of humanitarian assistance for as long as six months.

Mr. Boulierac stressed that, while that was a welcome breakthrough in accessing children who were beyond the line, UNICEF needed similar convoys to reach children in other parts of the country.

UNICEF had only received 50 percent of the funds it requested to assist people inside Syria, and still needed USD 94 million by end of the year in order to continue undertaking humanitarian operations and deliver much needed lifesaving supplies for children.

If UNICEF did not get those funds, there was a risk that it might reduce or completely bring to a halt some of the assistance it was giving to the 5 million children in need inside the country.

A UNICEF representative was in Aleppo and was available for questions.

Jens Laerke, for the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), informed that the UN humanitarian chief Valerie Amos had been on a mission to Turkey. She had gone down to the border to meet displaced people from Syria in the Yibo transit center in Suruc, which was very close to the border. That center sheltered some 5,000 people, half of whom were children from Syria.

Ms. Amos reported hearing horrendous stories of violence and brutality from the displaced in the centre, and stressed that the children clearly needed psycho-social assistance and the people needed shelter and other kinds of help. It was reported that there were nearly 900,000 registered Syrian refugees, and an estimated total of 1.6 million in Turkey from Syria. Inside Syria itself there was an estimated 11 million people still in need of aid. The crisis was becoming more and more acute with the onset of winter. Families required protection from the cold and that they needed to live in dignity.

Mr. Laerke emphasized that OCHA needed continued, unhindered access for aid workers to Syria so that they could deliver assistance.

Niger

Mr. Laerke said that USD 8 million had been allocated through the Central Emergency Response Fund to support 920,000 people in Niger with life-saving food, nutrition, health, education, protection and WASH assistance.

The new funding would be channelled through FAO, IOM, WFP, UNICEF and WHO. There were more than 4 million food insecure people in Niger and about 880,000 children under five are at risk of malnutrition.

That allocation showed that the international community was continuing to support the efforts of the Government to address humanitarian needs in close cooperation with partners. The funds would help to continue the provision of humanitarian assistance and reduce the vulnerability of people in need.

Mr. Laerke specified that the humanitarian agencies in Niger had now received 61 per cent - USD 186 million - of the USD 305 million required for 2014.

Human Rights Council

Rolando Gomez, for the Human Rights Council (HRC), announced the upcoming 20^th Session of the Universal Periodic Review, which would begin on 27 October and last until 7 November. Fourteen States would be reviewed by the UPR in this order: Italy, El Salvador, Gambia, Bolivia, Fiji, San Marino, Kazakhstan, Angola, Iran, Madagascar, Iraq, Slovenia, Egypt, Bosnia and Herzegovina. All reports of those states were available online, on the HRC website.

The meetings would be webcasted and statements would be posted on the extranet. Mr. Gomez said he would send media advisories for each of the States to those journalists following the session. Summaries after the fact would no longer be produced for the media.

The reports that would be adopted by the working group contained a much more accurate picture of the actual review. An important aspect of the second review for those States was that it would not only highlight the human right issues in the specific areas but would also allow the HRC to hear from the States about what steps they had taken to implement their recommendations agreed to during the first cycle four years earlier.

Mr. Gomez also announced that the election of fifteen new Human Rights Council members would take place in the General Assembly in New York later in the afternoon.

Asked about the details on the reported expulsion of OHCHR representative Scott Campbell from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mr. Gomez referred to the press statement issued by the High Commissioner and added that further queries should be directed to the OHCHR Spokesman Rupert Colville.

Geneva activities

Ms. Momal-Vanian informed that the Human Rights Committee had considered the report of Israel the previous day, which was the last report to be considered during the current session. For the rest of the session the Committee would be mostly meeting in private, until the public closing session on 31 October.

The Committee for the Elimination of Discrimination against Women was considering the report of Venezuela today. Later in the week, the Committee would consider reports of Poland, China and Ghana.

Ms. Momal-Vanian, speaking on the behalf of United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), informed about the roundtable discussions organized on the occasion of the 6^th session of UNITAR Peacekeeping Training Programme Advisory Board Meeting. The topic would be “Ending Sexual Violence in Conflict: Turning Commitment into Action: the Role of Local Communities in the Prevention of Sexual Violence”. The roundtable would take place in Room V, on 23 October from 3 to 5 p.m.

Catherine Sibut, for the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), reminded that the 15^th Raul Prebisch Lecture, hosted by UNCTAD on the occasion of its 50^th anniversary, would be given by Rafael Correa Delgado, President of Ecuador, in Room XX on 24 October at 10 a.m. Registration was possible on UNCTAD’s website. The lecture was entitled “Ecuador: Development as a Political Process” and would cover efforts by the country to build a model of equitable and sustainable development, as well as the lessons learned from implemented policies.

Hans von Rohland, for the International Labour Organization (ILO), announced the launch of a new ILO report on “The Skills Mismatch in Europe” in Press Room 1 on 29 October at 10 a.m. The report analysed the impressive numbers of over- and underqualified people on the European labour market and the related gap between supply and demand. At the press briefing, it would be possible to ask questions to the presenter of the study concerning general youth unemployment in Europe.

Ms. Chaib informed that the WHO Global TB Programme press conference for the launch of the Global Tuberculosis Report 2014 would take place in Press Room I on 22 October. Speakers would include Dr. Mario Raviglione, Director, Global TB Programme, and Dr. Katherine Floyd, Coordinator, TB Monitoring and Evaluation, Global TB Programme.
An electronic advance copy of the report could be obtained by email from the Communications Officer of the Global TB Programme, Monica Dias.

Spokespersons for the World Food Programme, International Organization for Migration and the United Nations Refugee Agency were also present, but did not brief.
The webcast for this briefing is available here: …http://bit.ly/ZEu8o1