REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE
Alessandra Vellucci, Director of the United Nations Information Service, United Nations Office at Geneva, chaired the briefing attended by the spokespersons for the Human Rights Council, United Nations Children’s Fund, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the International Organization for Migration and the World Health Organization.
Human Rights Council Update
Rolando Gomez, for the Human Rights Council, briefed the press on the Human Rights Council agenda of the day. At 10 a.m. the Council would continue its general debate on human rights situations that required the Council’s attention, which would be followed by the presentation of the report on the Fifth Annual Forum on Business and Human Rights held in November 2016, and two consecutive general debates: on subsidiary bodies and on the Universal Periodic Review.
Given the proposed work stoppages, the President of the Council had announced this morning that he was looking into the solutions and examining alternatives should the meetings not take place this afternoon.
On 19 June, the Council would hear the presentation of the report by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights on the Occupied Palestinian Territories and hold the general debate on the same topic, followed by the general debate on the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action. Also that day, the Council would hear from the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, Mutuma Ruteere who would present reports on country visits to Argentina, Australia and Fiji and the follow up report on glorification of Nazism and neo-Nazism. This would be the Special Rapporteur’s last presentation to the Council after having served as the mandate-holder for six years.
Mr. Gomez also said that a total of 35 draft resolutions had been submitted, which addressed a wide range of country situations and themes, including Syria, Eritrea, climate change, and corruption. Extensions had been requested for the resolutions on the Democratic Republic of the Congo and on Ethiopia.
Ukraine
Christophe Boulierac, for the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), said that as a follow-up on last week’s statement by Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Stephen O’Brien, he would provide the press with a child-focused perspective on the crisis. At least 750,000 children were at imminent risk of being cut off from safe drinking water following a surge in fighting in eastern Ukraine. The recent escalation of hostilities had damaged vital water infrastructures, and approximately 400,000 people (including more than 100,000 children) had had their drinking water cut off for four days this week after two filtration stations for the south Donbas water pipeline had been destroyed by shelling. Urgent repairs had bene completed on 15 June in the evening. However, nearly 3 million people in eastern Ukraine relied on water infrastructure that was now in the line of fire, and among them were 750,000 children. UNICEF expected more families to be cut off from safe drinking water, putting children at risk of disease and other dangers.
In Donetsk, power lines providing electricity to the city’s water filtration system had been damaged earlier this month, threatening more than 1 million people’s access to safe drinking water. Children cut off from clean drinking water could quickly contract water-borne diseases such as diarrhoea. Girls and boys having to fetch water from alternative sources, or forced to leave their homes, faced dangers from ongoing fighting and other forms of abuses.
After more than three years of 3.8 million people were in need of humanitarian assistance and more than 1.5 million people had been forced from their homes. Some 1 million children were in need of humanitarian aid, and the situation was particularly grave for the approximately 200,000 girls and boys living within the 15 kilometres on each side of the contact-line and were facing constant danger from landmines. Some of those children lived in communities which were shelled at least once a month. UNICEF’s partners, teachers, psychologists and parents reported signs of severe psychosocial distress in those children.
In response to questions, Mr. Boulierac said that no water-borne diseases had been reported yet, but it was a constant and legitimate concern. UNICEF had provided access to safe drinking water to 1.5 million people in Government and non-Government controlled areas, including trucking water when service was cut off, and provided essential supplies and equipment. It was very important that the security situation allowed for immediate repair of the infrastructure once it was damaged.
Syria
Christophe Boulierac, for the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), introduced Geneviève Boutin, UNICEF’s Emergency Coordinator for the Syria Response. Speaking by phone from Amman, Ms. Boutin said the war in Syria was in its seventh year, with unfortunately no end in sight, and that it had become the largest humanitarian crisis since World War II.
As the crisis dragged on, maybe contrary to people’s expectations, the needs were becoming more acute. Families’ resources had become depleted, and millions of people had been displaced more than one time. This repeated displacement and continued lack of access to services had exhausted their resources. In Syria and in the neighboring countries, there were also major protection concerns regarding the displaced. The impact of displacement on children had been really devastating. There were now 6 million children inside Syria who depended on humanitarian assistance for their daily survival. Some 280,000 of them were trapped in besieged areas where UNICEF had too rarely the opportunity to provide them with assistance.
There were also 2.5 million children registered as refugees in neighboring countries. Many of them did not live in camps, but among the poorest communities where they faced poverty, child labour, early marriage and other forms of exploitation. Ms. Boutin said 2016 had been reported as the worst year for children inside Syria. Some 662 cases of children killed by acts of war and 850 children recruited and used in the conflict, and according to Ms. Boutin it was only the top of the iceberg. There were 2.2 million school-aged children who were not in school today, inside Syria and in the sub-region. The question of the future of the sub-region arose, knowing that one third of those affected by the crisis were between the ages of 10 and 24. It was necessary to invest in those children to protect their future and the future of all those countries. Thanks to the generosity of Iraq, Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey and Egypt who were hosting 80 per cent of Syria’s refugees globally, where Governments and communities had been extremely generous in welcoming the Syrians, and thanks to donors also and partners, UNICEF had been able to provide meaningful support. For example in 2016, thanks to programs supported by UNICEF, 14.4 million people inside Syria and half a million people in neighboring countries have had access to safe drinking water. Some 580,000 children had enrolled in formal education in the countries neighbouring Syria, and 3 million children inside Syria had received back to learning supplies. Some 1.7 million children and their families have had access to basic healthcare.
Unfortunately, those services may not be able to continue, as UNICEF was facing the most critical funding gap it had faced since the start of the crisis. UNICEF’s appeal for 2017 to assist vulnerable children inside Syria and in the neighbouring countries, was for a total of USD 1.7 billion, and was only 25 per cent funded so far. Today, UNICEF was urgently calling to receive USD 220 million which would allow it to continue several critical programmes that would have to be scaled-down unless funding materialized very quickly. Those included a water and sanitation programme for 1.2 million children living in camps and settlements in host communities, basic health care and nutrition services for 5.4 million people, cash assistance for half a million families who used this money to keep their kids out of work and in school, and access to education for 2.8 million children. Ms. Boutin stressed that if we failed today to support the children of Syria and neighboring countries, not only we would have put the future of a whole generation at risk, but we would also risk losing all the benefits of the investments made in the last six years in supporting these children. UNICEF was also appealing for an end to the war in Syria and that the protection of civilians and children in particular be put front and centre by the considerations of all parties and those who had influence over them, as well as for the delivery of services and social infrastructures be sustained and scaled up to reach every child in need.
Responding to questions concerning the possibility of having to cut the cash assistance programme, Ms. Boutin said that about 500,000 families in the region had received cash assistance and that families with children with disabilities and children in school were primarily targeted, in order to supplement the family income and encourage them to keep the children in school. In terms of the incidence of child labour, various assessments conducted in Syria showed that more than half of the interviewed families had said that children had to work to a certain extent, from part time work to supplement the family income, to a full time job on construction sites for example. On the recruitment of children in armed conflict, all the parties were committing this violation, and last year, UNICEF had identified more than 850 children in conflict-related work with various armed groups.
In response to a question on the funding gap, Ms. Boutin explained that the whole appeal was for USD 1.4 billion and that the USD 220 million referred to in the press release was the funding necessary for the most urgent needs. If UNICEF would be constrained to cut its programmes, in the area of clean water as sanitation for example, some 1.2 million children would be left without access. The funding gap was considerable and UNICEF would have to start making some cuts unless urgent funding was received.
Jens Laerke, for United Nations Office of the Coordination for Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), recalled that during a press stakeout on 15 June, Jan Egeland had announced a convoy movement, and this morning, a joint convoy by the United Nations, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC) had gone to Talbiseh in Homs Governorate. It had delivered humanitarian aid for 84,000 people in need and the staff had also managed to conduct a rapid humanitarian needs assessment. The convoy had now crossed the last Government-held check point on its way back to Homs. The convoy had delivered the aid in Talbiseh but the idea was for the aid to also benefit people in need in Tulul al-Humur in the Hama Governorate, not so far from Talbiseh as the road between the two was now open. It was hoped that the Syrian Arab Red Crescent would distribute the aid in both locations.
Asked to update the press on all the convoys, Mr. Laerke explained that today’s convoy was one convoy movement which had delivered to two separate locations, to Talbiseh and to Tulul al-Humur. The 15 June convoy to Qamishli did not contain aid but was a reconnaissance movement, and the information whether it had reached Qamishli was not available as of now. Another convoy to Ghouta had been planned. Mr. Laerke clarified that, as noted by Mr. Egeland, it had been 40 days since a besieged area had last been reached; the two areas serviced by today’s convoy were hard-to-reach areas, and they had received multi-sectoral assistance.
In response to questions raised about the polio vaccination campaign in Syria announced by Mr. Egeland on 15 June, Geneviève Boutin, UNICEF’s Emergency Coordinator for the Syria Response, said that preparations were on the way to start the vaccination in Deir ez-Zor.
Fadela Chaib, World Health Organization, added that there were no new confirmed cases; the surveillance continued and the outbreak response was being planned. It was certain that the vaccination campaign would take place in Deir ez-Zor Governorate where a circulating vaccine-derived polio virus type 2 had been detected. Although access to vaccination was compromised by the prevailing insecurity in Deir ez-Zor, the World Health Organization had been able to conduct polio vaccination in this very challenging area; for example in the beginning of 2016, several vaccination campaigns had taken place and two campaigns had been conducted in March and April 2017. The details and the logistics of the vaccination campaign in Deir ez-Zor were being planned.
Ms. Chaib specified that it was not cases of polio but of a circulating vaccine-derived polio virus type 2, which were two different things. There were three new cases of vaccine-derived polio virus type 2 in Deir ez-Zor, and in total, 58 cases of paralysis in the Governorate had been confirmed in 2017.
Migrants in Libya
Joel Millman, for the International Organisation for Migration (IOM) said IOM had put out a statement earlier in the week regarding a case of hundreds of Horn of Africa migrants that IOM believed were being held for ransom and tortured in Libya. On 15 June, IOM, in collaboration with the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), had briefed the UN’s Libya country team in Tunis, Tunisia. Mr. Millman said that IOM was aware of efforts being made to trace, locate, and hopefully rescue those victims. IOM had been very clear on what they knew and what they did not know about the video and the information. IOM judged that the video was authentic and consistent with a trend that had been observed for years of using either social media or mobile phones to intimidate relatives and threaten to injure and kill migrants that were being held against their will. He specified that this was not the first time that it had been observed in the region. It had been seen in other parts of the world as well.
Asked about the exact number of people held, IOM staff in Libya that Mr. Millman had spoken to felt that it could be up to 360 people, but a safer estimate was up to 200. Because of the quality of the video, it was difficult to ascertain how large the rooms could be or even in how many locations that could be happening across the country.
Asked whether IOM had been able to identify exactly who was in control of the facility, Mr. Millman said IOM may piece this together using testimony form victims’ families as soon as it became available, but that was not yet the case. Historically, the problem with those kinds of situations was that, unless one could get into the compounds in question, it was hard to know who was controlling them. In the past, there had been bank account numbers which were traceable, or places where victims’ families were sending money. Also, occasionally, international law enforcement had cell phone pictures showing license plates or addresses of locations where those activities were taken place, but in the present case, those were not available.
Cyprus Talks
Alessandra Vellucci, Director of the United Nations Information Service at the United Nations Office at Geneva, informed the journalists that the note to correspondents regarding the Cyprus Talks was being finalized. The date for the conference was confirmed, it would be reconvened on 28 June and was expected to take place at the ministerial level. There was no definite information on the logistics as of yet, but the accreditation process for the media would be opened as soon as possible. The Special Advisor to the Secretary-General on Cyprus, Espen Barth Eide, intended to interact frequently and openly with the Geneva press corps.
Responding to questions, Ms. Vellucci said that the Secretary-General was extremely involved and committed to the solution of this crisis, and that his spokesperson had confirmed that it could be expected that the Secretary-General would participate in the Conference at some point.
Geneva Events and Announcements
Alessandra Vellucci, Director of the United Nations Information Service at the United Nations Office at Geneva, reminded the press that the informal thematic session on the way to the development of the Global Compact on migration would take place on 19 and 20 June in Room XIX of the Palais des Nations. The theme of the informal session would be “International cooperation and governance of migration in all its dimensions, including at borders, on transit, entry, return, readmission, integration and reintegration”.
In the context of this session, the United Nations Information Service in Geneva would screen No Monsters in Berlin, a film about a migrant Indian woman who met a family of Syrian refugees, followed by a debate. The screening would take place on Monday 19 June at 1.30 p.m. in the Cinema Room of the Palais des Nations.
The informal thematic sessions will be webcast live.
Turning to Geneva events and announcements, Ms. Vellucci said that the Conference Disarmament would meet in plenary at 10 a.m. on Tuesday, 20 June.
The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) would launch its Annual World Drug Report at 11 a.m. on 22 June in Room III. Speakers would be Aldo Lale-Demoz, Deputy Executive Director, (UNDOC), Dr. Luiz Loures, Deputy Executive Director, Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS, Dr. Shekhar Saxena, Director of the Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse, World Health Organization, and Chloé Carpentier, Chief of the Drug Research Section, UNODC. The report was under embargo until 22 June at 1 p.m. CET.