REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE

Elena Ponomareva-Piquier, Chief of the Press and External Relations Section of the United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the briefing, which also heard from Spokespersons for and Representatives of the UN Refugee Agency, the World Food Programme, the Swiss Foundation for Mine Action, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, the Economic Commission for Europe and the United Nations Children’s Fund.

Secretary-General’s Activities

Ms. Ponomareva-Piquier said the Secretary-General returned to New York after his Middle East trip yesterday and spoke to journalists at Headquarters. A transcript of his remarks was available in the press room. Also available were the statements by the Secretary-General on the earthquake and tsunami which hit the Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea, and on the murder of five African Union peacekeepers in Darfur.

International Day for Mine Awareness and Assistance for Mine Action

Ms. Ponomareva-Piquier said the International Day for Mine Awareness and Assistance for Mine Action was commemorated on 4 April. The message of the Secretary-General on the day was available in English and in French, and it was embargoed until 1 a.m. GMT Wednesday. April 4 was designated as Mine Awareness Day by UN General Assembly Resolution 60/97 of 8 December 2005.

On this occasion, Ms. Ponomareva-Piquier said Sergei Ordzhonikidze, the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva, would tomorrow participate in a seminar organized by the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining at the World Meteorological Organization from 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. The full programme of the seminar was available for interested journalists. It would be inaugurated by Cornelio Sommaruga, President of the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining.

At the Palais des Nations, an exhibition of photographs by Charlotte Oestervang entitled “Enduring Fear: images of the people affected by landmines and explosive remnants of war” was opened yesterday on the mezzanine of the new building. The exhibition, which was being held under the auspices of the Director-General and was being organized by the United Nations Mine Action Service, would continue until 13 April.

Judy Cheng Hopkins, Assistant Commissioner for Operations at the United Nations Refugee Agency, said UNHCR welcomed the opportunity of Mine Awareness Day to give support to the promotion of this Day. Mine action, including unexploded ordnance and explosive remnants of war, was an important part of international protection and a vital component in operations with human security concerns in many countries. As the lead global protection agency, UNHCR was committed to reinforcing mine action strategies in all relevant country programmes. There were five complementary components of mine action: first, clearance of landmines and explosive remnants of war; second, mine risk education; third, victim assistance; fourth, stockpile destruction; and fifth, advocacy. Some examples of projects undertaken by UNHCR in 2007 included community mine risk education advocacy for returnees in southern Burundi; surveys and clearance projects, including mine risk education in southern Sudan; and mine risk education projects in central and eastern Equatoria. Civilian populations were often the first and always the last casualties of war. Women and children were often the first affected. Mines must be eradicated. UNHCR would continue to be an active participant in the global UN mine action forum, both as an operational partner and in its capacity as one of the lead agencies in international protection. While refugees were often housed in camps or other settlements, people returning after the end of a war or displaced people on the move were the ones who were extremely at risk.

Simon Pluess of the World Food Programme said WFP wanted to highlight the relationship between the mine problem and the hunger problem in the world. WFP had invited the Swiss Foundation for Mine Action to speak about a joint programme in the People’s Democratic Republic of Laos. Laos was a small land-locked country and most of the people there lived in small villages cut off from social services. It was estimated that at least 30 per cent of the population spent most of the year without sufficient access to food, and 40 per cent of the children under five were chronically and constantly malnourished. Laos was also one of the most heavily bombed countries in the world, and two thirds of the country was still contaminated with unexploded ordnance from the second Indo-China war. The unexploded ordnance frequently caused death and injury and limited the use of land for food production and agricultural expansion in large areas of the country. WFP was working with the Swiss Foundation for Mine Action to free Laos from mines and unexploded ordnance. WFP was assisting some 165,000 people in mine contaminated areas with food and also fed the workers carrying out the demining activities.

Benedikt Truniger, the Deputy Director-General of the Swiss Foundation for Mine Action, said that at the end of the second Indo-China war, the American air force dropped more bombs on Laos than all the united forces at the end of the Second World War on all of Europe. Today, it was estimated that there was still two million tons of hidden and unexploded bombs. The Laos Government created a central force about 10 years ago to clear the country from these bombs. It employed around 1,000 experts. The organization was funded by foreign governments. The Swiss Foundation started helping about two years ago to further create capacity by training the senior technical staff, and it was also allowed to work with the organization in the south and it expected to continue working there for two to five years.

Somalia

José Luis Díaz of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said High Commissioner Louise Arbour was deeply concerned about the high number of civilian deaths and injuries in the recent hostilities in Mogadishu. Reportedly, these were the result of indiscriminate attacks and aerial bombardments in populated areas. The High Commissioner also condemned the repeated cases of desecration of bodies witnessed in recent days. As a tense calm prevailed over the city, the worry remained that civilians would again bear the brunt of fighting if the ceasefire in place since Sunday did not hold. The High Commissioner urged the parties to respect international humanitarian law and reminded them of their duty to protect the human rights of civilians at all times. This included granting civilians safe passage and allowing humanitarian agents to reach those who had been affected.

Ron Redmond of the UN Refugee Agency said nearly 100,000 Somalis were now believed to have fled the Somali Capital Mogadishu since the beginning of February, some 47,000 of them within the last two weeks alone. These figures were expected to rise as more people continued to flee Mogadishu to outlying areas despite a lull in the fighting. Most of those fleeing had gone to the adjacent Shabelle region. The insecurity in Mogadishu had curtailed humanitarian access to the capital and surrounding regions, making the plight of civilians all the more desperate. With scarce resources in the Shabelle region and deteriorating conditions in the already overcrowded towns and villages, people were making their way further west away from the capital. Across the Gulf of Aden in Yemen, meanwhile, smuggling boats continued to arrive, bringing hundreds of Somalis and Ethiopians fleeing conflict, persecution and poverty. In 2006, some 26,000 people made the perilous voyage across the Gulf of Aden, and at least 330 died. Another 300 were reported missing and believed dead.

Simon Pluess of the World Food Programme said WFP shared concerns about civilians being trapped inside Mogadishu. Mogadishu had already been home to a large number of people who had already been fleeing other areas of the country, and these same people were displaced again, making them of course much more vulnerable. Because of the fighting, humanitarian access was very difficult and movement of humanitarian personnel was very difficult. It was therefore difficult to make accurate assessments of the humanitarian situation on the ground and to respond with food assistance. WFP called on all the warring parties to stop fighting and to allow access to humanitarian agencies so that aid could reach those in need. There had also been delays in the transfer of food because of the continued highjacking of WFP trucks carrying food.

Occupied Palestinian Territory

Matthias Burchard of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East said he wanted to speak to journalists today about the sewage flooding of the village of Um Nasser in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza strip, as well as the underfunding of UNRWA’s 2007 emergency appeal for $246 million. Since the sewage flooding started in Um Nasser on 27 March, UNRWA had provided tents, mats and mattresses for 2,000 persons. It had also provided fresh water daily, and established latrines, showers and water tanks. UNRWA was concerned about the possibility of another sewage flooding. Concerning UNRWA’s 2007 humanitarian emergency appeal, it had been the largest in UNRWA’s history, but the funding to date, 11 per cent or $28.2 million, was one of the lowest responses. As a result of this underfunding, UNRWA’s emergency job creation programme would run out of funds by mid-April; the emergency food aid for the West Bank and Gaza, which had already been reduced, was only covered until July; the emergency cash assistance had been suspended; and the emergency health care in the West bank was near to being stopped. UNRWA urgently appealed to the international community to be forthcoming. UNRWA was also helping Palestine refugees from Iraq in Syria.

Other

Jean-Michel Jakobowicz of the European Economic Commission said UNECE has published the first set of internationally agreed recommendations to monitor and reduce the risks involving radioactivity in scrap metal. Available was a press release with more details. Also, from 23 to 24 April, the first World Youth Assembly on Road Safety would be held in Geneva to discuss road safety issues under the slogan “Road Safety is no Accident”. A press release with details was also available. This World Assembly was a key event in the first United Nations Global Road Safety Week, which would take place from 23 to 29 April, and was jointly organized by the World Health Organization and the UN Regional Commissions.



Ron Redmond of the UN Refugee Agency said High Commissioner Antonio Guterres was visiting Qatar, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates this week following a weekend visit to Baghdad for talks with senior Government officials there on ways of strengthening humanitarian support for millions of people uprooted by the conflict in Iraq. This visit was a continuation of the High Commissioner’s mission to Saudi Arabia and Kuwait in early February and part of a continuing effort by UNHCR to strengthen partnerships with the region, with the Gulf Cooperation Council and with the Muslim world in general.

Mr. Redmond said UNHCR and its partners were dealing with a new wave of displacement in south-eastern Chad following a deadly attack over the weekend in the villages of Tiero and Marena, about 45 kilometres east of Koukou in south-eastern Chad. Testimony gathered thus far indicated that the attack was led by “Janjaweed” militia who were repelled by local self-defence militias and national army soldiers.

Miranda Eeles of the United Nations Children’s Fund said following the tsunami that happened yesterday in the Solomon Islands, it was still very difficult to get concrete information. So far, it was known that 21 persons had died, hundreds remained missing and hundreds were injured. The numbers could be much more, with at least 5,000 displaced persons, and that was a conservative number. Hospitals in three towns and around 50 per cent of health centres had been affected by the tsunami. The Government had not declared a state of emergency, waiting for an initial assessment report in the next day or so. Three camps had been established by the Government and teams were visiting them to assess the situation. UNICEF had sent two staff members for an assessment mission. The Government had asked UNICEF to help by supplying emergency health kits which it had done in collaboration with the World Health Organization.

Ms. Eeles said that in Madagascar, they were expecting a very strong tropical cyclone today. So far, an estimated 450,000 persons had been affected by the cyclone season which had been going on for quite a few months, and a large percentage of those were women and children. Some of the poorest and most difficult to reach, and therefore most vulnerable, were children without homes and safe water. They were without access to healthcare and faced a growing risk of diarrhoea and other diseases. UNICEF was working closely with the Government and UN partners to deliver relief supplies to children and families. The situation was grave and complex, and a lot of areas were hard to reach, and this complicated the ability to deliver aid.