REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE

Marie Heuzé, the Director of the United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the briefing which was also attended by Spokespersons for the UN Refugee Agency, the Economic Commission for Europe, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the World Health Organization, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and the International Organization for Migration.

Secretary-General’s Visit to Switzerland

Ms. Heuzé said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will be conducting an official visit to Switzerland from 19 to 22 April. On Thursday, 19 April, the Secretary-General will be in Bern where he will be meeting with Micheline Calmy-Rey, President of the Swiss Confederation, Pascal Couchepin, Vice President of the Swiss Confederation, and Samuel Schmid, Minister of Defence of the Swiss Confederation. At 7 p.m. on Thursday, there will be a press encounter with the Secretary-General and Ms. Calmy-Rey at the Palais Federal in Bern. The note to correspondents which has the provisional programme of the Secretary-General’s visit will be made available. On Friday, 20 April, the Secretary-General will be in Geneva where he will have a working breakfast with the Conseil d’Etat de Genève at 8 a.m. at the Fondation Zoubov. There will be a photo opportunity at 9 a.m. at the Fondation. The Secretary-General will then proceed to the Palais where he will speak to UN staff in the Assembly Hall. This meeting is not open to journalists. The Secretary-General will then head for the International Labour Organization where he will preside over the United Nations Chief Executives Board meeting. This meeting is especially important in light of his presentation to the General Assembly yesterday of his report on the recommendations contained in the report of the High-Level Panel on system-wide coherence across the world body.

On Saturday, 21 April, the Secretary-General will continue to chair the United Nations Chief Executives Board meeting, and in the evening, he will attend a dinner in his honour hosted by ACANU, the Association of Correspondents of the United Nations. The Secretary-General will leave for the Middle East on Sunday, 22 April. ACANU sent this invitation to the Secretary-General as soon as he had taken office, and it had been seen to be a good opportunity to meet with the Secretary-General, especially since there was no possibility of holding a press conference during this visit.

Richard Waddington, the President of ACANU, said the dinner would be at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, and there would be remarks and a question and answer session with the Secretary-General after dinner was served.

Iraq

William Spindler of the UN Refugee Agency said the conference on humanitarian assistance to refugees and internally displaced persons in Iraq and neighbouring countries opened this morning at the Palais des Nations. António Guterres, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, would speak to journalists about the meeting on Wednesday, 18 April 2007 at 1.15 p.m. in Room V. They were trying to organize for the High Commissioner and the Foreign Minister of Iraq to speak to the press this afternoon at 6 p.m. and more information would be available on that later.

Jemini Pandya of the International Organization for Migration said with about half of Iraq's 15 Central and Southern governorates reportedly turning away newly displaced people from internal borders unless they could prove they originated from there, the displacement crisis in Iraq was taking on a new urgency. An estimated 740,000 people had been internally displaced in Iraq since the bombing of the Al-Askari shrine in February 2006, with IOM monitoring and assessing the needs of nearly 400,000 of them. The security situation in various parts of Iraq was affecting the movement of internally displaced persons. Food, shelter, water and work were among the priority needs of the newly displaced. Since February 2006, IOM had also been carrying out emergency distributions of food, non-food items and water assistance to the recently displaced with funding from the US government. Over the past twelve months, IOM had provided emergency assistance to almost 200,000 individuals.

Human Rights

Yvon Edoumou of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said High Commissioner Louise Arbour would be travelling to Central Asia from 24 April to 5 May. She would be in Kyrgyzstan on 24 to 25 April; Tajikistan from 25 to 29 April; Kazakhstan from 30 April to 2 May; and Turkmenistan from 3 to 5 May. During her visit, the High Commissioner would be meeting with the Heads of State of those countries and with other government officials, United Nations officials and representatives of national and international non-governmental organizations and civil society. The aim of this mission was to assess and discuss the situation of human rights in these countries and also to increase the engagement of the Office there.

Mr. Edoumou said that on Wednesday, 18 March, the High Commissioner would be participating in an all-day debate with the Council of Europe on what was the status of human rights and democracy in Europe today. Around 1 p.m. tomorrow, she would join a number of other dignitaries attending the debate in addressing the press on this issue.

Global Road Safety Week

Jean-Michel Jakobowicz of the Economic Commission for Europe said the First United Nations Global Road Safety Week would be held from 23 to 29 April. It was jointly organized by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Regional Commissions. The key event of the week was the holding of the first World Youth Assembly on Road Safety on 23-24 April to discuss road safety issues under the slogan “Road Safety is no Accident.” Road accidents were a major cause of death for young people aged 5-24 years. Young drivers were prone to overestimate their own capabilities as well as those of their vehicle, and despite numerous campaigns, they continued to pay a heavy toll in road accidents, especially at weekends. Statistics also showed that young people were over-represented in road accidents.
The Global Road Safety Week aimed to engage young people in the issue of road safety, raise awareness of the issue among the general public, and encourage action and support from governments. At 2 p.m. this afternoon, José Capel Ferrer, Director UNECE Transport Division; and Etienne Krug, Director Injuries and Violence Prevention at WHO, would speak to the press. Next Monday, 23 April at 12:30 p.m., there would be another press conference with Margaret Chan, WHO Director-General; Marek Belka, UNECE Executive Secretary and others.

Other

Fadela Chaib of the World Health Organization said there would be a press conference at 11:30 a.m. today on a report which showed that access to HIV therapy had grown significantly in 2006, but that significant obstacles remained to approaching universal access to HIV services. The report, press conference and press release were embargoed until 2:30 p.m. Geneva time today.

Ms. Chaib said the first WHO Global Partners’ Meeting on neglected tropical diseases would be held on 19 and 20 April at WHO Headquarters. A media advisory was available with all the details. WHO Director-General Margaret Chan would open the meeting, and high-level attendees included the President of Burkina Faso, Blaise Compaore.

Wivina Belmonte of the United Nations Children’s Fund said there would be a press conference on 19 April at 3 p.m. at the Palais des Nations on the occasion of the naming of Her Royal Highness Grand Duchess of Luxembourg Maria Teresa as “Eminent Advocate for Children” by UNICEF. The press conference would be attended by the Grand Duchess, Anne Veneman, the Executive Director of UNICEF, and Peter Piot, the Executive-Director of UNAIDS. The Grand Duchess would be focusing particularly on children affected by AIDS and children whose lives had been impacted by conflict.

Elizabeth Byrs of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said on Thursday, 19 April at 1:15 p.m., there would be a press conference by Eric Laroche, Humanitarian Coordinator for Somalia, OCHA, to present the revised appeal for 2007 for Somalia.

Jemini Pandya of the International Organization for Migration said IOM yesterday signed an agreement to work with the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs to improve migration management through inter-ministerial dialogue and regional cooperation with the aim of establishing regular labour migration schemes allowing Afghans to work abroad legally and supporting institutional capacity of Afghanistan's consular representations in the region. Decades of fighting in Afghanistan had caused mass population displacement both internally and across borders. Many Afghans had now returned home, but millions of them still remained abroad, particularly in neighbouring countries, as both regular and irregular migrants.