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 for the International Organization for Migration, the World Food Programme, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the World Health Organization, the International Committee of the Red Cross, the UN Refugee Agency, the World Meteorological Organization, the International Parliamentary Organization, the World Intellectual Property Organization and the United Nations Environment Programme.
Geneva Activities
Ms. Momal-Vanian said the Conference on Disarmament was this morning holding a public plenary, the only public plenary planned for this week. It started at 10 a.m. and had five speakers on its list of speakers. [It was later announced that the Conference heard from Seven States and the Group of 21, and that it would hold a plenary at 10 a.m. on Thursday, 4 February at 10 a.m.]
The Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women was meeting behind closed doors today to discuss its concluding observations and recommendations on the country reports which it had considered during the session, namely Uzbekistan, Ukraine, Malawi, United Arab Emirates, the Netherlands, Egypt, Botswana and Panama. Yesterday, the Committee reviewed the periodic report of Panama, the last country report for this session. The session would be concluding on Friday, 5 February.
Ms. Momal-Vanian said that Gareth Evans, former Australian Foreign Minister and co-chair of the International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament, presented yesterday to disarmament experts the conclusions of the latest report of the International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament. The report offered a concrete programme to the international community on eliminating the nuclear threat, in particular targeting the 2010 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference in 2010.
Director-General’s Schedule
Ms. Momal-Vanian said Sergei Ordzhonikidze, the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva, would be meeting tomorrow with His Most Eminent Highness the Prince and Grand Master of the Sovereign Order of Malta, Fra' Matthew Festing. The Grant Master was in Geneva to take part in a high-level meeting at the Palais des Nations on 1 and 2 February focused on the international humanitarian activities of the Sovereign Order of Malta. During their meeting, the Director-General and the Grand Master would be discussing issues of mutual interest and concern, including the Secretary-General’s seven priorities for 2010 and progress towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals, as well as the situation in Haiti and the humanitarian work of the Sovereign Order of Malta.
Secretary-General’s Visit to Cyprus
Ms. Momal-Vanian said UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was in Cyprus yesterday where he met separately with Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat and Greek Cypriot leader Dimitris Christofias before meeting the two of them together. The Secretary-General made brief remarks at a press conference afterward and read out a joint statement on behalf of the two leaders, who then answered some questions. The Secretary-General said, “This has been a productive and constructive day.” He said that, today, the world was seeing two leaders who were rising to the challenge. And he added that he was encouraged that the two leaders personally assured him of their shared commitment to a comprehensive solution as early as possible.
Haiti
Ms. Momal-Vanian reminded journalists that shortly after the briefing, John Holmes, the UN Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, would be giving a press conference in Salle III on Haiti.
Jemini Pandya of the International Organization for Migration said three weeks on from the devastating earthquake that had left about 1.1 million people homeless, focus was shifting to the urgent need for transitional shelter that could tide people through the upcoming rainy season. IOM was continuing to bring in a lot more non-food items into the warehouses. Since the focus was now moving to transitional shelter, this kind of assistance basically included tarpaulins, plastic sheeting, tools and ropes that could provide more weather-proof and durable shelter in the months to come and upon which they could add more materials. There were more than 55 aid agencies working on providing emergency shelter and non-food relief assistance to Haitian earthquake victims and they were aiming to reach more than one million earthquake victims. So far, the aid agencies including IOM had distributed or would soon have distributed close to 52,000 tarpaulins, more than 9,000 family tents, thousands of ropes, family toolkits, mosquito nets, and kitchen sets. Among the non-food items in the pipeline due to arrive in the coming days and weeks were tens of thousands more tarpaulins, tents, ropes, shelter kits and blankets.
Ms. Pandya said assistance such as this would be particularly important to help support families hosting those displaced from the capital, Port-au-Prince. With 340,000 people having left the city on government transport, most of them to stay with family or friends elsewhere, and an unknown number through their own means, it was clear that host families would need support in providing a roof for the displaced. IOM and partners would also be assessing displacement and population influxes in the towns of Jacmel, Leogane, Gressier, St Marc, Gonaeves, Les Cayes and Jeremie in order to better define shelter needs and distributions. For those who had not left the capital and were living in spontaneous settlements, work was ongoing to improve their living conditions. Shortly, about 3,500 people in the neighbourhood of Tabarre would be able to move into the first organized settlement prepared for those left homeless and which would be managed by the French non-governmental organization ACTED. Three-hundred and fifty tents each capable of accommodating 10 people, had been put up at the site which would also have other essential facilities such as clean water and sanitation. Another four sites around the capital had been selected for the establishment of organized settlements that would facilitate more coordinated and comprehensive aid delivery. IOM and others needed to continue work on clearing the rubble because there were very few sites, particularly in Port-au-Prince, which were clear for them to build proper accommodation for the victims. Rubble removal was an urgent priority now.
Emilia Casella of the World Food Programme said everyone had probably followed the roll out of the food distribution system over the weekend. As for the latest figures, yesterday they were able to distribute in 12 of the intended 16 sites. Today, 2 more sites would come on, which would make 14 sites, and they were hoping that by Wednesday the final 2 would be operational. As of last night, WFP had reached 850,000 people since the earthquake struck, and more than 200,000 of those were reached in the last 48 hours. WFP was working closely with a number of partners. With fixed distribution points, people got the sense that they knew with more certainty that their turn to receive the food would come and that they would get their ration.
Veronique Taveau of the United Nations Children’s Fund said concerning the distribution of water, UNICEF and its partners were able to daily distribute around 2,600,000 litres of water for around 519,000 persons in Port-au-Prince and in some of the other affected towns. UNICEF also provided water to the centres for children.
Paul Garwood of the World Health Organization said that today, a staged immunization campaign was meant to begin, targeting children under the age of seven living in temporary settlements. This campaign would focus on providing vaccines against a range of clinical diseases, including measles, rubella, diphtheria, whooping cough and tetanus. The campaign was being conducted by the Haitian Ministry of Health, with the support of WHO, UNICEF and non-governmental organization partners. Also, some 200,000 people who had been wounded and undergone medical care since the earthquake would be targeted with the tetanus vaccine. Beyond that, there still needed to be a strong emphasis on establishing more and more post operative care facilities in mobile clinics. Due to the large number of patients who were now homeless, the question of where to discharge patients was very challenging.
In response to a question, Ms. Momal-Vanian said the UNDP cash-for-work initiative was already employing 32,000 people and aimed to employ 100,000 people. These people were paid to clear the debris and remove the rubble.
Somalia
Anna Schaff of the International Committee of the Red Cross said ICRC was issuing its latest bulletin on Somalia today. The situation there was getting worse, specifically in central Somalia, in some of the areas where there had been renewed fighting in the past weeks, adding to the ongoing fighting in Mogadishu. The fighting had displaced even more people, adding to those already displaced from Mogadishu. There was also a drought in some of the areas in central Somalia, where the rains that were expected at the end of last year had not happened. The situation was getting very bad for the families living in central Somalia. Many of these resident families in central Somalia had been trying to help out the displaced people, sharing their limited resources with them, but now the situation was becoming really unbearable for most of them. ICRC had been distributing non-food household items as well as shelter material for 65,000 displaced persons in central Somalia as well as one month food rations for the same number of people. In addition to that, ICRC, together with the Somali Red Crescent Society, was trying to help treat the wounded in these areas, providing various medical facilities on either side of the frontline. In Mogadishu itself, over the past three months, the two ICRC supported hospitals had treated over 1,200 people wounded by weapons.
Andrej Mahecic of the UN Refugee Agency said violence in Somalia sharply escalated in January resulting in hundreds of civilian deaths and widespread destruction. According to local sources, intense clashes between government forces and militia groups fighting for control of the conflict-torn central regions had left at least 258 civilians dead and another 253 wounded, which made January
the deadliest month since last August, when 284 people were killed and the same number injured. UNHCR estimated that more than 80,000 Somalis had been displaced since the beginning of the year.
During January, some 29,000 people had been uprooted by heavy fighting in Dhusamareebb in Galgaduud region, over 25,000 had fled their homes to escape renewed clashes in Beled Weyne in Hiraan region, while another 18,000 were known to have been displaced in the on-going conflict in the
capital, Mogadishu. Thousands were also forced to leave their homes in other parts of Somalia. The internally displaced people in Galgaduud region faced difficult conditions. Fearful of returning to their homes, many were reported to be sleeping in the open with dwindling shelter and little water. There were also growing concerns about the health conditions of particularly vulnerable groups - such as children, women and elderly. So far, the deteriorating security conditions had made it hard, if not
impossible, for humanitarian workers to access the needy population. UNHCR planned to distribute emergency relief items and shelter material to over 18,000 people in 27 locations where the displaced were temporarily settled around Dhusamareebb and Belet-Weyn as soon as the security situation permitted. More than 1.4 million people were internally displaced in Somalia and some 560,000 Somalis lived as refugees in the neighbouring countries.
Paul Garwood of the World Health Organization said WHO and a partner organization were training health workers in south central Somalia and in other parts of the country in disease surveillance. There had been reports of cases of acute watery diarrhea and of measles in Somalia, so strengthening disease surveillance was a critical part of WHO’s work inside the country.
Southern Sudan
Emilia Casella of the World Food Programme recalled that in the fall, WFP had launched an emergency hunger gap response for 300,000 people in southern Sudan, including air drops of 2,000 metric tons of food and another 20,000 metric tons that were being brought in by land. This was due to very bad conditions in terms of security in southern Sudan, as well as the drought. Since then, WFP had conducted a needs and livelihood assessment, together with the Food and Agricultural Organization and the Government of Southern Sudan. A press release on the result of this survey had been issued. It found that four times as many people in southern Sudan would require some form of food assistance over the coming year than last year. This was a significant number, in all some 4.3 million people in southern Sudan would need some sort of food assistance, which was up from about 1 million people last year. In much of the Horn of Africa, there had been severe drought and the crops had been particularly bad. The prices of food had gone sky high and the price of cattle, which people in southern Sudan were selling off, had rocketed downward. WFP was expecting to feed about 1.5 million of those people with a general food distribution. It was also targeting a number of them with targeted food distribution during the hunger gap period before the coming period. WFP was moving 50,000 metric tons into the south right now, as the rainy season was due to begin in a couple of months. WFP also planned a blanket supplementary feeding for all children under the age of five during the hunger period as well as reaching more than 400,000 children with school feeding as well as some programmes to give children food at school that they could take home for their families.
Ms. Casella said Sudan was their biggest programme right now. WFP was appealing for $ 485 million of funding to keep the Sudan operation going. The overall Sudan budget for WFP was $ 915 million to feed about 11 million people throughout the year.
Other
Fadela Chaib of the World Health Organization said there would not be a virtual press briefing on H1N1 this week, but they were working on holding a press conference next week, probably on Monday, 8 January in Salle III.
Andrej Mahecic of the UN Refugee Agency said Japanese government officials were visiting Mae La refugee camp in northern Thailand today to begin interviewing refugees from Myanmar who had applied for resettlement to Japan. This was the first concrete step towards making Japan Asia’s first resettlement country after it announced in December, 2008, that it would accept 90 Myanmar refugees from Mae La camp over three years in a pilot resettlement project. The refugees being interviewed this week were identified by UNHCR as being in need of resettlement primarily because they had lived in the refugee camp for long periods - in some cases 10 or 20 years - with no other solution in sight. The final decision as to whether they would be accepted for resettlement rested with Japan. If all went smoothly, the first family should depart in September this year, with 30 refugees scheduled to be resettled each year over three years. Some 20,000 Myanmar refugees had already been resettled from Mae La camp, part of the more than 55,000 Myanmar refugees who had been resettled from the nine camps in Thailand since large-scale resettlement began in 2005.
On a similar note, Mr. Mahecic said UNHCR welcomed the approval by the Council of Ministers of Spain on 29 January of the establishment of an annual refugee resettlement programme, in accordance with the recently amended asylum law. Resettlement was an important tool of refugee protection and provided a durable solution every year for tens of thousands of refugees who could not safely remain in their first countries. UNHCR recently also welcomed the European Commission's proposal for the establishment of a Joint EU Resettlement Programme. UNHCR would like to see more European engagement in refugee resettlement, and hoped the Spanish decision would encourage other EU Member States to follow. At present, 90 per cent of the refugees resettled every year were taken in by the United States, Canada and Australia. All European countries together provided roughly 6 per cent of the world's resettlement opportunities.
Gaelle Sevenier of the World Meteorological Organization said planning and operation of air transport based on global standards and accurate weather forecasts and warnings was vital for safety. Some 150 representatives from national meteorological and hydrological services, including aeronautical meteorologists and representatives from aviation organizations, would meet from 3 to 10 February in Hong Kong, China for the fourteenth session of the WMO Commission for Aeronautical Meteorology. Among other issues, the Commission would discuss the need for establishing standards of competency for meteorological personnel serving civil aviation. There were more details in the press release.
Luisa Ballin of the International Parliamentary Union said within the framework of the International Day of Zero Tolerance against Female Genital Mutilation, IPU, IOM, the African Committee on Traditional Practices Affecting the Health of Women and Children and others would be organizing a roundtable on Friday, 5 November from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. A media advisory would be sent out with more details.
Samar Shamoon of the World Intellectual Property Organization said a Joint WIPO-ITU Accessibility Workshop opened this morning, dealing with web accessibility for disabled persons. It was bringing together about 180 people, most representing web masters of international organizations. She could set up interviews for interested journalists. The programme and list of participants was available in the press room.
Julie Marks of the United Nations Environmental Programme said she just wanted to take the opportunity to introduce herself. She would be working in the information office for UNEP in Geneva for the next five months, while her colleague Isabel Valentini was on maternity leave.