REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE

Corinne Momal-Vanian, Director of the United Nations Information Service at Geneva, chaired the briefing which was also attended by Spokespersons for the United Nations Children’s Fund, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the World Health Organization, the International Organization for Migration, the World Food Programme, the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the UN Refugee Agency and the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Pakistan Floods

Ms. Momal-Vanian said the number of persons directly affected by the floods in Pakistan had now risen to 17.6 million.

Marco Jimenez Rodriguez of the United Nations Children’s Fund said UNICEF’s Executive Director Anthony Lake was touring Pakistan since yesterday. He was in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province yesterday and today was in Sindh. His visit would conclude at 5 p.m. Pakistan time today with a joint press conference with the Executive Director of the World Food Programme Josette Sheeran, Irina Bokova, the Director-General for the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, and Martin Mogwanja, the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator for Pakistan.

Concerning UNICEF’s operations in Pakistan, Mr. Rodriguez said that UNICEF was continuing with the distribution of nutritional assistance, and it had now reached 36,000 people, mostly children. This figure had tripled since last Friday’s briefing. Concerning health operations, UNICEF had up to last week reached 1 million people with vaccinations of polio and measles, and with a Vitamin A supplement. Since then UNICEF had reached another 240,000 people. UNICEF had carried out 90,000 health consultations, and in the last few days, the demand for medical care had increased by one million, so at this moment, there were around three million people in need or urgent medical assistance. UNICEF was responding to the needs as it gained access to the people, many of whom remained out of reach. The humanitarian response still needed to be escalated massively. With regard to education operations, nearly 11,000 schools had been damaged or destroyed by the floods, and UNICEF would be distributing tents to enable these schools to continue their work for about 1 million children. And finally, regarding protection efforts, eight children had been reunited with their families since the last briefing, bringing the total figure to 139 children.

Elizabeth Byrs of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said the situation in Pakistan remained grave and serious in parts of Sindh which continued to experience severe flooding, especially where the Indus river flowed into the Arabian Sea. That was where the situation was critical and where the United Nations and its partners needed to continue to accelerate efforts to help the affected people. In Sindh, while efforts to divert floodwaters from Thatta city appeared to have been successful and some residents were now returning to their homes, tens of thousands of families were still seeking shelter in Makli graveyard on the outskirts of Thatta. A fifth coordination hub was being established in Hyderabad to cover the worsening situation in southern Sindh. In the areas where the flood waters were receding, the soil remained sodden and it was covered by a thick layer of sludge or mud, and it would need to be removed with heavy machinery before the soil could be planted again. It would take six to eight weeks before the soil was fit for planting. The loss of animal power would also seriously compromise the ability of farmers to prepare their land. Silt deposits in some places was considerably deeper than could be plowed, and this would make it difficult to clear the fields in time. This was one of the problems. In other areas of Sindh, stagnant water was taking weeks to evaporate, in the meantime becoming a breeding ground for mosquitoes and other insects which increased the risk of spread of vector borne diseases like malaria. The response plan for Pakistan was now funded by 64 per cent, with some sectors like water, sanitation and health needing more funds.

In response to a question, Ms. Byrs stressed that the United Nations and its partners all faced huge logistical constraints. This was the major challenge they had so far. The affected people were scattered, some people were still isolated and it was difficult to reach them. Another point was that the funding requirements for agriculture would certainly be significant in the presented response plan that would be revised before the end of September.

Fadela Chaib of the World Health Organization said available at the back of the room was a press release issued yesterday in Pakistan on how WHO was establishing diarrhoeal treatment centres throughout Pakistan. More than 60 diarrhoeal treatment centres were operational or were in the process of being established in 46 of the most affected districts in Pakistan. According to new data, as of 29 August, more than 500,000 people were recorded to have been treated for various forms of diarrhoeal disease, ranging from acute watery diarrhoea, bloody diarrhoea or shigella and milder versions. This number represented 13 per cent of the 3.7 million people recorded to have been treated between 29 July and 26 August. For example, on 26 August alone, nearly 20,000 cases of acute diarrhoea were reported. For the moment, there were no available figures for deaths. There were no results available yet on whether there were cases of cholera, but WHO was treating all acute diarrhoea as if it was cholera. Cholera was endemic in the region, so it was very possible that some of the cases were cholera. Diarrhoeal diseases were not the only public health risks facing Pakistanis. Acute respiratory infections, hepatitis A and E, malaria and skin infections were among multiple health threats that had already sickened hundreds of thousands of people. Malaria had already increased, especially in Sindh province. Medical needs had been rising even as assessments indicated that some 400 of the more than 1,000 health facilities in flood-affected districts had been damaged or destroyed by floodwater. WHO and the health cluster partners had sought $ 56.2 million, and so far that figure was 43 per cent funded.

In response to a question, Ms. Chaib said there was a concern that half a million women were expected to give birth in the next six months, and there was a need to ensure that reproductive health services were working in the region. WHO was also trying to restore health through mobile and static health centres for people who had chronic diseases. It was a huge undertaking and the challenges remained great.

Jean Philippe Chauzy of the International Organization of Migration said with an estimated one million people uprooted by the latest flooding in southern Sindh, IOM had delivered 500 emergency shelter kits to the Government for distribution in Thatta district. IOM had already distributed 6,000 of the kits, each of which contained two 4 x 5 metre plastic sheets, rope, two blankets, a jerry can, a bucket and a kitchen set, to flood-affected families in Sindh. It was currently shipping a further 3,000 kits to Thatta district, where Pakistan's National Disaster Management Authority was setting up a displacement camp for flood victims. On Saturday, IOM and local non-governmental organization partners distributed 1,108 of the kits to displaced families in Sukkur district, in northern Sindh. The latest mass displacements in Sindh followed a major breach of flood defences near the town of Sarjani, south of the Kotri barrage, last week. On Sunday advancing floodwaters also entered the district of Dadu, forcing thousands more to flee and leaving an estimated 40,000 people stranded in 40 outlying villages. They bring the total number of people directly affected by the floods to 17.6 million, with 1.2 million homes damaged or destroyed across an area of 160,000 square kilometers. The Emergency Shelter Cluster of 40 aid agencies working with Pakistan’s National Disaster Management Authority to provide emergency shelter and non-food relief items, which was coordinated by IOM, had already provided shelter for some 1.13 million flood victims. Shelter materials for another 2.5 million people were currently in the cluster's procurement pipeline.

Emilia Casella of the World Food Programme said the latest distribution figures as of this morning from Pakistan were that 2.8 million people had now received one month rations in 37 districts. Given the fact that WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran was currently in the field in Pakistan, and would participate in the joint press conference later, Ms. Sheeran would be providing more updated material to journalists.

Responding to a question, Ms. Casella said that given the impact of the floods on farmers and crop lands and the huge loss of live stock, food security was going to be a concern. Normally, the planting season would be starting in mid September, so that put additional pressure farmers to get back to their land. But as her colleague from OCHA had mentioned, part of that land would potentially not be in a condition to be planted yet. Normally, it would be about a two-month planting period, so the hope was that the land would begin to dry out. Assessments would have to be ongoing.

Geneva Activities

Ms. Momal-Vanian said in Room III at 11:30 a.m. today, right after the briefing, there would be a press confrerence by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development to present the 2010 Report on UNCTAD's assistance to the Palestinian people. (Embargoed 31 August 2010 at 5 p.m. GMT). The speaker would be Mahmoud Elkhafif, UNCTAD, Coordinator of the Assistance to the Palestinian People.

On Thursday, 2 September, at noon in press room 1, there would be a press conference on the status of UN climate change negotiations and the role of climate finance in achieving a strong outcome at COP16 in Cancún. Christiana Figueres, UNFCCC Executive Secretary, would be the speaker.

The Conference on Disarmament was meeting this morning and would be addressed by the Foreign Minister of Cameroon as Cameroon took over the rotating presidency of the Conference. Other speakers listed included the Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs for Multilateral Affairs of Indonesia.

Ms. Momal-Vanian said the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development would be launching its UNRISD flagship report entitled Combating Poverty and Inequality, which outlined how poverty reduction depended on the interconnection between economic development, social policy and politics. The report would feed into the international discussions in the run-up to the UN High-level Plenary meeting on the Millennium Development Goals which would be held from 20 to 22 September in New York. This launch would take place in a ceremony at 10 a.m. on Friday, 3 September 2010 at the Palais des Nations, in the presence of Sergei Ordzhonikidze, the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva, and Sarah Cook, Director of UNRISD. Other speakers at the launch event would include Kyung-wha Kang, Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, and Jomo Kwame Sundaram, Assistant Secretary-General for Economic Development. There would also be a press conference [it was later announced that the press conference would be held on 3 September at 1:00 pm].

Secretary-General’s Activities

Ms. Momal-Vanian said United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon would today begin a week-long visit to Liechtenstein and Austria. He would first travel to Liechtenstein for an official visit. He would meet with several senior officials there, including Prince Hans-Adam II, the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister of Foreign Affairs. He would also deliver a speech on global governance to parliamentarians, politicians, business leaders and members of civil society.
The Secretary-General would then travel to Vienna, Austria, where he would also meet with senior officials. He would give opening remarks at the Conference: “From Vision to Reality: A New and Holistic Approach to Fighting Corruption.” In Alpbach, also in Austria, the Secretary-General would address the European Forum 2010 as well as the Security Council Retreat. He would then host the annual retreat for UN senior officials.

Haiti

Jean-Philippe Chauzy of the International Organization for Migration said the International Organization for Migration and Digicel were launching a major public awareness campaign in Haiti using hundreds of thousands of SMS messages to advise vulnerable Haitians on ways to protect themselves during the hurricane season. IOM was also launching a daily radio show that would focus on disaster risk reduction during hurricane season. The campaign would deliver clear and simple information about staying safe during hurricanes and avoiding floods and landslides. Meteorologists had warned of a particularly dangerous Atlantic hurricane season with as many as 8 to 12 hurricanes expected. There were more details in the briefing notes.

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Rupert Colville of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said he understood that some journalists had questions about the so-called Democratic Republic of the Congo’s mapping report and he was here to answer any questions.

Asked when they would get the report, Mr. Colville said he wished that he could say. There was no fixed date yet, but they hoped it would be very soon. OHCHR would let journalists know as soon as the Office knew. The leak as journalists were aware had complicated the environment somewhat. Setting the actual date of the launch was now in the hands of New York. The High Commissioner was in New York last week, holding meetings on this, to ensure that all parties understood the background and genesis of the report and the focus on what the report was really about, which was more than just the headlines that they had seen in recent days.

Asked if he could confirm that the Government of Rwanda had threatened to stop cooperation with the United Nations if the report was launched, Mr. Colville said that was not really for OHCHR to confirm. The Secretary-General’s Spokesperson had dealt with that. There was correspondence with the Secretary-General. Obviously, given that it was a peacekeeping issue, the Department of Peacekeeping Operations might have something to say on that. But it was not really something that he could comment on.

A journalist said that Mr. Colville had said that the date was now in the hands of New York; whose hands in New York? Were they talking about the Secretary-General, and whose hands was the date in before? In response, Mr. Colville said that it was a bit wider than the Secretary-General. Like he had said, the leak had complicated matters. Obviously it had received enormous attention and there had been quite a furor about it. The environment around it affected other parts of the United Nations. So there were lots of discussions going on in New York with various actors. It was not simply the Secretary-General.

Responding to a question on who would have set the dates of the report before, Mr. Colville said it would have been a consensus decision basically. This report was not a simple matter, the genesis and how this report was sent out involved many actors. So essentially the genesis was that in 2005, three mass graves were discovered in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, and several UN bodies, including OHCHR, the Department of Peacekeeping Operations, MONUC, DPA and the Office of Legal Advice, as well as the Office of the Special Advisor on the Prevention of Genocide, agreed at that time to recommend a mapping exercise of the most serious violations of human rights and international humanitarian law in that period, between 1993 and 2003. So the exercise was being led by OHCHR, but it very much involved other parts of the United Nations. The Secretary-General at that time, Kofi Annan, endorsed the exercise and advised the Security Council in June 2006 of the intention to conduct the mapping exercise. In May 2007, the current Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon approved the terms of reference following consultations with relevant UN bodies and with the Congolese Government. In May 2007, the then-High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour discussed the mapping exercise with President Kabila of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, who welcomed the project. And also very importantly, the Security Council endorsed the exercise in resolution 1794 in December 2007. In that resolution, it called upon the Congolese authorities “to fully support the human rights mapping exercise initiated in the country by the High Commissioner for Human Rights.” OHCHR had managed it, had run it, had been heavily involved in it, but it also was a much more inclusive exercise and a very transparent one. That was an important point to make.

A journalist said he was trying to understand how the decision to release the report was taken out of the hands of OHCHR and appropriated. In response, Mr. Colville said it was never taken out of the hands of OHCHR. It was always going to be a matter of consultation with other parts of the United Nations who obviously had a very important interest in the report and the launch and the aftermath and everything else. It was never going to be solely the decision of OHCHR.

Asked if the report was still being edited in any way, in terms of content or style, Mr. Colville said the report was finished.

Mr. Colville said he would like to add one rather important point. There was a suggestion in the famous Le Monde leak which was replicated in many other places that the Secretary-General had pressured the High Commissioner to remove the word genocide from the text of the report. He wanted to make it crystal clear that this was absolutely untrue. Up to this point, the Secretary-General had never put pressure on the High Commissioner to alter the text.

A journalist said he had asked last week when the UN had first heard of the recent mass rapes, throughout the UN system, up to the Secretary-General’s Office, not just the peacekeeping unit. Mr. Colville said he had not been able to follow up on that question because he had been swept away by the enormous interest in the mapping report.

Ms. Momal-Vanian said she had conveyed the question to New York. She referred to the statement by the Special Representative of the Secretary-General in the Democratic Republic of the Congo that was issued yesterday where he talked about how they had already started a review of their actions and procedures to determine what they could have done better and faster to protect and assist victims of these heinous rapes. Mr. Meece added that they worked in partnership with security forces of the Congolese State and they sought every day to improve their ability to protect people in danger. The Assistant Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations was in Kivu today and tomorrow, and upon his return to New York, he would brief the Secretary-General and the Security Council, and she was sure they would have more details then.

Saudi Arabia

A journalist said that five Ethiopians had died this week in deportation camps in Saudi Arabia. He wanted to know if UNHCR had been able to get more information on this, who were these persons, would an investigation in the protection of human dignity of these persons be carried out?

Adrian Edwards of the UN Refugee Agency said UNHCR was aware of the reports that came out yesterday about the five deaths of Ethiopian migrants in a Saudi deportation facility. In the same report there was a mention of a note which UNHCR delivered on 30 July in relation to Saudi deportations of Somalis. The purpose of the note was to raise the issue which was clearly disturbing to UNHCR because its guidelines to all Governments in the world regarding Somalis were that people should not be sent back to central and southern Somalia. At the time, UNHCR also said that many of the people who had been sent back had probably come through Yemen, where most of them were immediately recognized as refugees. In that regard, UNHCR had approached the Saudis. These two cases were not necessarily linked, but certainly, the five deaths in detention were deplorable. Asked again if an investigation would be held, Mr. Edwards said he believed there were competent authorities to look into this. UNHCR was the UN Refugee Agency and it did not have access to any detention or deportation facilities. What UNHCR was looking for from the Saudis was the possibility to screen the people there and to make sure that the people who were being deported were not in need of international protection.

Somalia

Nicole Engelbrecht of the International Committee of the Red Cross said ICRC would like to stress another critical situation for hundreds of thousands of displaced person on the axis between Mogadishu and Afoye where the situation was becoming more and more critical. These people were fleeing the fighting in Mogadishu. Just last month alone, 4,000 new people, according to ICRC estimations, joined these displaced on that axis. They were barely able to meet their most urgent needs. ICRC had just completed the distribution of food together with its partner organization the Somali Red Crescent Society to more than 55,000 people on that axis.

Benjaim Wahren, ICRC Deputy Head of Operations in the Horn of Africa, including Somalia, said in terms of access, ICRC’s primary partner, the Somali Red Crescent Society, was present all over the country and they worked closely together. ICRC also had its own teams on the ground. In terms of coverage, they managed to do something everywhere where there was need, although they were far away from covering the needs of the country. ICRC was a small organization when compared to the humanitarian needs that existed in Somalia. Regarding the food distribution in Afoye, this was a one up operation. Generally speaking, ICRC preferred to do production support livelihood, which had more sustainability than food distribution, which was a sort of last resort, which they had resorted to in this particular case.

South Sudan

Marco Jimenez Rodriguez of the United Nations Children’s Fund said a self explanatory news note was available at the back of the room on the establishment of a child protection unit within the Sudan People’s Liberation Army as a result of its commitment to release all children by the end of November 2010. There was a contact number in case there were more questions.