REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE

Corinne Momal-Vanian, Director of the United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the briefing, which was also attended by Spokespersons for the International Labour Organization, the International Organization for Migration, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, the United Nations Human Rights Office, the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator in Yemen, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, the United Nations Refugee Agency, the World Health Organization and the World Trade Organization. A statement on behalf of the World Food Programme was also delivered.

Yarmouk Refugee Camp in Syria

Christopher Gunness, for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), speaking via the telephone from Jerusalem, said it was very important for people to understand the severity, enormity, and far-reaching consequences of what was happening in Yarmouk. Mr. Gunness said that when the Secretary-General of the United Nations used a word like ‘massacre’ as he did last night, when he talked about 18,000 people being held hostage, and about a refugee camp looking like a death camp, and when he talked about Yarmouk “descending to the lower regions of hell” everybody had to sit up and take notice. With 18,000 people trapped in Yarmouk, including 3,500 children, we were looking at nothing short of a potential slaughter of the innocent As the Secretary-General made clear, the international system itself was being weighed in the scales and must not be found wanting.

UNRWA had called for a ceasefire to enable humanitarian access to bring aid to people in Yarmouk. Furthermore, civilians in Yarmouk must be allowed to leave the camp if they wished to, in accordance with international standards.

Yarmouk was already a community in which women died in childbirth due to lack of medicine, in which children reportedly died of malnutrition, and this week things had got significantly worse. Civilians were terrified, holed up in their battered homes and although they were starving they were too frightened to go out and scavenge for food for their children, women, elderly, the sick and the dying.

UNRWA also had received unconfirmed reports of the aerial bombardment of the camp. The world could not stand by and do nothing. The Secretary-General had been working the phones and he had made it clear that everyone in the Syria conflict was backed by somebody - everyone had a master, an overlord, a backer of sorts - on whom leverage could be exerted. Therefore UNRWA was calling for diplomatic and political, economic and financial, and perhaps even religious and spiritual pressure and influence brought to bear. Without that, we faced a potential massacre, said Mr. Gunness.

A journalist asked Mr. Gunness about reports that ISIS could not be present in Yarmouk without the complacency of the Syrian Government on some level. Mr. Gunness responded that UNRWA had not had access to Yarmouk since 28 March 2015 and today, as an unarmed humanitarian organization, it had no presence in it. It was clear, from media reports, however, that the armed groups entered Yarmouk from the southern approaches.

Responding to a journalist asking how much of Yarmouk was controlled by ISIS, Mr. Gunness said the UNRWA estimation was that the armed groups that went in a week ago controlled more than half of the camp and that 95 per cent of the Yarmouk’s population was in the areas controlled by those groups. The Secretary-General himself used the term “held hostage”.

Asked how many Yarmouk residents had escaped the camp, Mr. Gunness said UNRWA could not confirm the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) figure of 2,000 but it could confirm that 94 Yarmouk residents, including 43 women and 20 children, had escaped four nights ago after a heavy night of intense fighting to an area outside of Yarmouk. For security reasons UNRWA could not say where that was. The 94 people had reached a safe place and UNRWA had administered aid to them in the form of food, medicine, water, blankets and mattresses.

People could not leave Yarmouk both because those who controlled the camp were stopping them but also because of security around the perimeter imposed by Syrian Government security forces, said Mr. Gunness in response to a question. In July 2013 the Syrian Government imposed an almost total siege on Yarmouk which was one of the
main obstacles to freedom of movement. Since the armed groups moved in a week ago it had been impossible for people to move, largely because of intense street fighting all around them.

Asked to elaborate on the situation in terms of food, water and medical supplies Mr. Gunness said since 28 March UNRWA had not had access to the camp, so there was no UN food, water, medicine or any sort of humanitarian supplies. The water mains in Yarmouk was destroyed in September 2014 so there had been no publicly-available water since then. To give an idea of how bad the situation was Mr. Gunness said in 2014 UNRWA was able to distribute food on just 131 days. On average 89 food parcels were distributed. The bare minimum was 400 food parcels in order to meet the basic World Health Organization standards of 2,000 calories per day. It was estimated that in 2014 Yarmouk residents lived on an average of 400 calories per day. That was a recipe for certain malnutrition. Now the situation was even worse following the arrival of the armed groups and the intensification of the fighting.

On medical supplies Mr. Gunness said there were unconfirmed reports that one of the two hospitals in the camp had been hit. There were unconfirmed reports of diseased diarrhoea outbreaks, a classic water-borne disease. UNRWA had established temporary medical points in the camps with doctors and nurses but they were not enough, and only a few people were seen. People with a terminal disease, a disability, who were paraplegic, could not attend them. The bare minimum of health care that UNRWA provided only scratched the surface.

In terms of food, medicine and water Yarmouk was seeing scenes of disgraceful depravity. It was an affront to the civilized world that in the capital city of a United Nations Member State, in the twenty-first century, a UN-protected population were in a situation which the world’s top diplomat, the Secretary-General, described as “akin to one of the lower circles of hell”, said Mr. Gunness.

Responding to a question about who may be carrying out aerial bombardments in Yarmouk, and whether ISIS now had planes or was it the Syrian Government. Mr. Gunness replied that UNRWA was not a military analysis organization, and could not categorically confirm who was responsible for aerial bombardment.

Was the Yarmouk crisis a disaster that could not be helped, asked a journalist? What could be done beyond international pressure? Mr. Gunness replied that UNRWA, as a UN humanitarian agency, backed any peaceful process. He noted that there was increasing speculation about the possibility of an attempt for a military solution but said there were no examples in the Syrian context where military escalation had actually saved Syrian lives. The people of Yarmouk had suffered enough: UNRWA hoped that there would be no military escalation and called for a ceasefire and evacuation of the camp, said Mr. Gunness.

Asked about UNRWA’s cooperation with the Syrian Government and whether it had any contact with the armed groups, Mr. Gunness said UNRWA had maintained good working relations with the Syrian Government since it was established in 1950. UNRWA had been able to go into Yarmouk on 131 days in 2014 thanks to the Syrian Government. Mr. Gunness noted that before the conflict began the Syrian Government was the most generous of all the host governments of Palestinian refugees in the region, and Yarmouk had been the heartland of the Palestinian community in Syria, a place where 160,000 Palestinians lived in a thriving suburb of Damascus. Yarmouk had been an extraordinary melting point where Palestinians felt safe and appreciated. What was happening today was heart-breaking.

UNRWA did not have direct contact with ISIS, said Mr. Gunness. He referred the journalist to the Office of the Joint Special Representative in Damascus to ask about approaches, both direct and indirect, on how the United Nations could work with ISIS and other armed groups in the camp. The cooperation of all parties, both the Syrian Government and the armed groups in the camp, was needed to establish a safe environment in which unarmed humanitarian workers could carry out their mandate. UNRWA had lost 14 staff members since the conflict began, said Mr. Gunness, and a humanitarian pause, a ceasefire was a matter of life and death.

Responding to a question raised on what the Special Envoy on Syria was doing to address the crisis, Ms. Momal-Vanian said she would enquire. [The Office of the Special Envoy on Syria later said the Special Envoy was following the issue of Yarmouk very closely. He had been in constant touch with various stakeholders through his office in Damascus and had asked his Deputy Ramzy Ezzeldin Ramzy to go to Damascus. Mr Ramzy was on his way.]

Yemen

Johannes Van Der Klaauw, the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator for Yemen and United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) representative, said the humanitarian situation in Yemen was getting worse by the hour. Today 15 out of the 22 governorates in the country were affected by conflict. Millions of people were at risk of physical injury or death due to ongoing fighting on the ground and airstrikes, but also because of the quick unravelling of anything there was left of basic services including health care, safe water and availability of food.

As the United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator for Yemen, Mr. van der Klaauw said he called on all parties to the conflict to ensure that civilians and the civilian infrastructure was protected. That infrastructure was indispensable for the survival of the people. He also called on all parties to the conflict to allow humanitarian organisations and their personnel to deliver assistance to the most vulnerable Yemeni people and to facilitate humanitarian staff and supplies to reach the country, by air and by boat. Aid workers must be able to deliver life-saving assistance in all affected areas in Yemen. The Humanitarian Coordinator said he called again this morning on all parties to enact an immediate humanitarian pause in the conflict.

The Humanitarian Coordinator said the current conflict in Yemen took place against the backdrop of a humanitarian crisis of a protracted nature and of a size and a complexity which was amongst the largest in the world. Even before the latest escalation of the conflict, 16 million of the 25 million Yemenis required humanitarian assistance to meet their most basic needs. The conflict was aggravating the needs of the most vulnerable and putting others at grave risk. Ordinary Yemeni families were struggling to access health care, water, food and fuel – commodities that were basic requirements for their survival. Thousands of Yemeni families had fled as a result of the fighting, and we were now seeing the regional dimension of the flows out of Yemen into Djibouti and the autonomous parts of Somalia, Somaliland and Puntland, said the Humanitarian Coordinator.

Civilian infrastructure, including schools, health facilities, markets, power plants and warehouses had been damaged and disrupted by the fighting. Food and fuel shortages were now being reported across the country and as a result, prices for food and commodities had increased significantly. Frequent power cuts were being experiences across the country along with shortages of water and fuel. In Aden, Yemen’s second city, one million people risked being cut off from access to clean drinking water within a matter of days unless additional fuel was brought in. Health facilities were also under great strain: they lacked fuel for the generators and water necessary to maintain basic operations, said the Humanitarian Coordinator, adding that there was an urgent need for support to mass casualty management, including trauma kits and other medical supplies.

The humanitarian community was on the ground in Yemen. It was doing its utmost to deliver life-saving assistance and protection services, to the greatest extent possible, through its national United Nations staff and the national staff of international non-governmental organizations, as well as through a strong network of national community-based non-governmental organizations. Humanitarian partners had provided medical supplies and trauma kits for 18 hospitals throughout Yemen, among other assistance.

Yemeni national staff of the United Nations and international non-governmental organizations were delivering life-saving assistance and protection to people in need across the country at great personal risk. Three Yemeni aid workers of the Yemeni Red Crescent were recently killed in crossfire in Aden while trying to save the lives of others. The current impact of the fighting on civilians, including aid workers, was simply unacceptable, said the Humanitarian Coordinator.

Ahmed Shadoul, World Health Organization (WHO) representative in Yemen, briefed journalists via the telephone from Jordan. He said that the situation in Yemen was critical, particularly in Aden. Major concerns included the air strikes, the internally displaced people, malnutrition and disease outbreaks due to crowded places such as meningitis, typhoid and measles. The latest figures regarding fatalities and injuries were released by the Ministry of Health’s Operation Room on Thursday 9 April and stated that 648 people had been killed and 2,191 people had been injured.

Health facilities, medical clinics and ambulances had been targeted and suffered damage from airstrikes. WHO appealed for the need to keep health facilities safe. There was a shortage of medical equipment and teams, and those already on the ground had been very stretched over the last three weeks. WHO was doing its best to provide more than 20 hospitals with necessary supplies and equipment but the fuel shortages were a major problem.

WHO, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) were spearheading the mass casualty management and responding to the injuries, supporting the Ministry of Health and other partners, said Dr. Shadoul, and WHO was coordinating the health cluster response to fill the gap. WHO had so far donated 20 trauma kits to hospitals which were sufficient for 1,000 major operations and inter-agency health kits sufficient for the needs of 240,000 people for one month. WHO had activated the shock room in its regional office in Cairo to provide necessary surge and capacity building. Ensuring the continuation of basis services was problematic due to power cuts across the country. WHO was very concerned about the safety of the country vaccines for the whole year.

Adrian Edwards, for the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) said with the escalation in Yemen’s conflict, UNHCR was seeing a rise in people fleeing by boat across the Gulf of Aden to countries in the Horn of Africa – historically a major route travelled by refugees and migrants headed in the opposite direction, i.e. to Yemen. Over the last 10 days 317 Yemeni refugees had arrived at Obock in Djibouti. In Somalia’s Puntland, at Bossaso port, and Somaliland, at Berbera and Lughaya ports (around 200 km west of Berbera), there had been 582 arrivals, the vast majority Somalis but also Yemenis and a small number of Ethiopian and Djiboutian nationals. They all received food and water, and health and medical checks on arrival.

The refugees told UNHCR staff that many more people were trying to leave Yemen but were being prevented from doing so by fuel shortages and high fees charged by boat operators. Ports were said to be closed and boats not allowed to depart. A Somali man who was separated from his wife and daughter while fleeing bombing in Basatin district, in Aden city said he had been in hiding for three days in the port before managing to board a boat to safety. Among those with him on the 24-hour boat journey were an Ethiopian woman, recognized as a refugee in Yemen in 2002, and her three children. She said she did not have to wait as smugglers prioritized women and children, but that her husband was still waiting in Aden for a place on a boat.

UNHCR was extremely concerned about the dangers for anyone trying to flee across the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, where there were no search and rescue operations. Last year, 246 lives were reported lost in sea crossings to Yemen. UNHCR appealed to all ships in the area to be extra vigilant and assist any boats in distress. It also asked that countries with vessels in waters near Yemen – including surveillance and anti-piracy vessels – instruct their ships to help with rescues. As demand increased, boats were likely to become more crowded and prices for places more expensive.

In Djibouti, newly arriving refugees were being registered at the Al-Rahma temporary transit centre near Obock, where they receive food, water, medical care and other assistance. The authorities had identified a site for a refugee camp four kilometres away at Markazi. Djibouti was already home to nearly 15,000 refugees, the majority from Somalia. Most lived in two refugee camps in the south of the country. UNHCR was making contingency plans to be able to receive up to 30,000 refugees in Djibouti over the next six months.

In Somaliland and Puntland, Somalia, UNHCR was refurbishing two buildings to serve as reception and transit centres for refugees from Yemen and Somalis who may return home because of the crisis. UNHCR and partners had started preparations to be able to receive up to 100,000 people, also over six months.

Inside Yemen UNHCR’s operations to protect and assist the 250,000 refugees continued where possible. That number included mostly Somalis with smaller numbers of Eritreans, Ethiopians, Iraqis and Syrians, the 330,000 Yemenis displaced by previous waves of violence, and the thousands more affected by the violence of the last two weeks. The main difficulties for UNHCR’s 115 national staff and non-governmental organization partners were the security situation and fuel shortages. At the Al Kharaz camp in Yemen’s south, food distribution and medical care continued. The camp was home to some 18,000 Somali refugees, and the primary school remained open. UNHCR saw an increase in refugees moving from urban areas to the camp, and was providing them with shelter and other aid. It also continued to do outreach to vulnerable refugees, including counselling by phone and email where offices were unable to open.

Even with the rising outflow to the Horn of Africa, UNHCR partner the Yemeni Red Crescent, was registering hundreds of asylums-seekers who continued to arrive on Yemen’s shores. Those desperate people, mostly Somalis and Ethiopians, were either unaware of the situation or in the hands of smugglers and unable to escape their journeys. UNHCR had moved its field office in the port of Bab Al Mandab, a traditional arrival point, to the Kharaz camp where its reception centre was functioning. Mr. Edwards highlighted that despite the desperate situation in that part of the world there had been more sea crossings to Yemen in the first three months of the year than seen in the Mediterranean – there had been 20,000 crossings to Yemen versus 15,000 crossings of the Mediterranean.

UNHCR field teams in conflict-affected Sana’a and Sa’ada, in the northwest, said some people had not been able to flee to safer parts because they simply had no money. Throughout conflict-affected areas, fuel and food shortages meant prices were very high. With 14 out of Yemen’s 22 governorates affected by air strikes or armed conflict, UNHCR yesterday issued a position paper to governments calling on all countries to allow civilians fleeing Yemen access to their territories and urging governments around the world to suspend forcible returns to the country, said Mr. Edwards.

Joel Millman, for the International Organization of Migration (IOM), said IOM continued to wait for landing clearance for evacuation flights, which was a core mission for the organization. Having hoped to get clearance for the flights this week, IOM had now been informed that the earliest possible day would be Monday 16 April. IOM had heard from 38 Governments requesting advice or assistance in evacuating their nations, and it had identified 13,000 nationals to evacuate if it could get clearance at Sana’a airport. To put that figure into context Mr. Millman said IOM knew there were 250,000 Somalis and 100,000 Ethiopians in Yemen, so 13,000 was a small number compared to how large the evacuation could potentially be.

Christophe Boulierac, for the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), informed the press that UNICEF’s first airlift of urgent medical and other supplies landed in Sana’a this morning and was now being unloaded on the tarmac at Sana’a International Airport. The 16 tonnes of medical equipment and water supplies that were now being unloaded would be made available to organizations working on the ground in Yemen to help save innocent lives. The cargo of antibiotics, bandages, syringes and other medical supplies, as well as water storage materials, was airlifted through Djibouti from the UNICEF supply centre in Denmark.

The conflict in Yemen continued to exact a heavy toll on children and their families. The humanitarian situation was worsening all the time. Thousands of families across the country had left their homes in search of safer places and hospitals were under increasing pressure as they struggled to manage mass casualties with insufficient supplies. The supplies brought in today could make the difference between life and death for children and their families, said Mr. Boulierac, but they were not enough and UNICEF planned more airlifts.


On behalf of the spokesperson for the World Food Programme (WFP), Ms. Momal-Vanian read out a statement in which WFP said the worsening conflict in parts of Yemen threatened the country’s already fragile food security. WFP was concerned about the growing number of displaced civilians in the poorest country in the Arab world. Food and fuel shortages could push even more people into hunger in a country where more than 10 million people – some 41 per cent of the population – were already suffering from food insecurity. WFP continued to work where it could through its 185 national staff as well as non-governmental organization partners and was seeking more partners to help operations to scale up to reach those most in need with assistance where security permitted. Despite operational and security difficulties, WFP and its partners distributed food assistance last week to nearly 30,000 in the Mazraq camps for internally displaced people and Kharaz camp for refugees.

Responding to a question, Dr. Shadoul said WHO could not be sure how many of the 648 deaths were due to airstrikes and how many were due to other issues. The true number of fatalities and injuries were likely to be higher. He also noted that the WHO planned an airlift of supplies to Sana’a on Monday 13 April, and that it had sent trauma kits sufficient for 10,000 people for three months to Djibouti.

The United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator for Yemen, Mr. van der Klaauw, responding to a question about what a humanitarian pause would entail, said a pause was needed to allow aid to come into the country by air or boat. UNHCR was cooperating with the coalition forces who had set up a cell for the coordination of humanitarian aid – as ICRC, MSF and UNICEF colleagues could testify because their first flights had been allowed to land. Many more flights and boats were needed, and in order to coordinate incoming aid effectively a mechanism had to be set up, and for that space – a pause – was needed. The windows of cleared air space in which aid flights could land were very short: 90 minutes to land a plane, unload it and get it out, was just too short, he said, adding that the airspace had to be clear to allow flights to land.

Mr. van der Klaauw said as the Humanitarian Coordinator he emphasized that a political solution to the conflict was needed. He cited the words of Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Thursday that humanitarians could bring in aid and help to alleviate the suffering of the people and the consequences of the conflict, but the conflict could not be resolved through humanitarian means.

A journalist asked whether the UN was calling on the Saudis to end their airstrikes. Mr. van der Klaauw responded that he was calling for four things: first, respect for the lives of the people and the civilian infrastructure; second for parties to the conflict to allow aid workers and humanitarian organizations to be present in the country and have space to work and transport aid; third, for a humanitarian pause coupled with the parties sitting at the negotiating table; and fourth, respect for international humanitarian law.

Responding for a question on the blockade, and whether, if it was hindering humanitarian aid going into Yemen, it was a violation of international humanitarian law, Mr. van der Klaauw said he could not comment on the blockade but he reiterated that the coalition forces wished to coordinate with the humanitarian community on the delivery of aid and to enable a space to bring in aid by air and boat. The UN was actively working with the coalition forces to make that happen. It was not a matter of a blockade but of extremely complex negotiations among the multitude of actors including the coalition forces, the Yemeni Government on the ground, and the rebel forces.

Asked who currently controlled Aden airport and port, Mr. van der Klaauw said the control of Aden airport and port had shifted over recent weeks and it was unclear who was currently in charge. Aden was the second city of Yemen and the situation there may be catastrophic, he said. It was urban warfare between different militias who were engaged in a sort of vendetta war, because youngsters had been armed by all sorts of groups. The fragmentation of the situation in Aden and the lawlessness was of great concern, he said, as was the risk of a security and governance vacuum there. There was a risk that the ability of the Yemeni society, which was a tribal society, to reconcile and talk together would be gone. What was happening today was without precedence in the modern history of Yemen, he concluded.

Israel Administrative Detention

Ravina Shamsadani for the United Nations Human Rights Office (OHCHR) said they were concerned by the continued and increasing use of administrative detention by Israeli authorities against Palestinians. Administrative detainees were held without charge or trial, often on the basis of secret evidence, for periods of up to six months, which were extendable indefinitely. Detainees were also often transferred to prisons inside Israel in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention.

Most recently, Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) member Khalida Jarrar was arrested on 2 April 2015 and subsequently detained pursuant to an administrative detention order issued by an Israeli military commander in the West Bank on Sunday 5 April. Ms. Jarrar remained in administrative detention in a prison in Israel. The order was currently under review by the Ofer Military Court in the West Bank and if confirmed, Ms. Jarrar would be subjected to six months detention, without charge or trial, renewable indefinitely. It was not the first time Ms. Jarrar had been subject to administrative orders by the Israeli military commander in the West Bank, said Ms. Shamsadani. On 20 August 2014, Ms. Jarrar received a military order giving her 24 hours to move from Ramallah, where she lived, to the district of Jericho where her movements would be restricted for six months. On appeal, an Israeli court reduced the restriction to one month.

The Israeli practice of administrative detention had been condemned on numerous occasions by the United Nations Human Rights Office and the Human Rights Committee that oversaw implementation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Israel had ratified. However, as of February this year, there were reportedly 424 Palestinians held under administrative detention orders – more than double the 181 held at the same time last year, said Ms. Shamsadani.

OHCHR called, once again, on Israel to end its practice of administrative detention and to either release without delay or to promptly charge all administrative detainees and prosecute them with all the judicial guarantees required by international human rights law and standards, Ms. Shamsadani concluded.

Cyclone Pam in Vanuatu

Christian Lindmeier, for the World Health Organization (WHO), said Monday 13 April would mark one month since Vanuatu was hit by Cyclone Pam. The cyclone affected 166,000 people on 22 islands, 30,000 of them school-age children. 110,000 people were still in need of clean water. There was a risk of the outbreak of disease, and people needed nutritional support, particularly for 12,500 children aged less than five years. So far 20,000 people had received hygiene kits and 50,000 people had received emergency shelter assistance. There was a short fall in the funding for the health response, said Mr. Lindmeier, as only 23 per cent of the almost US$5 million requested by health sector partners had been collected by 8 April. The recovery in Vanuatu would be an opportunity to not only restore the damaged health system but to rebuild a better system which prevented health inequalities, he stressed.

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Ravina Shamsadani for the United Nations Human Rights Office (OHCHR) reported that serious allegations regarding the presence of a mass grave holding 421 bodies in Maluku commune, Kinshasa province were received by the United Nations Joint Human Rights Office in the Democratic Republic of the Congo last month. OHCHR had since been working closely with the authorities over the past few weeks, including by supporting the judicial investigation into those very serious allegations. OHCHR was also conducting our own independent human rights investigation, including by carrying out site visits and interviewing witnesses and family members of victims. Ms. Shamsadani said OHCHR continued to support the Government and urge them to ensure that the judicial investigation was promptly completed in a transparent, credible and independent manner.

United Nations Crime Congress in Doha

Corinne Momal-Vanian, Director of the United Nations Information Service in Geneva, announced that the United Nations Secretary-General would be in Qatar on Sunday 12 April to open the United Nations Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice. The Congress took place every five years, and 2015 marked its sixtieth anniversary.

The 2015 Congress, the thirteenth to be held, would have a strong focus on integrating crime prevention and criminal justice into the wider work of the United Nations. In particular, it would highlight the effects of crime on sustainable development. The outcome document of the Congress -- the Doha Declaration -- would be sent as a contribution to the preparations for the summit on the sustainable development goals in New York in September.

The event, which would last until 19 April, was led by the Vienna-based United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, said Ms. Momal-Vanian, noting that her Vienna counterpart Martin Nesirky would be in Doha with a team from the Department of Public Information.

A press kit was already available on the Congress website in all six official languages (http://www.un.org/en/events/crimecongress2015) and key events would be webcast at http://www.un.org/en/events/crimecongress2015/webcast.shtml. The Congress could also be followed on social media using #CrimeCongress, on Twitter via @crimecongress13, on Facebook via https://www.facebook.com/UNCrimeCongress2015 and on Instagram via https://instagram.com/crimecongress.

High Commissioner to visit Burundi

Ravina Shamsadani for the United Nations Human Rights Office (OHCHR) announced that High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein on Sunday would begin a three-day visit to Burundi – his first official country visit as the United Nations’ top human rights official. During his visit, High Commissioner Zeid would meet the President as well as a number of top officials, including the Minister for External Relations and International Cooperation and the Minister in Charge of Human Rights. He would also meet the Executive Secretary of the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region, the Bureau of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the President of the National Assembly, the President of the National Independent Electoral Commission, the President of the National Independent Human Rights Commission, members of civil society, political parties and the diplomatic corps. At the end of his visit, the High Commissioner would hold a press conference at 2 p.m. on Wednesday 15 April in the Conference Room of the United Nations Electoral Observation Mission in Burundi.

Geneva Activities

Ms. Momal-Vanian announced that the Committee on Migrant Workers would start a new two-week session on Monday in which it would review the reports of Kirghizstan, Peru and Uganda. Background press releases in English and French had been issued.

Christian Lindmeier, for the World Health Organization (WHO), announced that a press conference would take place at 1 p.m. today on the outcomes of the fifth meeting of the International Health Regulations Emergency Committee on Ebola Virus Disease. Subjects to be discussed included whether the Ebola outbreak in West Africa continued to constitute a public health emergency of international concern, and whether the current temporary recommendations should be extended, restricted or revised.

Jean Rodriguez, for the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), said the 66th Session of the Commission would take place from Tuesday 14 to Thursday 16 April at the Palais des Nations, in Room XIX. It was the bi-annual meeting of the 56 State Parties in which they discussed issues of common interest and validated the strategic orientations of the Commission for the next year. The theme this year was “Concrete Actions for Implementing Sustainable Development”, and the Parties, along with other speakers, would discuss what role conventions, international standards and good practices could play in transforming the objectives of international development into concrete actions on the ground.

A High Level Dialogue would take place from 10.30 a.m. on Tuesday morning with the Secretary of State for the Environment of Germany, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Russia, the Acting Director of the Environment of the European Commission, the Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan, and the Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Bureau of International Organization Affairs of the United States State Department.

A series of activities and workshops would be organized on different matters, said Mr. Rodriguez, highlighted two that may be of interest to the press. At 9 a.m. on Tuesday, at Door 40 of the Palais des Nations, two cars that had passed a crash test at 64 km/h would be displayed in order to show the difference in terms of security quality between cars that were sold in developed and developing countries. It was part of a call for all vehicles sold worldwide to comply with international security standards. At 9.30 a.m. on Tuesday, in the park next to Serpentine Bar, people would have the opportunity to test drive a car with an automatic braking system, attended by the UNECE Executive-Secretary and the Secretary General of Globalncap.

Melissa Begag, for the World Trade Organization (WTO), announced that next Tuesday 14 April the WTO would release its Trade Statistics for 2014 and Trade Growth Projections for 2015 to 2016. The lockdown would start at 10 a.m.in Room D, and would be followed by a press conference with WTO Director-General, Roberto Azevêdo at 11 a.m. The embargo will be lifted at noon, she noted.

Briefing the press on other WTO activities next week, Ms. Begag said the Negotiating Group on Rules would meet informally on Tuesday 14 April at 3 p.m. and the Investment Measures Committee would meet at 10 a.m. on Thursday 16 April. On Friday 17 April Director-General Roberto Azevêdo would meet with United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Director-General José Graziano da Silva and Energy Charter Secretary General Urban Rusnák at the WTO. The Director-General would also address an International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD) meeting on Energy Governance and Trade. Ms. Begag also noted that intensive consultations were also taking place this week on the Doha Round, led by the Director-General and the chairpersons of the negotiating groups.

Catherine Huissoud, for the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), said the Global Commodities Forum would take place at the Palais des Nations on Monday 13 and Tuesday 14 April. The Forum would be opened on Monday morning, and that afternoon there would be a discussion on the evolution of transparency of the trading market in Switzerland. On Tuesday morning a discussion on the political space available to resource-rich developing countries would take place, which had been an important topic in current development policies, she noted.

Jean-Luc Martinage, for the International Labour Organization (ILO), briefed on the upcoming International Labour Conference which would take place in Geneva from 1 to 13 June 2015. The list of speakers was not yet available, but the three main topics to be presented would be on the transition from an informal economy to formal economy; the creation of new jobs by small and medium enterprises; and social protection and the protection of workers. Mr. Martinage noted that some details were already available on the International Labour Organization website.

The spokesperson for the Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs was also present, but did not brief.
The webcast for this briefing is available here: http://bit.ly/unog100415