REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE

Marie Heuzé, the Director of the United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the biweekly press briefing, which informed correspondents on the activities of the Director-General of the Office, the Seminar on the International Criminal Court (ICC) at the Palais, the Working Group on Internet Governance meeting next week and the upcoming Eleventh United Nations Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice.

Also briefing the press were spokespersons of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), World Health Organization (WHO), UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), World Food Programme (WFP), World Trade Organization (WTO) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM). The spokesperson from the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) was available to take questions but had no announcements to make.

Gary Fowlie, Media Officer for the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) came to bid farewell to the Geneva press corps before taking up his post next month at Headquarters as Chief of Media Liaison and Accreditations, Department of Public Information. Replacing him temporarily at ITU would be Sara Parks but Francine Lambert and Sanjay Acharya were of course also available.

Funeral of Prince Rainier

Ms. Heuzé began the briefing by informing journalists that Sergei Ordzhonikidze, Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva, was representing the Secretary-General today at the funeral in Monaco of its monarch, Prince Rainier III.

Seminar on the International Criminal Court (ICC)

Ms. Heuzé said that continuing today in room XX was the Seminar on the International Criminal Court (ICC) organized by the World Federation of United Nations Associations (WFUNA). Two events were of interest, the first was a presentation at 12:00 by Judge Philippe Kirsch, President of the ICC, on the role of the ICC in establishing accountability for international crimes. The second event was a panel discussion at 3.30 p.m. on the ICC as an effective international instrument. Participants would include Judge Kirsch, Mr. Cornelio Sommaruga, former President of the International Committee of the Red Cross, Judge Fausto Pocar, Vice-President for the International Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, Nicholas Howein, Secretary-General of the International Commission of Jurists, and Eric Sottas, Secretary-General of the NGO World Organization against Torture.

Eleventh United Nations Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice

On another question relating to international justice, Ms. Heuzé announced that the Service would make available the statement of the Secretary-General to the Eleventh United Nations Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice to be held on Bangkok from 18 to 25 April 2005. The agenda of the Congress would include effective measures to combat transnational organized crime; international cooperation against terrorism and links between terrorism and other criminal activities; corruption: threats and trends in the twenty-first century; economic and financial crimes: challenges to sustainable development; and making standards work: fifty years of standard-setting in crime prevention and criminal justice.

In that connection, Ms. Heuzé reminded journalists that the General Assembly had adopted on 13 April an International Convention for the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism. The Assembly had requested the Secretary-General to open the Convention for signature, starting on 14 September and lasting until the end of December 2006. It also called on all States to sign and ratify, accept, approve or accede to the Convention.

Working Group on Internet Governance

Taking place in Geneva week from 18 to 20 April would be the third meeting of the Working Group on Internet Governance under the chairmanship of Nitin Desai, Special Adviser to the United Nations Secretary-General for the World Summit on the Information Society. It would focus on the roles and responsibilities of all parties involved in governance arrangements and assess the adequacy of existing arrangements. On 18 April, consultations would be open to all stakeholders and on 19 and 20 April, the Group would go into closed session. The UN contact person for the Working Group was Preeta Bannerjee of the Information Service (72317) and at ITU, Bob Shaw.

Spokesmen’s Round-Table event

Two correspondents said that they regretted that the Spokesman's Roundtable held at Headquarters yesterday had not been transmitted to journalists in Geneva. The Director said that she had taken note of their remarks and would investigate the issue.

The audio had been transmitted from New York to the Palais as announced. However, because of technical problems arising from the number of media requests for audio in various languages on voting on country-specific resolutions in the Human Rights Commission, which coincided with the roundtable in New York, there were unfortunately many interruptions making the transmission somewhat inaudible.

UNICEF press conference

Outgoing Executive Director Carol Bellamy would give a press conference on 18 April at 11.30 a.m. in room III to launch the report Progress for children: A report card on gender parity and primary education ”exclusively from Geneva. It would be her last press conference, which Ms. Heuzé said she had reserved for the Geneva press. Also participating would be Ambassador Wegger Strommen, Permanent Representative of Norway.

Commission on Human Rights

David Chikvaidze, Media Liaison Officer for the 61st session of the Commission on Human Rights, told journalists that the Expanded Bureau had this morning reviewed time management issues (general debates, voting, additional meetings). While all the details had not yet been elaborated, he could confirm the addition of two meetings on Tuesday and Thursday next week. This was a positive development because it meant there would be no curtailing of speaking times through the end of the session. Also, there would probably be a rationalization of the schedule for next week, whereby all the general debates would be rescheduled for Monday, 18 April and for the morning of Tuesday19 April. Voting on all outstanding items would start on Tuesday afternoon and run through the end of the session as needed. The weekly meeting of the Expanded Bureau with NGOs would take place today Friday, 15 April, at 2.00 p.m. he said.

Programme today

Mr. Chikvaidze moved on to today’s programme of work. This morning the Commission would act on the remaining draft proposals under item 10 (economic, social and cultural rights). The Commission would then resume and conclude its general debate under agenda item 14 (Specific groups and individuals). Immediately afterwards, the Commission will take up the lists of speakers under agenda item 16 (Report of the Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights), and if time permitted, under item 17 (Promotion and Protection of Human Rights).

This afternoon, the Commission would briefly open agenda item 19 (Advisory services and technical cooperation in the field of human rights) in order to hear the presentations of reports by the following:

Mr. Thomas Hammarberg, Chairperson of the Board of Trustees of the UN Voluntary Fund for technical cooperation in the field of human rights; Mr. Louis Joinet, Independent Expert on the situation of human rights in Haiti; Mr. M. Cherif Bassiouni, the Independent Expert on the situation of human rights in Afghanistan; Mr. Ghanim Alnajjar, Independent Expert on the situation of human rights in Somalia.

As the presentations were taking place outside the framework of the general debate on agenda item 19, the Commission will not hold interactive dialogues with the special procedures mandate-holders mentioned above. However, concerned countries, if any, would be given the floor for comments.

Resolutions

Mr. Chikvaidze announced that yesterday afternoon, the commission voted on draft resolutions under Item 9 (violation of human rights in any part of the world). Voting on resolutions under item 10 was continuing this morning. Last night, just before the deadline, Cuba had submitted a draft resolution on Guantanamo under item 3 (organization of work), which had been posted on the OHCHR Extranet making a total of 94 draft resolutions posted to date.

Press conference

Mr. Chikvaidze mentioned that Peter Leuprecht, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for human rights in Cambodia, would be giving a press conference in Monday 18 April at 3.00 p.m. A public briefing given by him would take place Tuesday, 19 April at 2.00 p.m. in room XXVII. He would address the Commission on 18 April.

Two questions dealt with the draft resolutions on Sudan and when they would be voted on. D. Chikvaidze answered that in view of the two different draft resolutions on Sudan, voting was postponed yesterday and is expected middle to late next week.

Another question pertained to the apparent typo in the draft resolution on Cuba (L.31), which was voted on yesterday; the unedited draft said “draft decision”, while the edited version said “draft resolution”. Mr. Chikvaidze said that there was no legal difference between a decision and a resolution, but since there was interest in greater detail, he would be pleased to explore the issue of this particular draft and revert at the next meeting.

Colombia

WFP reported that it was extremely concerned about the humanitarian situation in the region of Bojaya, Colombia. Constant clashes between illegal armed groups have caused important displacement of population in the past few weeks. Some 4,000 indigenous people belonging to communities along the Cuia and Bojaya rivers are also at risk of becoming displaced because of the insecurity and presence of irregular armed groups on their land. Last week a WFP team travelled to the areas bringing emergency food aid to some 4.5 thousand people from 28 different communities. The rations will last for approximately 40 days. There was “a tacit consensus” between the Colombian regular forces and the illegal armed groups which allows the WFP team to deliver emergency food aid in this region.

WFP said that Eritrea was facing acute water shortage adding nearly 250'000 Eritreans more in need of food aid. The spring rains remained erratic and scarce and the poor agricultural infrastructures have once again caused crops to fail. This is the fifth successive year of inadequate rainfall and it has left 2/3 of the population dependent on food assistance. This had made the total of drought-affected people receiving food aid from WFP to 840,000.

WFP also announced the launch of “Food Force” the first humanitarian video game about global hunger. The idea was to communicate with children and help them to understand what hunger is all about and that there are people starving in the world. Children could fulfil six different missions like negotiating with rebels, using food to help rebuild villages, etc. and also learn how to get involved themselves and help.


Sudan/Chad

UNHCR announced that Acting High Commissioner Wendy Chamberlin would be leaving this Sunday on a five-day mission to Sudan and Chad, to visit UNHCR staff working to help hundreds of thousands of refugees and others displaced by the conflict in Darfur. The mission followed this week's Oslo donors' conference on Sudan. The Darfur region was one of the most difficult protection environments UNHCR faced anywhere. The two-year conflict had uprooted over 2 million people – 1.8 million of them displaced within Darfur and 200,000 others now across the border in camps in neighbouring Chad.

Bosnia

UNHCR reported that the number of internally displaced people had decreased by around two-thirds from the 2000 figure of more than half a million, to the new total of 186,500 people. This was also a considerably lower total than the last UNHCR estimate at the end of 2004, which projected that there were still around 310,000 such people in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Other

Yesterday, UNHCR clarified its position on the Lampedusa debate just before the start of a debate in the European Parliament on a draft resolution on the recent expulsion to Libya of people from the Italian island. UNHCR felt obliged to circulate a brief statement to European Members of Parliament, clarifying its position. Also, 12 refugees had left on an early morning convoy to repatriate from Dukwi refugee camp in northeastern Botswana to Katima Mulilo in Namibia's Caprivi region, the first voluntary repatriation from Botswana to Caprivi region since 2002.

IOM reported having rescued 537 children in Ghana who had been sold by impoverished parents to fishermen and who were suffering mental and physical trauma. Forced labour was at a high level in some communities. The children would need at least two years of constant medical attention.

WIPO announced that it would host a one-day open seminar on Monday 18 April on the copyright liabilities of those who act as on-line intermediaries.

Asked about a story which appeared today in Le Temps, the spokesperson of WIPO said that as this was a Swiss case, involving a Swiss company, she was unable to comment on the case or any speculation contained in the article as she simply did not have access to this information. To the best of her knowledge, this was an ongoing case and added that it was important to underline that there was no investigation of WIPO or anyone at WIPO.

Finally, Ms. Heuzé reminded journalists working over the weekend at the Palais that the Pregny gate was closed for construction so they should enter through the railway side entrance.


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