REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE

Marie Heuzé, the Director of the United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the briefing which provided information about the sixtieth session of the General Assembly, Geneva activities, Hurricane Katrina and other issues. Spokespersons for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the World Food Programme, the United Nations Conference for Trade and Development, the High Commissioner for Refugees, the International Labour Office and the International Organization for Migration participated in the briefing.

Sixtieth Session of the General Assembly

Mrs. Heuzé said available were a number of documents concerning the sixtieth session of the General Assembly which would start in New York on 13 September. They included general information on the session, the curriculum vitae of the incoming President of the session, Mr. Jan Eliasson of Sweden, and a draft of his acceptance speech upon his election as President. Also available in the Documentation Centre were copies of the draft outcome document of the World Summit which would be held at Headquarters from 14 to 16 September. It still included "brackets" which had to be agreed upon by Member States.

A number of press conferences were scheduled in New York, including one today by the President of the fifty-ninth session of the General Assembly, Mr. Ping, on the draft outcome document of the World Summit. A press conference by the Secretary-General was expected on 12 September and there would be one by Mr. Eliasson on 13 September.

Geneva Activities

Mrs. Heuzé said that the Committee on the Rights of the Child would start on Monday, 12 September and would continue until 30 September. The Committee was made up of 18 Experts who were elected for four-year terms and who worked in their personal capacity. The Committee this session would be looking at the situation of children in Trinidad and Tobago, Australia, Algeria, Uganda, China, Finland, Denmark and the Russian Federation. On Friday, 16 September, the Committee would hold a day of General Discussion on "children without parental care".

The Working Group on a draft legally binding normative instrument for the protection of all persons from enforced disappearance would be meeting in Geneva from 12 to 23 September in Room XXI. The goal of the Working Group was to elaborate a draft legally binding normative instrument for the protection of all persons from enforced disappearance.

Questions

In response to a question on the Committee on the Rights of the Child, Mrs. Heuzé said the Committee would be meeting at the Palais Wilson and its meetings were public. Interested journalists could attend the meetings or could listen to the proceedings on the telephone. She said that it would be possible to arrange a press briefing with the Committee at the end of its session.

Asked why the Secretary-General had not resigned after being implicated indirectly by the Volcker report, Mrs. Heuzé said that this was the journalist's own deduction. The final report had totally exonerated the Secretary-General. The Secretary-General had already said that as Chief Administrative Officer, he took responsibility. He was responsible, but was not guilty. The statement by the Secretary-General to the Security Council after the final report of the Independent Inquiry Committee (IIC) into the Iraq Oil-for-Food Programme was also available in the press room and it answered the journalist's question. Now, the Secretary-General was concentrating on the World Summit which hopefully would allow the Member States to adopt the reforms which he had proposed before the oil-for-food investigation.

Hurricane Katrina

Sian Bowen of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said Hurricane Katrina was the largest operation by the American Red Cross in its 125-year history. The American Red Cross was being helped by various other national societies, including Belgium, British, Canadian, Finnish, French, German, Mexican, Netherlands, Norwegian and Spanish as well as the International Committee of the Red Cross. To date, 4.2 million meals had been provided by the Red Cross as well as 5.2 million snacks. The Red Cross had also provided a safe haven for more than 157,000 survivors in 600 shelters across 19 states. It was also opening additional shelters as numbers were expected to reach 200,000. More than 26,000 trained Red Cross workers from 50 states, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands had responded to help. The Red Cross was concentrating on shelter, food, water, personal comfort (hygiene), medical assessment care and mental and emotional health counselling.

In response to questions, Ms. Bowen said the Red Cross had been asked to take care of the evacuees, so it was concentrating on setting up shelters outside of the crisis area. The Red Cross estimated that it would need $ 1 billion to help, but the amount of money raised to date was not immediately available. The Red Cross was not present in New Orleans, and the gathering of the corpses was in the hands of the American authorities.

Other

Elizabeth Byrs of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said concerning funding for African appeals, unfortunately, money was not coming in. For Niger, only half of the $ 80 million appeal had been funded. If there was no acceleration in the funding, the UN agencies participating in the appeal would have problems in implementing their humanitarian work in that country. Some of the agencies were already using their own reserves to continue working there. This was very worrying. Jan Egeland, the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, had noted that for the appeal for Malawi which was issued on 30 August for $ 88 million, nothing had been pledged for it at all to date. Other appeals which were under-funded included that for Benin which had received only 21 per cent of the funds required; Central African Republic which had received 27 per cent; Djibouti which had received 28 per cent; and others.

Christiane Berthiaume of the World Food Programme said WFP hoped to help 8 million persons in 6 countries in southern Africa. Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Swaziland, Zimbabwe and Zamia were now entering their fourth year of drought and were seriously affected by food insecurity, HIV/AIDS and the weakness of Government infrastructures to help the people. WFP was always concerned about the lean period before the harvest, which was usually from December to April, during which food prices increased because of the decreased availability. However, this lean period had already started in these countries, most problematically in Mozambique. The Secretary-General had sounded the alarm at the beginning of August, writing to 27 Heads of States, the European Commission and the African Development Bank about a possible catastrophe in the region.

Catherine Sibut-Pinot of the United Nations Conference for Trade and Development said on 13 September, UNCTAD's 2005 report on "Economic Development in Africa - Rethinking the Role of Foreign Direct Investment" would be released. The main launch would be held at 9:30 a.m. on Monday, 12 September. Embargoed copies of the report and the press release on it were already available.

Ron Redmond of the High Commissioner for Refugees said at the last briefing, UNHCR had expressed its concern about the plight of Somalis and others who were taking rickety boats in the Gulf of Aden to try and reach Yemen and other countries. Over the past few days, there had been another incident. UNHCR praised the humane gesture of the captain and crew of the Danish ship "Eli Maersk" who on Wednesday rescued 39 Somalis adrift in the Gulf of Aden. The tanker was given authorization to dock in Djibouti. While the 39 had not asked for asylum and while UNHCR was not certain of their intentions, this incident once again highlighted the tragedies that were occurring all too often at sea when people pursued illegal means to seek refuge or a better life.

Corinne Perthuis of the International Labour Office said the main message of Juan Somavia, the Director-General of ILO, to the World Summit about implementing the Millennium Development Goals would be the importance of "working out of poverty" and the importance of work and the creation of jobs. Available was a press kit entitled "decent work and the Millennium Development Goals" which would also be available in New York next week, as well as an information note on the main subject.

Jean Philippe Chauzy of the International Organization for Migration said IOM had offered its expertise to the United States Government to assist foreign workers who required help in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. IOM said it could also offer its expertise in population movement and registration in disaster situations, transport as well as logistics. IOM had also signed an agreement with the Sri Lankan Government to support the creation of computerized database centres to register people affected by the tsunami. The centres would speed and strengthen the delivery of relief and the implementation of reconstruction activities.

PB050909E