REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE

Marie Heuzé, the Director of the United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the briefing which also heard from Spokespersons for the World Food Programme, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the World Health Organization, the UN Refugee Agency, the World Intellectual Property Organization and the International Organization for Migration.

Secretary-General’s Activities

Mrs. Heuzé said the Secretary-General was today co-presiding a conference on Afghanistan in London today with President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan and Prime Minister Tony Blair of the United Kingdom. The embargoed opening statement of the Secretary-General at the London Conference on Afghanistan was available. It was embargoed until 11 a.m. Geneva time and journalists were asked to respect the embargo. This was an important conference which sought to assure the Afghan people of the continuous support of the international community. The Secretary-General, in his statement, was saying that it was in the interest of the entire international community to provide assistance as the country consolidated its moves towards peace, democracy and security. The partnership which had emerged in Bonn, and which he said the international community was renewing today, had to continue to support the Afghan people. Security concerns were at the head of the list of priorities, along with the rule of law and good governance, development and reconstruction and narcotics.

Copies of the embargoed statement of the Secretary-General were available in English, French and Spanish.

Also available was the press release concerning the meeting of the principals of the Middle East Quartet in London yesterday. A transcript of the press conference was also available. The Secretary-General read out a communiqué on behalf of the Quartet at the end of the meeting, saying that the Quartet believed that the Palestinian people had the right to expect that a new government would address their aspirations for peace and statehood and it welcomed President Abbas’ affirmation that the Palestinian Authority was committed to the Road Map. The Quartet stressed that future aid to the Palestinian Government would be reviewed in light of a number of conditions, including recognition of Israel and a commitment to non-violence. The communiqué was available in English.

Yesterday morning, the Secretary-General had been in The Hague where he
met with Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende. They discussed UN reform, as well as Afghanistan and the Middle East, and afterwards they held a joint press encounter. The transcript of the press encounter was available on the website as well as in the Documentation Centre.

The Secretary-General had over the weekend issued a statement on Côte d’Ivoire in which he expressed his concern about the issuance of a Presidential decree concerning the National Assembly in the country. He said the announcement did not appear to be in conformity with the information he had received from President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria, and from the UN Operation in Côte d’Ivoire (UNOCI) on the outcome of Obasanjo’s visit to Abidjan. The statement was available in the press room.

Geneva Activities

Mrs. Heuzé said the Conference on Disarmament was holding a public plenary this morning which was its one thousandth plenary. There were eight speakers on the list, and Sergei Ordzhonikidze, the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva and the Secretary-General of the Conference, would address the plenary after the speakers. A press release would be issued at the end of the meeting in English and in French.

The Working Group on the draft declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples was meeting from 30 January to 3 February at the Palais des Nations in Room XVIII. The meetings of the Working Group were public and documentation on its work was available at the back of the room.

Mrs. Heuzé said there were a number of interesting press conferences this week. Dennis McNamara, Special Advisor to the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Director of the Inter-agency Internal Displacement Division, would speak about the situation of IDP's worldwide on Thursday, 2 February at 11 a.m. in press room 1. There were also two briefings by the World Trade Organization on Wednesday, 1 February, at 4 p.m. in press room 1 on the Doha Agenda; and on 2 February at 4 p.m. in press room 1 on the services negotiations.

Afghanistan

Christiane Berthiaume of the World Food Programme said since the Bonn Accord in 2001, a lot of progress had been made in Afghanistan including the new Constitution, the elected President and parliament, and the return of millions of children, including girls, to school. The number of persons suffering from hunger had also decreased from more than 9 million in 2002 to 6.5 million this year. However, it was still necessary to feed these 6.5 million and that meant more funds were needed. The situation in Afghanistan was still fragile and insecurity remained an important issue. More than 50 per cent of children suffered from malnutrition. WFP had launched an appeal at the beginning of January for a three-year period to help these 6.5 million persons at the cost of $ 360 million. To date, it had only received 11 per cent of the money necessary. WFP needed urgently 21,000 tons of food costing $ 13.7 million for the next six months for Afghanistan.

Mrs. Heuzé said available was a press release by the United Nations Children’s Fund in which UNICEF urged delegates at the London Conference on Afghanistan to maintain a clear focus on the development needs of children and mothers in Afghanistan.

Pakistan

Elizabeth Byrs of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
said at the back of the room was an information note with details about the funding of the general appeal for the victims of the earthquake in Pakistan.

Larry Hollingworth, Deputy Humanitarian Coordinator for Pakistan, said a lot had been achieved for the victims of the earthquake in Pakistan, including 800,000 tents, 240,000 shelters, 5 million blankets, 5 million sheets of corrugated iron, and looking after 23 planned camps and hundreds of spontaneous camps. There had been no major health crisis. All the UN agencies had been working in Pakistan, in addition to 89 non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and 115 national NGOs. It remained very cold at night and the tents were damp on the inside. Only now was the battle to heat the tents being won. It was important to note that the disaster relief to the victims was not going to conclude on the last day of winter. Throughout winter, the UN agencies and their partners would continue to battle the weather, winterise tents, issue clothing, provide food, and monitor health, and even then the job would not be over. As the first signs of spring appeared, this would not be the end of relief. Those who could go home would do so when the weather improved. However, many victims of the earthquake would not be able to go home because their homes no longer existed and the land on which their homes were on no longer existed. They would remain until a solution was found for them.

Mr. Hollingworth said many of these victims would not benefit from the compensation package offered by the Government of Pakistan, because it would only go to persons who had owned homes. Many of the people in the camps and in the spontaneous settlements had not owned their own homes. So when winter ended, they would have no place to go to. For those persons, homes, schools, hospitals and clinics would be needed. All three phases of the operation - relief, recovery and reconstruction - needed funding. In Muzzafarabad, about 80,000 people who used to live in apartments had gone to live with their relatives. When spring came, they would want to come home, but there was nowhere for them to return to. OCHA was still short of $ 200 million for the initial appeal. Probably another appeal covering the period from March 2006 to March 2007 would have to be launched.

Christiane Berthiaume of the World Food Programme said WFP had launched an appeal for $ 59.6 million for food for Pakistan, and it had only received $ 40.8 million. As for the logistical part, which included the use of helicopters to reach villages in the mountains, the appeal was for $ 72.8 million, and only $ 36 million had been received for that. WFP believed it would now need the helicopters for longer than initially planned because the roads were still in such bad condition and it was estimated that it would take up to five years to clear them all from the effects of the landslides. Meanwhile, the helicopters were necessary to transport food and other aid to the people.

Malawi

Damien Personnaz of the United Nations Children’s Fund said the humanitarian situation in Malawi remained very serious. After four years of drought, Malawi was facing floods, an outbreak of cholera, a bad harvest, and a high prevalence of HIV/AIDS. Some 400,000 children under 15 had been orphaned by HIV/AIDS and many were being cared for by relatives. About 40 per cent of the population – some 4.9 million persons – were in need of food assistance, including an estimated one million children under five and pregnant women. Some 48 per cent of children under five in Malawi were stunted; 5 per cent were wasted or severely malnourished, and 22 per cent were underweight or malnourished. To date UNICEF had received $ 11.5 million in contributions or pledges against the $ 13 million appeal. A total of $ 1.4 million was now required to respond to the ongoing deteriorating situation of children. Available was an information note with more information.

Avian Influenza and Polio

Iain Simpson of the World Health Organization said the Iraqi Ministry of Health had confirmed that the fifteen-year-old girl who had died on 17 January in Iraq had been diagnosed with H5N1. A WHO team was going to Iraq via Amman, leaving tomorrow for the north near Solimaniya where the girl, her uncle and a third suspected case had been found.

As for the situation in Turkey, the WHO collaborating laboratory in the United Kingdom had confirmed that 12 of the 21 cases that were suspected from Turkey were indeed H5N1, so the toll at this stage was 12 confirmed cases, including four persons who had died.

A journalist repeated a request for a briefing on avian influenza and Mr. Simpson said one would be organized.

Concerning polio in Egypt, it was just over a year since Egypt had reported its last case of polio, and WHO hoped to be able to announce tomorrow that Egypt had now been polio free for a year, which would mean that polio would no longer be considered to be endemic in Egypt. A briefing would be organized on Wednesday, 1 February.

Other

Ron Redmond of the UN Refugee Agency said UNHCR yesterday signed separate tripartite agreements with the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Sudan to set up the legal framework for the voluntary return of 13,300 Sudanese refugees in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, as well as for 6,800 Congolese refugees in Sudan. UNHCR was planning to begin refugee return operations under these agreements in March. The agreements, which were signed in Kinshasa, came more than a year after the signing of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement that ended 21 years of civil war in South Sudan.

Mr. Redmond said since an agreement was reached between the Sri Lanka Government and the LTTE last week to hold new talks in Geneva, violence in the northeast of Sri Lanka was reported to have fallen significantly. However, tensions remained high in many areas and some population movement persisted.

Samar Shamoon of the World Intellectual Property Organization said a press briefing with Francis Gurry would be organized for Friday, 3 February on the patent cooperation treaty figures for 2005.

Jean Philippe Chauzy of the International Organization for Migration said an inaugural flight returning the first 50 Sudanese refugees who have been in southeastern Central African Republic for more than 16 years, would take place in the first week of February. The flight, the first of many to be organized by IOM, would be the first official return of Sudanese refugees by UNHCR following the signing of a tripartite agreement governing the return of Sudanese from the Central African Republic. About 300,000 Sudanese refugees registered or attended by UNHCR were living in countries neighbouring Sudan, including 10,000 in the Central African Republic.

Mr. Chauzy said an IOM study in Turkey revealing the impact of human trafficking on children and families was the backbone of a major IOM information campaign getting underway today in Turkey to raise awareness of the issue. More than one third of women trafficked to Turkey were mothers, according to the study "2005: Turkey, Trafficking and Trends". The report also found that illegal profits from trafficking to Turkey topped more than $ 1 billion each year. In Geneva, IOM and the British based non-governmental organization (NGO) Islamic Relief, yesterday signed an agreement allowing for greater cooperation between the two organizations.