REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE

Corinne Momal-Vanian, the Director of the United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the briefing which was also attended by Spokespersons for the World Health Organization, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the International Organization for Migration.

World Health Assembly

Fadela Chaib of the World Health Organization said among the highlights of the World Health Assembly meeting today was the speech of Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina at 11.30 a.m. and the address by Bill Gates, the Co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Ms. Momal-Vanian said that Bill Gates and WHO Director-General Margaret Chan would give a press conference at 12.30 p.m. in Room III. Ms. Chaib added that Mr. Gates and Ms. Chan would deliver brief remarks and that Ms. Chan would be available for a few questions before attending the technical briefing on health and radiation. Journalists were invited to participate in the technical briefing which would take place from 12.30 p.m. to 2.15 p.m.

English and French copies of Mr. Gates’ press release would be provided to journalists. If available, advance copies of his speech and Ms. Hasina’s address would also be distributed to the press.

Hundreds return to Libya in desperate bid to reach Europe by boat

Melissa Fleming of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said that hundreds of people who had fled Libya for Tunisia and Egypt in recent weeks had crossed back into Libya with the intention of boarding boats to reach Europe. Among them were refugees, including members of the Somali, Ethiopian and Eritrean communities in the camps at Shousha near Tunisia’s border with Libya.

UNHCR was in ongoing discussions with these communities, highlighting the risks involved in this journey at sea as well as the risks they took in crossing the Libyan border. In March, UNHCR learnt from the Somali community at Shousha camp that two Somalis were killed in Libya after they had been shot after crossing back from Tunisia.

To date around 14,000 people had arrived by boat in Italy and Malta from Libya. Of this number 1,669 arrived on Friday and Saturday. Based on accounts from survivors and family members, at least 1,200 people were unaccounted for since March 25, said Ms. Fleming.

UNHCR had met with refugees in Tripoli who were planning to make this treacherous journey. They were all fully aware of the high death toll, but told UNHCR that they felt they had nothing to lose. One Eritrean man said that he would rather die trying to reach safety than continue to live in danger. Many had been living in Libya for several years; they had faced periods of detention and come from countries like Eritrea and Somalia where safe return was not a possibility.

Ms. Fleming said that UNHCR repeated its call to all vessels on the Mediterranean to consider all boats departing Libya to be in need of assistance, and likely to face a situation of distress at some point in the journey.

UNHCR estimated that 6,000 people would need resettlement from the borders of Egypt and Tunisia in the coming months. So far 11 resettlement countries had offered over 900 resettlement places, with the United States being the most significant.

Ms. Fleming said that the short film on arrivals in Lampedusa which had been shown to journalists would be available on UNHCR’s FTP server and be sent to the European Broadcasting Union and UNifeed.

Addressing sexual violence against women and girls in Haiti’s displacement camps

Jemini Pandya of the International Organization for Migration said there was an increase in reported cases of sexual and gender-based violence in Haiti’s displacement camps, where still 680,000 people were living after the devastating earthquake last year. The data was provided by police, health facilities as well as national and international organizations.

However, it was unclear whether the rise in reported cases was due to a real increase in this type of violence or growing trust between survivors and the police/service providers, as access to services was increasing.

Convictions were extremely difficult to secure, as victims did not file charges for fear of reprisal attacks and because law enforcers were poorly trained. However, one thing was sure: women and girls were the greatest victims of sexual and gender-based violence in Haiti. Of the 60 victims of this type of violence who had been helped by IOM since last year, all but 3 per cent were women and young girls.

Sexual abuse of child victims of trafficking had also come to light during IOM’s work. Since January this year, IOM had identified close to 400 cases of trafficked children living in the displacement camps in extreme poverty, with about 50 per cent of them having suffered physical and sexual abuse by the time they had been rescued.

More cases had been uncovered and rescued in the most poverty-stricken areas of Port-au-Prince and in the provinces where so many victims of the earthquake had fled. In addition, 30 trafficked Haitian children had been identified and rescued in the neighbouring Dominican Republic.

Working to lessen the vulnerability of women and girls to sexual gender-based violence in the camps, IOM was using funds from the Swedish Government to improve lighting in key areas in 20 priority displacement sites across Port-au-Prince’s seven communes, as well as to carry out skills training programmes to help young women become more self-sufficient and less vulnerable to victimization.

IOM had received additional funding from the US Government and UNICEF which allowed to scale-up IOM’s counter-trafficking work in Haiti and assist up to 1,000 victims of trafficking, Ms. Pandya underscored.

Green Star Awards honouring environmental heroes working in disasters and other emergencies

Elisabeth Byrs of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said at the back of the room was a press release on the Green Star Awards (under embargo until 18 May at 9 a.m. GMT).

The Award was awarded by OCHA and UNEP together with Green Cross International, an environmental organisation founded in 1993by Mikhail Gorbachev. The awards ceremony would be held in Bern, Switzerland.

Conference on Disarmament

Corinne Momal-Vanian said that the Conference on Disarmament would resume its work towards 11 a.m. this morning.

The Conference would be asked to concur with the Secretary-General’s decision to appoint the newly elected Director-General of UNOG, Mr. Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, as Secretary-General of the Conference.

Conference Members and Observers were also expected to take the floor, notably on the question of expanding membership of the Conference.

A further plenary meeting might be held on Thursday, 19 May in presence of the newly elected Secretary-General of the Conference on Disarmament.

Human Rights Committees

The Committee against Torture was being presented the report of Turkmenistan this morning. This afternoon, Ghana would answer the questions asked by the Committee yesterday. Finland, Mauritius and Monaco were scheduled for consideration later this week, to be followed by Ireland next week.

The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights was holding closed meetings during this last week of its session in order to adopt its concluding observations on the five reports examined since Monday, 2 May (Turkey, Moldova, Germany, Yemen and Russia). The concluding observations were expected to be made public on Friday, 20 May.

Press Conferences

Ms. Momal-Vanian said that OCHA would give a press conference on the humanitarian situation in Libya today at 2.30 p.m. in Room III.

This would be followed by a press conference with Dr. Fatima Albalooshi, Minister of Social Development and acting Minister of Health of Bahrain, who would brief journalists on the situation in Bahrain at 3.30 p.m. in Room III.