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 Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees, the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the United Nations Children’s Fund, the World Food Programme and the International Organization for Migration.

South Sudan

Elisabeth Byrs for the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that in response to the humanitarian situation following violence in South Sudan’s Jonglei state, United Nations agencies with support from the United Nations Mission in South Sudan had launched a massive humanitarian emergency operation in Pibor to provide immediate assistance to the affected communities.

During the last 72 hours, assessments had been done in Pibor, Likuangole, Boma and Walgak, she said, and more were scheduled for Fertait and Bilait. Needs already reported were significant in all areas assessed and assumed to be significant in the areas yet to be visited, she explained. In this context the estimated caseload was expected to be around 50,000 people and a rapid response plan was being finalized by the responsible agencies.

She added that while the situation was currently calm, the influx of people returning to Pibor continued and by 5 January the number registered stood at 942 households (4,710 people) according to partners on the ground. In Boma in the southeastern part of Pibor County, some 1,700 people had been registered as displaced by 5 January. Monitoring for further violent incidents would continue, she said.

The 2012 United Nations Appeal for the Republic of South Sudan sought $763 million and was now eight per cent covered.

Gaëlle Sévenier for the World Food Programme (WFP) said there was great concern as the level of food insecurity reached crisis point. Millions of people, including women and children had fled violence and walked for days with nothing to eat or drink.

On 31 December, emergency rations were delivered to the people at Pibor, which would feed a thousand people for two weeks. On 3 January further dry rations for about 40 children were distributed in association with the Red Cross, and yesterday packages of cereal, oil and salt for 2,000 internally displaced people at Boma, of which more than 90 per cent were women and children. In the coming days, ration packs for 15 days would be distributed at Pibor to 7,000 people.

Reports on the ground also suggested instances of child mortality and kidnapping she said, which would hit hard a population which remained highly vulnerable due to loss of property, lack of agriculture, unexploded ordnance and high food and petrol prices. Plans put in place for the whole country by the WFP at the end of 2011 aimed to provide assistance to more than 2.7 million people affected by conflict.

Marixie Mercado for the United Nations Children’s Fund said she was aware of five children wounded during the violence being evacuated, one of which died, and verified reports of nine children abducted. In addition 45 unaccompanied minors had been registered. Unaccompanied children were extraordinarily vulnerable to abuse and abduction, she explained, so the focus was on returning them to their families as quickly as possible. Water, sanitation and hygiene were also particularly urgent for the displaced and supplies were being positioned on busy routes.

Answering a question, she said that South Sudan was clearly a huge development and emergency challenge with only two per cent of children fully immunized, severe acute malnutrition rates at eight per cent and just one third of the population with access to safe water.

William Spindler for the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres was travelling to South Sudan this weekend. He would be in the capital Juba on Saturday and visit a refugee site in Mabaan on Sunday.

UNHCR was supporting the government of the-newly-independent country to reintegrate some 660,000 returnees, including 360,000 South Sudanese who had come from Sudan and some 300,000 who had returned mostly from other neighbouring countries. In addition, recent fighting had caused some 75,000 Sudanese refugees to flee across the border into South Sudan, as well as some 23,500 into Ethiopia.

To assist the arriving refugees, UNHCR had started-airlifting relief supplies into Malakal and Mabaan, he said. And in this vein 16 flights had delivered family tents, kitchen sets, blankets, jerry cans, plastic sheets, sleeping mats, mosquito nets and other essential relief items, since 20 December. He also added that the airlift was ongoing and more assistance was needed.

Mr. Spindler continued saying the High Commissioner was to then will fly to Khartoum, the capital of Sudan on Tuesday (10 December). From there, he was scheduled to travel to Kassala in East Sudan where some 70,000 refugees, mostly of Eritrean origin, reside in 12 camps. During the visit discussions with the authorities would focus on programmes aimed at enhancing self-reliance, he said.

Answering a question, Ms. Momal-Vanian said it was very difficult to put a figure on the casualties resulting from the events in Jonglei State because many people had fled in the bush. The Secretary-General had stressed the importance of addressing the root causes of the conflict and to uphold a commitment to the rule of law and respect for human rights.

Uganda

William Spindler for the High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said the United Nations refugee agency had ended its assistance to nearly two million internally displaced people (IDPs) in Uganda as the vast majority had returned home. Last week, the UNHCR office in Gulu, northern Uganda was closed after five years of assisting and protecting people displaced by fighting between the Ugandan army and the rebel Lord's Resistance Army. At the conflict's peak in 2005, there were 1.84 million IDPs living in 251 camps across 11 districts of northern Uganda.



Saudi Arabia

Rupert Colville for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said his office was alarmed at the significant increase in the use of the death penalty in Saudi Arabia in 2011. According to reports, the number of executions almost tripled last year compared with 2010, he said, and just last month (December), yet another woman was executed on charges of sorcery and witchcraft.

He added it was even more worrying that court proceedings often reportedly fell far short of international fair trial standards, and the use of torture as a means to obtain confessions appeared rampant. The OHCHR therefore called on the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to respect international standards guaranteeing due process and protection of the rights of those facing the death penalty, to progressively restrict the use of the death penalty and to reduce the number of offences for which it may be imposed.

Some of the offences for which the death penalty was given included drugs-related offences, murder, sorcery, blasphemy, rape, adultery and apostasy he said. Methods of execution were principally by beheading, he said.

There were also grave concerns at the sentence of cross amputation handed down to six men convicted on charges of highway robbery, he said, which would involve amputation of the men's right hands and left feet. He again called on the authorities to halt the use of such cruel, inhuman, degrading punishment as, being a party to the Convention against Torture, Saudi Arabia was bound by the absolute prohibition against the use of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Answering questions he said it was believed there were 27 executions in the country in 2010, rising to 70 or over in 2011, women were a small proportion of the executed. The Committee Against Torture (CAT) had already made a recommendation to the Kingdom, expressing concern over the sentencing to, and the imposition of, corporal punishments by judicial and administrative authorities, including in particular flogging and amputation of limbs.

In general the United Nations was opposed to the death penalty, he noted, and repeated the call for all states to at least establish a moratorium on the practice, a position two-thirds of United Nations members now embraced. While there was a general trend towards the cessation or decrease in the application of the death penalty, his Office had wanted to draw attention to a reverse trend in Saudi Arabia.

Syria

Responding to a question, Rupert Colville for the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said the report from Commission of Inquiry on Syria had provided well documented evidence of the use of torture.

He also added that discussions in relation to United Nations technical cooperation with the Arab League in Syria were in progress.







Libya

Marixie Mercado for the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said more than 1.2 million children had returned to school in Libya, 10 months after evacuating classrooms because of the fighting during the country's popular uprising. A total of 27 million textbooks had been printed, 10 million of which are already being distributed by the Ministry of Education throughout the country. Severely distressed children and their families were receiving psycho-social support from UNICEF and work was underway to track internally-displaced and other vulnerable children to ensure that they were enrolled, she said.

Support over the coming year would be for pre-primary education, developing standards for quality including issues related to gender disparities, minorities and children with disabilities and improving the education information system. The first step to this would be this month’s nationwide school-based survey to collect data for planning around schools, equipment, supplies, teaching materials, teachers and enrollment.

Vietnam

Jumbe Omari Jumbe for the International Organization for Migration said a new study looking at the migration of Vietnamese nationals showed that 4 million Vietnamese people were now living in 103 countries around the world, 80 per cent of them in developed countries such as the United States or Europe.

The importance of Vietnamese international migration and the role of the Vietnamese diaspora were highlighted in the study which detailed how remittances to Viet Nam had jumped dramatically from $135 million in 1991 to $8 billion in 2010. The study also highlighted recent trends in Vietnamese marriage migration and human trafficking of Vietnamese nationals abroad, including women and children being sold to brothels in region. Several hundreds of women and children on average were cited in the study as being trafficked abroad each year, he said, from hotspots in the country such as the Viet Nam-China border provinces.

World Food Programme donations

Gaëlle Sévenier for the World Food Programme (WFP) said the German Government donated more than $194 million to more than 35 operations of the WFP in 2011, the highest ever annual contribution to the agency.

She also noted that the online hunger-fighting game, Freerice.com, had now reached one million registered players.

Geneva activities

Ms. Momal-Vanian said the first meeting covered by the information service would be the session of the Committee on the Rights of the Child, from January 16. The Conference on Disarmament began its work on January 24.

Gaelle Sévenier for the World Food Programme said a commemorative exhibition honouring five decades of partnership between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the World Food Programme would open on 12 January at 13:00 on the Mezzanine of the E Building at the Palais des Nations. Speakers included the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva and the Permanent Representative of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.