Friday, 16 January 2004
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Annan Urges Developing Countries To Push For Trade Negotiations

The UN Secretary-General today urged the Group of developing countries known as the G77 to push for trade negotiations between the developed and developing countries. Speaking at a meeting to hand over the chairmanship of the G77 from Morocco to Qatar, the Secretary-General said the events of 2003 distracted the world's leaders from dealing with other issues. He stressed that fair trade can help meet some of the millennium development set by world leaders in 2000 including the reduction of hunger, poverty and disease by 2015.

"We must move quickly to give developing nations free and fair access to global markets and to spare them from subsidized competition. Rich countries must recognize that it is in their self interest to open up trade on fair terms."

The Secretary-General said this year should also be one of renewed commitment to the most vulnerable members of the international community in small island developing states and the least developed countries.

No Move Towards Peace in the Middle East: UN Chief of Political Affairs:

The Head of the UN Department of Political Affairs, Kieran Prendegast, has said there has been little or no substantive move towards peace in the Middle East. Briefing the Security Council today, he said the situation is tragic and frustrating because the solution is evident and Israeli and Palestinian sides should take parallel steps to advance peace. Mr. Prendergast reminded the Council that the government of Israel's most basic concern remains security. He said the Palestinian Authority should take effective steps to halt all acts of terror and violence against Israelis. The Palestinian's most basic concern, are the end of occupation and the establishment of an independent sovereign and viable state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

"In response, and also as a necessary first step, the government of Israel should take effective action to halt settlement expansion, the construction of the separation barrier and all actions that work against the contiguity and therefore viability of the state."

Mr. Prendegast said despite the initial contact between the new Palestinian government and the government of Israel, both parties had continued to ignore each other's core concerns.

UNHCR Confirms that Ethiopian Anuaks Are Fleeing to Sudan

A team sent by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, UNHCR, to Sudan has confirmed that Ethiopian and Sudanese Anuaks are fleeing violence in Ethiopia to Sudan. The Anuaks are reported to have started to flee reprisals following killings in mid-December in the Gambella region of western Ethiopia. UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond says residents reported that 100 to 200 people were arriving daily after walking for a week to reach the border. Mr. Redmond says they appear to be in reasonably good health.

"However they are arriving with no possessions, not even carrying water. They have just been drinking straight out of rivers and streams. There are some children among the group, women and elderly as well, but mostly are young men aged between 14 and 25."

UNHCR says local residents are providing some help to the new arrivals who are also foraging in the countryside for food.

No Travel Alert Yet for Vietnam: WHO

The World Health Organization, WHO, says it is not yet advising people not to go to Vietnam as a result of bird flu. WHO spokesperson Fadela Chaib says a team from the agency is assisting local authorities to figure out how three people contracted the disease.

"It seems that the people who were laboratory confirmed were infected by an avian virus. But there is no evidence of human to human transmission. So it is not time for us now to the country."

IOM Launches Reintegration of Former Croatian Soldiers

The International Organization for Migration, IOM, has launched a programme to reintegrate 3,000 demobilized soldiers in Croatia. The programme will provide vocational training to the former combatants to enable them to reintegrate into civil society.