A F R I C A W A T C H

RIO + 10

Earth Summit review set for South Africa

Ten years after the UN Conference on Environment and Development, a review of progress made in implementing its goals will be held in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 2002. The UN confirmed the venue on 8 December, in response to an offer by President Thabo Mbeki to host the event. South African Deputy Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism Rejoice Mabudafhasi said that holding the meeting in South Africa should be a major boost for the continent as a whole. No official date has been set, but sources at the South African Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism point to June as a likely time.

The summit will bring together world governments, concerned citizens, UN agencies, multilateral institutions and other major actors to review progress over the past 10 years in implementing the Agenda 21 goals set by the "Earth Summit," as it was known, held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in June 1992. The Johannesburg "Rio + 10" meeting also will set further goals for the next decade. "It is therefore significant that it should take place in the developing world, where the issues of development and the environment are fundamental to the daily struggle against poverty," Mr. Mabudafhasi said.

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FINANCING DEVELOPMENT

Panel to recommend increased resource flows

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan announced on 15 December that he had appointed former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo to head a panel to examine what the international community can do to help rescue more than 1 billion people from abject poverty. "Development cannot happen without resources, especially financial resources," Mr. Annan observed.

The panel is mandated to come back by May 2001 with recommendations for concrete, achievable steps that can be taken by governments, business, civil society and international institutions to augment the flow of resources to the developing world. The proposals will be submitted to a UN conference on "financing for development," mandated by the General Assembly, to be held in 2002 in collaboration with the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, World Trade Organization and representatives of the private sector and civil society. While the more successful developing countries have been able to mobilize private investment, one goal of both the panel and the conference will be to determine how such private flows can be increased to all developing countries.

Other members of the panel include Mr. Majid Osman, a former finance minister of Mozambique who now heads a commercial bank; Mr. Robert Rubin, former US treasury secretary; Mr. David Bryer, director of OXFAM, UK, an international non-governmental relief and development organization; and Ms. Mary Chinery-Hess, former deputy director-general of the International Labour Organization.

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BURUNDI

Donors pledge $440 mn

An international donor’s conference for Burundi ended on 12 December with pledges of $440 mn for urgent humanitarian, reconstruction and development aid. The Paris gathering was convened by the UN Development Programme and the World Bank at the request of former South African President Nelson Mandela. The conference is part of an effort by the international community to help end a civil war that has taken an estimated 200,000 lives. A peace agreement mediated by Mr. Mandela was signed in Arusha, Tanzania, on 28 August 2000. However, some guerrilla movements from the majority Hutu population have refused to participate and fighting has continued. On 21 December, the UN Security Council condemned the continuing violence and urged the combatants to join the peace process.

African countries imposed sanctions on Burundi in 1996 after a military coup installed the government of General Paul Buyoya, comprised mainly of Tutsi. The sanctions were suspended in 1999 to support peace efforts. International Alert, a UK-based non-governmental organization, has pressed for greater reconstruction and development assistance to support peace-building. In a June 2000 report on access to education in the ethnically-divided country, the group said, "the onus is on the international community" to ensure that aid becomes a "peace dividend in which all Burundians can share."

Appointments
	Secretary-General Kofi Annan has appointed Mr. Amara Essy, former minister of foreign affairs of Côte d'Ivoire, as his special envoy to the Central African Republic and the Republic of Congo. Mr. Essy served as his country's permanent representative to the UN from 1981 to 1990. In 1988/89 he served as vice-president of the General Assembly, in January 1990 as president of the Security Council and in 1994/95 as president of the General Assembly.
Mr. Annan has also appointed Mr. Ruud Lubbers, a former prime minister of the Netherlands, as the new UN High Commissioner for Refugees. He will succeed Ms. Sadako Ogata of Japan, to whom the Secretary-General paid tribute for her "remarkable" 10 years as high commissioner. Mr. Lubbers, a minister of state of the Netherlands at the time of his UN appointment, was prime minister for 12 years, from 1982 to 1994	.
	Ms. Thoraya Ahmed Obaid is the new executive director of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), succeeding Ms. Nafis Sadik, who held the post for 13 years. Ms. Obaid, from Saudi Arabia, has worked with UNFPA since 1998 as director of the Division for Arab States and Europe. Before that she had worked in various capacities at the UN’s Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia, including as deputy executive secretary between 1993 and 1998.