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1 February 2000

The General Assembly held a brief meeting this morning, at the outset of which, Assembly President Theo-Ben Gurirab offered, on behalf of the Assembly, condolences to the bereaved families, relatives and friends of all those whose lives ended so tragically in the crash of a Kenyan Airways plane off the coast of Cote d’Ivoire on Sunday, and of an Alaskan Airlines plane off the California coast yesterday.

The President announced the designation of the two Vice-Chairpersons of the open-ended working group of the General Assembly on the causes of conflict and the promotion of durable peace and sustainable development in Africa, which he will chair. They are: Ambassador Kishore Mahbubani, Permanent Representative of Singapore; and Ambassador Inocencio Arias, Permanent Representative of Spain. The working group is scheduled to meet in March.

The Assembly appointed Mr. Juichi Takahara of Japan as a member of the 16-member Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions (ACABQ), through 31 December 2001. Mr. Takahara will serve the remainder of the term of Mr. Fumiaki Toya, also of Japan, who has resigned. The related document is A/54/101/Rev.1/Add.1.

Also, this morning, the President drew attention to a letter from the Secretary-General (A/54/730), containing a list of 52 Member States that are in arrears in the payment of their financial contributions within the terms of Article 19 of the Charter. The Assembly took note of the information.

Under Article 19, "A Member of the United Nations which is in arrears in the payment of its financial contributions to the Organization shall have no vote in the General Assembly if the amount of its arrears equals or exceeds the amount of the contributions due from it for the preceding two full years". Copies of the document, in French, are available in room 378.

This morning, the President met with the Permanent Representative of Pakistan, Ambassador Inamul Haque, for a farewell call. He then met with the incoming and outgoing Presidents of the Executive Board of the World Food Programme, Ambassador Mohammed Saiid Nouri-Naeeni of Iran and Ms. Laurie Tracey of the United States. He met, at noon, with the representative of the Polisario, Ambassador Ahmed Boukhari. This afternoon, he will meet with the new President of the International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia, Judge Claude Jorda.

Question: The Secretary-General and senior UN officials have given high priority to the situation in Chechnya, yet the President of the General Assembly has been silent on the issue. Why is that?

Answer: Your point is taken, and I will refer your question to the President.