HIGHLIGHTS OF THE NOON BRIEFING
BY MICHELE MONTAS
SPOKESPERSON FOR THE SECRETARY-GENERAL
UN HEADQUARTERS,
Monday,
September 28, 2009
NEGOTIATIONS ON
CLIMATE CHANGE DEAL RESUMES IN BANGKOK
UN negotiations on a comprehensive, effective and fair
international climate change deal
resumed today in Bangkok. This is the penultimate round of negotiations
ahead of the Copenhagen Conference.
Addressing delegates, Yvo de Boer, Executive Secretary
of the UN Climate Change Secretariat, warned that there was "no plan B" for
failure at Copenhagen. "If we do not realize plan A, the future will hold us
to account for it," he added. He said that time was pressing and had almost
run out.
But de Boer also said that he believed the pace of the
negotiations could and would now match the increasing pace of action seen at
the highest level, during the
Summit convened last week in New York by the Secretary-General.
The two-week Bangkok Climate Change talks are being
attended by more than four thousand participants, including government
delegates from 177 countries.
HUMAN RIGHTS
COUNCIL TO TAKE UP GAZA REPORTS TOMORROW
Tomorrow morning in Geneva, the
Human Rights Council will hear a presentation by Justice Richard
Goldstone on the report of the UN Fact-Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict.
Goldstone briefed correspondents on that report two weeks ago here in New
York.
Goldstone will be joined by all four members of the
Mission: Ms. Hina Jilani, Professor Christine Chinkin and Colonel Desmond
Travers. Later in the day, also in Geneva, they will give a press
conference.
Also tomorrow, the Human Rights Council will hear a
briefing by High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay, on her own
report on Gaza, as well as statements from Israel and Palestine. The Human
Rights Council will also hold an interactive discussion.
In terms of next steps, there is a draft resolution on
Gaza currently before the Human Rights Council. Action on that text is
expected this Thursday or Friday.
SECURITY
COUNCIL TO MEET ON AFGHANISTAN, COTE D’IVOIRE
The
Security Council has scheduled a briefing tomorrow morning on the work
of the UN Assistance Mission for Afghanistan (UNAMA).
Kai Eide, the Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Afghanistan,
will brief Council members on the work of that mission. And Mr Eide intends
to speak to you at the Council stakeout following that meeting.
The Council also intends to hold a ministerial-level
meeting on Côte d’Ivoire tomorrow morning. The Secretary-General’s Special
Representative for that country, Yoon-jin Choi, will be attending the
meeting.
DELIVERY OF
ELECTORAL MATERIALS BEGINS IN COTE D’IVOIRE
The Mission in Cote d’Ivoire (ONUCI)
has begun preparations for the delivery of electoral materials across the
country.
This morning, it supervised and led the removal of
voting equipment from the Abidjan seaport to the warehouses of the
Independent Electoral Commission. This first batch of materials will be
distributed in the east and south of the country, with further deliveries
for the central region and the capital Yamoussoukro expected on October 1st.
Elections are planned for 29 November.
MISSION IN
DARFUR RENEWS APPEAL FOR RELEASE OF ABDUCTED PEACEKEEPERS
The UN/African Union Mission in Darfur (UNAMID) has
renewed its appeal for the release of two of its staff members abducted
at gunpoint 35 days ago from their homes in West Darfur. The Mission notes
that the Sudanese government is also continuing its efforts to secure their
release.
Meanwhile, the Mission’s police advisors this weekend
led a workshop on community policing in the Duma camp for the internally
displaced. That camp is located in Nyala, in South Darfur. Close to 100 camp
residents took part in the workshop which sought to prepare volunteers,
including religious leaders and some 30 women, to help enforce basic law,
human rights and safety rules in the camp.
HAITI: ATTACK
ON LEADING JUDGE IS CONDEMNED
The UN Mission
in Haiti,
MINUSTAH, has condemned the attack against a judge late last week.
Maitre Jean Carves, who worked on many sensitive cases,
had recently taken up additional ones involving kidnapping. He was shot and
wounded in Port-au-Prince last Thursday.
The Mission says it will lend its full support to the
Haitian national police to bring to justice the perpetrators of this crime.
Asked about reports alleging
the excessive use of force by UN peacekeepers in Haiti against one
individual, the Spokeswoman noted that an investigation was conducted by a
UN military officer, a UNPOL officer, a special investigator and a senior
human rights officer on that specific case. The investigation team examined
carefully all the allegations made by that person who had been detained by
UN Peacekeepers during a routine patrol on 9 September 2009 in a street near
his residence in Cité Soleil; that individual was found to be in possession
of 310 grams marijuana.
Montas said that, based on
all their interviews and the medical reports of two doctors, including X-ray
and blood tests, the team concluded that the individual had neither been
beaten nor tortured. He was handed over to the Police Nationale d'Haiti.
MINUSTAH later learned that he had been released.
U.N. AGENCIES
RUSH RELIEF AID INTO STORM-BATTERED PHILIPPINES
The Office of the Coordination for Humanitarian Affairs
says that tropical Storm ‘Ondoy,’ which made landfall near Quezon
province in the Philippines, has resulted in 73 deaths and a rising number
of missing and injured people. A state of calamity has been declared in
eight regions.
At the request of the Philippines authorities, OCHA has
dispatched a disaster response advisor to the country. Other humanitarian
staff in the UN country office will operate from the disaster operations
centre in the coming days in order to ensure proper coordination with the
Government.
UNICEF has
released 2,000 non-food items kits and is assessing the need for further
kits and water and sanitation support. The World Food Programme is preparing
to assist with food packages.
WFP is
working closely with the authorities in the Philippines, assisting
thousands of Filipinos whose lives were devastated after Saturday’s deadly
tropical storm. As an initial step, WFP will provide vital food
rations to approximately 180,000 Filipinos in the worst-affected
areas, according to a statement by its Executive Director, Josette Sheeran.
DROUGHT AFFECTS
2.5 MILLION PEOPLE IN GUATEMALA
The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
(OCHA) says that the effects of the El Niño weather pattern have prolonged
the drought, which has caused a reduction in agricultural production,
affecting approximately 2.5 million people in 21 municipalities.
The World Food Programme (WFP) will provide food
assistance, estimated at some 10,600 metric tons, to some 45,000 families
through their “food for work” programme. WFP has allocated another 200
metric tons of food aid to meet emergency food needs for vulnerable
populations in the departments of Baja Verapaz, Zacapa and El Progreso.
Meanwhile, the UN Development Programme (UNDP) intends
to strengthen its early warning system for monitoring nutrition in the
country.
MORE COMPLEX
WARS PRESENT GREATER CHALLENGES FOR HUMANITARIAN RELIEF WORK
Humanitarian efforts are increasingly put at risk as
global conflicts become more complex – involving state armies, militias and
insurgents. That’s the
warning given by Antonio Guterres, the head of the UN refugee agency,
(UNHCR), when he addressed the annual session of the UNHCR’s governing
Executive Committee in Geneva today.
He said it has become difficult and dangerous to
provide humanitarian relief in an environment where the line separating the
civilian from the military has become blurred.
Guterres cited the situation in Pakistan earlier this
year, when three UNHCR staff members were shot and killed, and one was
kidnapped and later released. He added that such incidents undermined relief
operations and humanitarian action in general.
Guterres also criticized some countries that deny
access to asylum procedures for refugees.
BAN KI-MOON
URGES PROGRESS IN BUENOS AIRES TALKS ON COMBATTING DESERTIFICATION
The high level segment of the Ninth Session of the
Conference of Parties to the United Nations Convention to Combat
Desertification began in Buenos Aires today, and the Secretary-General has a
message today encouraging progress in those deliberations.
Expanding deserts suffocate livelihoods and ways of
life, he warns. The more than 2 billion people who live on the world’s
drylands are also among the poorest and most vulnerable, and often the least
able to cope. There is only one way forward, he argues: We must strengthen
our ability to adapt to a changing climate.
OUTLOOK FOR
AFRICAN AGRICULTURE IMPROVING
The outlook for agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa is
improving, says the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). It also
adds that the recent positive performance is indicating a break with the
past. FAO reminds that a “concerted and purposeful policy action” is
required to maintain this momentum.
FAO’s Assistant Director-General welcomes this news and
underlines that “agriculture is the backbone of overall growth for the
majority of countries in the region and essential for poverty reduction and
food security”.
RWANDA:
EXTRADITED GENOCIDE SUSPECT PLEADS NOT GUILTY
A former Rwandan mayor has pleaded not guilty to
genocide charges brought against him by the Prosecutor of the International
Criminal for Rwanda (ICTR). A fugitive since his June 2001 indictment,
Grégoire Ndahimana was arrested in August in North Kivu, in the Democratic
Republic of Congo in the course of a joint UN/DRC operation. He was
transferred to the Tribunal last week.
The Tribunal says he helped lure ethnic Tutsis into a
church building in the town of Kivumu in April 1994 and then unleashed
killing mobs on them.
The Tribunal also heard oral arguments this morning in
the appeal case of Protais Zigiranyirazo, who was found guilty of genocide
in December 2008. The accused, a former high-ranking member of parliament,
is the brother-in-law of the late Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana.
**Our guest at the noon briefing today was B. Lynn
Pascoe, Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, who briefed on peace and
security issues during the general debate.
Office of the Spokesperson for the Secretary-General
United Nations, S-378
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