HIGHLIGHTS OF THE NOON BRIEFING BY STEPHANE DUJARRIC,

SPOKESMAN FOR SECRETARY-GENERAL BAN KI-MOON

WEDNESDAY, 7 SEPTEMBER 2016

IN LAOS, SECRETARY-GENERAL HAILS EVER STRONGER TIES BETWEEN U.N., A.S.E.A.N.

• The Secretary-General is in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic today where he participated in the ASEAN-UN Summit. In his remarks, he stressed that the Association of South East Asian Nations’ vital and growing role in ensuring peace and stability in the region and beyond, and praised the progress made in building strong ties between the two organizations over the past ten years.  He said that the ASEAN-UN Plan of Action will advance the two major agreements reached last year: Agenda 2030 and the Paris Agreement on climate change. He strongly encouraged ASEAN members to establish a coordinating mechanism to ensure the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals, and urged them to ratify the Paris Agreement. Laos deposited its instrument of ratification with him today, and the Secretary-General commended the country for being the first ASEAN community member to do so.
• The Secretary-General also commended ASEAN members for addressing regional tensions through peaceful dialogue and said he looked forward to the early conclusion of the Code of Conduct for the South China Sea.
• Before the Summit, the Secretary-General visited the Training Centre of the Lao National Unexploded Ordnance Programme and participated in the launch of SDG18 for Lao, which is a national SDG goal aimed at removing unexploded ordnance that impacts millions of people across the country. On top of these activities, he launched the Lao-UN Partnership Framework, and met with the country’s President and Prime Minister.

WESTERN SAHARA: U.N. MISSION REPORTS SITUATION IN BUFFER AREA REMAINS TENSE

• The situation in the Guerguerat area of Western Sahara, inside the Buffer Strip, remains tense, with road construction activity initiated by Morocco in the area south of the Berm being opposed by Frente Polisario. Despite the ongoing efforts of the UN Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara (MINURSO), to de-escalate the situation with the parties, security elements from both Morocco and the Frente Polisario have maintained their positions on the road, approximately 120 metres apart from each other. The UN Mission has deployed unarmed military observers into a position between the parties in an effort to maintain calm.
• In parallel, we have been actively engaging at senior levels with the parties and key Member States to urge restraint and identify options for an acceptable solution to the current crisis. Any resumption of hostilities, with the potential to have wider regional implications, remains of significant concern.

U.N. RELIEF WING VOICES CONCERN OVER NEW DISPLACEMENT OF 100,000 PEOPLE BY CLASHES IN SYRIA’S HAMA GOVERNORATE

• The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) says it is concerned with the new displacement of some 100,000 people in Syria’s Hama governorate, due to fighting between Government forces and non-state armed groups.
• The mass displacement took place between 28 August and 5 September from northern rural Hama and the north-western countryside of Hama towards neighbouring villages and Hama City itrself.
• The UN and its humanitarian partners have delivered food, nutritional supplies, water and sanitation and other items for about 15,000 people on an inter-agency convoy that went to Hama on 4 September. Distribution of aid is being done in collaboration with the Syrian Arab Red Crescent. The UN has also conducted a field visit to visit two distribution centres to better understand the situation on the ground and continue planning humanitarian response.

AFGHANISTAN: U.N. RELIEF CHIEF CALLS FOR STEPPED UP SUPPORT TO 1 MILLION PEOPLE EXPECTED TO BE UPROOTED BY YEAR’S END

• In Kabul today, the UN Relief Coordinator, Stephen O’Brien, called on the international community to urgently scale up support to over one million people who are expected to be displaced internally and across borders by the end of the year.
• More than 1.1 million people have been displaced from their homes by the conflict in Afghanistan, including more than 245,000 people since the beginning of 2016. More than 5,000 displaced Afghans are returning from Pakistan every day.
• The humanitarian community in Afghanistan will launch a Flash Appeal requesting some $150 million to meet the needs of people on the move, including Afghan returnees.
• Mr. O’Brien said that the international community must remain steadfast in support of the people of Afghanistan and to prevent more than 126,000 children from dying every year.

NEARLY 30 MILLION CHILDREN DRIVEN FROM THEIR HOMES BY VIOLENCE, CONFLICT – NEW U.N.I.C.E.F. REPORT

• A new UNICEF report finds that 28 million children – a third of whom are refugees – have been driven from their homes by violence and conflict within borders.
• Children represent a growing proportion of those seeking refuge outside their countries of birth. Last year, nearly half of all child refugees under UNHCR’s protection came from Syria and Afghanistan.
• UNICEF Executive Director Anthony Lake said that indelible images of individual children – Aylan Kurdi’s small body washed up on a beach after drowning at sea or Omran Daqneesh’s stunned and bloody face as he sat in an ambulance after his home was destroyed – have shocked the world.
• He added that each picture, each girl or boy, represents many millions of children in danger – and this demands that our compassion for the individual children we see be matched with action for all children.
• The report also found that Turkey hosts the largest total number of recent refugees and very likely the largest number of child refugees in the world. Relative to its population, Lebanon hosts the largest number of refugees by an overwhelming margin, with roughly 1 in 5 people in Lebanon being a refugee.

MINISTERIAL-LEVEL MEETING ON U.N. PEACEKEEPING SET TO TAKE PLACE IN LONDON

• A UN Peacekeeping Defence Ministerial event will be taking place tomorrow in London, hosted by the United Kingdom. This is a follow-up to the Leaders’ Summit on Peacekeeping hosted by the Secretary-General and US President Barack Obama last year during the General Assembly.
• During the event, Defence Ministers will review progress on the implementation of last year’s pledges and announce new commitments. They will also focus on operationalising pledges through better training, force generation, pre-deployment processes, doctrine, equipment, leadership, performance, lessons learned mechanisms and rapid response capabilities. The meeting will develop a shared plan on how peacekeeping can help implement the Women, Peace and Security agenda and discuss how to prevent and respond to sexual exploitation and abuse allegations. The UN will be represented by three Under-Secretaries-General: Herve Ladsous, the Head of the Peacekeeping Department; Atul Khare, the Head of the Department of Field Support; and Jane Holl Lute, who as you know is the Special Advisor for the Secretary-General on Sexual Exploitation and Abuse.
• This evening, the first UN Military Gender Advocate of the Year Award will be presented in London to Major Aichatou Ousmane Issaka from Niger. Nine peacekeeping missions nominated peacekeepers to be considered for the Award and they were assessed on how they integrated the principles of UN Security Council resolution 1325 on women, peace and security into military functional areas. 

SPEAKING OUT AGAINST ANTI-SEMITISM, SECRETARY-GENERAL ‘APPALLED’ BY USE OF RELIGIOUS BIGOTRY FOR POLITICAL AIMS

• In a video message to the High-Level Forum on Anti-Semitism today, the Secretary-General said that it is the world’s oldest, most pervasive and deadliest form of hatred.
• He noted that despite the lessons of history and the horror of Holocaust, Jews continue to be targeted for murder and abuse solely because they are Jews.
• The Secretary-General stressed that violence against people because of their religion identity or beliefs is an assault on the core values of the United Nations.
• He added that alongside a global rise in anti-Semitism, we are also seeing many other alarming forms of discrimination – in particular hatred and stereotyping directed at today’s refugees and migrants.
• The Secretary-General says he is appalled by those who fan the flames of religious bigotry for political aims.

U.N. CHAMBER MUSIC SOCIETY TO HOLD CONCERT TO HONOUR 9/11 VICTIMS

• There will be a concert by the UN Chamber Music Society of the UN Staff Recreation Council in remembrance of the victims of 9/11 and that will take place on the evening of 11 September at the All Saints Episcopal Church in New York.

NUMBER OF MEMBER STATES HAVING PAID U.N. DUES IN FULL REACHES 108

• Chad, Niger and Uruguay have paid their UN dues in full, making the total number of Member States having done so 108.