United Nations Daily Highlights, 98-03-10

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From: The United Nations Home Page at <http://www.un.org> - email: unnews@un.org

DAILY HIGHLIGHTS

Tuesday, 10 March 1998

HEADLINES

• United Nations and Iraq continue talks on expanded "oil-for- food" programme.
• United Nations Secretary-General says return of Sierra Leonean President strengthens democracy in Africa.
• Under-Secretary-General for Management says United Nations cash flow "weak and getting weaker".
• Prosecutor of International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia is gathering information on Kosovo.
• United Nations refugee agency is uncertain about scale of displacement of Albanians in Kosovo.
• Dragoljub Kunarac pleads guilty to rape charge before International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia.
• United Nations refugee agency brings home first groups of Malian refugees from Niger.
• Malnutrition likely to increase in Democratic People's Republic of Korea, United Nations food agency warns.

Under the current programme, Iraq is allowed to export $2 billion worth of oil every six months and to use part of the revenues for humanitarian aid to alleviate the effects of the sanctions. The Security Council recently raised the export ceiling to $5.2 billion, which will take effect only after the Secretary-General has approved a plan for distributing the aid submitted by the Iraqis.

The Secretary-General's Spokesman, Fred Eckhard, said the discussions of the distribution plan were likely to conclude by Wednesday morning. Iraq's Foreign Minister, Mohammed Said Al-Sahaf, and the United Nations Deputy Secretary-General, Louise Frechette, were expected to wrap up the talks on Thursday afternoon.

According to Mr. Eckhard, Monday's talks focused on a number of issues, including procedures employed by the Security Council committee monitoring the sanctions, as well as the arrangements and financing for Iraqis going on the Haj pilgrimige.

In a related development, those arrangements were discussed on Monday by the sanctions committee, according to its Chairman, Antonio Monteiro of Portugal. He told reporters at a press briefing in New York on Monday that during its meeting on Monday, the committee's longest exchange concerned the authorization of expenses related to the Haj pilgrimage. He noted that the committee had to come to a solution very quickly because the Haj would begin on 20 March.

Monday's United Nations-Iraqi talks on the oil-for-food programme also dealt with Iraq's capacity to export oil. In the past, Iraq has indicated that it can only export $4 billion worth of oil every six months. The Security Council said it would be willing to consider authorizing the export of the necessary equipment to enable Iraq to increase its oil exports based on an independent report. According to Mr. Eckhard, a group of oil experts will visit the country on Thursday to assess Iraq's capacity to pump the authorized amount.

Also on Iraq, the Spokesman told reporters that on Monday evening, the Secretary-General had transmitted a letter to the Security Council concerning the request by the Russian Federation for the establishment of a second deputy executive chairman for the United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) charged with overseeing the disarmament of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

Meanwhile, an UNSCOM team led by Scott Ritter, which recently successfully concluded its investigations of eight "sensitive" sites, left Baghdad on Tuesday, Mr. Eckhard said.

The message of the Secretary-General was delivered in Freetown by Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs Ibrahima Fall on the occasion of the return to Sierra Leone of President Ahmad Tejan Kabbah.

"Africa can no longer tolerate, and accept as faits accomplis, coups against elected governments and the illegal seizure of power by military cliques," said the Secretary-General, reiterating the sentiment he had expressed last year.

Mr. Annan said that the return of President Kabbah accomplished a major objective not only of the people of Sierra Leone, but also of the United Nations, the Organization of African Unity (OAU), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and the entire international community.

The diplomacy of ECOWAS and the resolve of the ECOWAS Monitoring Group (ECOMOG), which ousted the military junta, "played a crucial role in this turn of events" the Secretary-General said. He added that the OAU and the United Nations Security Council added their voices to the "chorus" calling for the junta to relinquish power.

The Secretary-General said that the United Nations looked forward to working closely with President Kabbah to broaden his Government's base, reassert its authority and strengthen its capacity throughout the country in order to create a stable, united and democratic state. He identified disarmament, demobilization and reintegration into civilian life of ex- combatants as a major part of this effort.

Mr. Annan said that as a first step in this direction, he had proposed, subject to the concurrence of the Security Council, that a number of United Nations military observers be deployed alongside ECOMOG to monitor the military and security situation in the country. He also said that he planned to strengthen the Office of his Special Envoy and to establish a Trust Fund for Sierra Leone.

Mr. Connor predicted that at the end of 1998, the projected amounts in both the regular and peacekeeping budgets would be $577 million -- the smallest amount in four years. By the same date, the United Nations would be forced to cross-borrow 25 per cent of peacekeeping cash to cover the deficit in regular budget cash, again the largest percentage in four years. The Organization was thus borrowing more and more from a smaller and smaller source, he noted.

When the amount of cash on hand was low and the amount of unpaid assessments was large, the United Nations was forced to slow its payment for troops and contingent owned equipment for peacekeeping operations, Mr. Connor said. He concluded that the Organization's debt to Member States had now become resistant to change.

Briefing the press after his presentation to the Budgetary Committee, Mr. Connor said that he would accompany Secretary-General Kofi Annan to Washington on Thursday to discuss, in part, the United States' overdue payments, which totalled $1.3 billion. United States legislation, passed last year, would permit some $100 million more to be paid over the course of certain months in 1998, largely on a quarterly basis -- leaving $1.2 billion for which there was no legislation for payment, he noted. "We're hanging on by our fingernails," Mr. Connor said.

In a statement released at the Tribunal's headquarters at The Hague on Tuesday, Prosecutor Louise Arbour noted that the Tribunal's Statute covers prosecutions of persons responsible for serious violations of international humanitarian law committed in the territory of the former Yugoslavia since 1991.

"This jurisdiction is ongoing and covers the recent events in Kosovo," said Judge Arbour. She indicated that she was currently gathering information and evidence in relation to the Kosovo incidents and would continue to monitor any subsequent developments. She also stated that she "expects the full cooperation of the authorities of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in respect of investigations into the Kosovo situation."

UNHCR said that it had no access to areas which bore the brunt of the military and police crackdown over the weekend. The United Nations refugee agency had asked the authorities of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia for access to all areas and reiterated its concern about the situation in Kosovo.

According to UNHCR, more than 4,000 people have fled the Kosovo province to neighbouring Montenegro. Most of the refugees, who included both ethnic Albanians and Serbs, were staying in private homes in the municipality of Rozaj, and another group was in Montenegro's Plav municipality further south.

Mr. Kunarac pleaded guilty to one of four counts against him, and not guilty to the others, which include torture, rape and crimes against humanity. The hearing on the matter is expected to continue Friday to determine what future course of action the Tribunal will take in response to his plea.

The 37-year old Kunarac is one of eight people charged in the indictment, which covers "the brutal regime of gang-rape, torture and enslavement which Muslim women of Foca and elsewhere were subjected to between April 1992 and February 1993," according to the Tribunal. It is alleged that in his capacity as commander of a unit of irregular Serb soldiers, Mr. Kunarac was responsible for the acts of his subordinates, who sexually assaulted Muslim women. He is also alleged to have been personally involved in those sexual assaults.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said that the refugees were part of the 12,000 people who fled in 1994. UNHCR said that over the weekend, a convoy of 106 people travelled 60 kilometres from the refugee site of Banibangou to their village in the east of Mali. The United Nations agency added that in the coming days it would help in the repatriation of more than 2,000 people.

Malian authorities visited refugee sites for the first time last month in an effort to persuade countrymen that the conditions were conducive for the return, UNHCR said, adding that so far 4,500 people had signed up to go home.

UNHCR said that the Malians in Niger were the last group of more than 140, 00 refugees, mostly Taureg, who left Mali and sought refugee in neighbouring countries. Last year, the United Nations refugee agency wrapped up repatriation programmes for Malian refugees in Mauritania and Burkina Faso. UNHCR said that it also planned to repatriate another group of Malian refugees from Algeria.

The Democratic People's Republic of Korea will deplete most of its grain stocks by May, according to the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO). This will make the country entirely dependent on food imports, mostly in the form of aid, until the next harvest in September.

Thanks in part to donations, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea has been able to import some grain, although that amount falls short in relation to needs, according to an FAO statement released on Tuesday. In the past, barter trade has accounted for a significant source of food imports, but FAO warns that this may be diminishing as tradable resources, like timber, become increasingly depleted.

The FAO predicts that there will be a continued need for food aid to vulnerable groups in the coming months. Unprecedented levels of assistance to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea have enabled it to avoid even more widespread chronic malnutrition. While continued assistance is urgently needed, FAO also notes that in the longer term, the country's food security will depend heavily on solutions that address its major economic difficulties. "In the absence of these, even without emergencies, the food supply situation will remain highly precarious as productivity in agriculture falls, the ability of the country to finance food imports to cover shortfalls recedes further, and tradable resources for barter become scarcer," FAO states.

From the United Nations home page at <http://www.un.org> - email: unnews@un.org

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