United Nations Daily Highlights, 98-04-08

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

DAILY HIGHLIGHTS

Wednesday, 8 April, 1998

HEADLINES

• Secretary-General says UN is prepared to coordinate international observation of Cambodia elections.
• Head of UNHCR urges Croatian President to speed up and simplify return procedures for ethnic Serbs.
• United Nations refugee agency expresses concern about expulsion of mainly Burundi refugees in Congo-Kinshasa.
• At World Bank event, United States First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton urges attention to maternal deaths.
• Commission on Human Rights should end consideration of situation in Guatemala, its representative says.
• New UN Survey says current Asian-Pacific economic crisis should not undermine development plans.
• United Nations Secretary-General expresses regret at death of coal miners in an explosion in Ukraine.
• Secretary-General nominates veteran Nigerian diplomat to head new UN Mission in Central African Republic.
• Secretary-General reiterates support for his envoy in Tajikistan.
• United Nations expands its network of depository libraries.

In a statement issued on Wednesday by his Spokesman, the Secretary- General said that he decision was taken after a careful assessment of political developments in Cambodia. He noted in particular "the progress that the Cambodian authorities have made in establishing a framework for multiparty elections" and the return of Prince Norodom Ranariddh.

The Secretary-General's decision was conveyed to King Sihanouk, Prince Ranariddh, Hun Sen and Ung Huot by letters dated 2 April.

However, the Secretary-General noted that he had made his decision notwithstanding continuing concerns on a number of issues. He said that if those issues were not addressed, they might hinder the prospect for free and fair elections and their credibility thereafter.

An accompanying memorandum spells out the main elements of the United Nations' role and the conditions for its participation.

The High Commissioner met with President Tudjman in yesterday, after visiting the Krajina, once a predominantly ethnic Serb area which has seen very few returns. During their meeting, Ms. Ogata asked the Croatian President to close the gap between political commitment on minority returns and administrative procedures on the ground which often make return extremely difficult.

At a press conference in Zagreb yesterday, Ms. Ogata said refugee and displacement problems in various countries of the former Yugoslavia were interlinked and must be resolved through a regional approach. Tomorrow, the High Commissioner will travel to Kosovo, where she will meet with Serb refugees and the representatives of Kosovo's ethnic Albanian community.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) said on Wednesday that an estimated 500 mostly Burundi nationals had been forcibly sent back to Burundi since Monday. The expelled refugees included 48 Rwandans and four Congolese who were immediately taken back to the DRC border by the Burundi authorities.

According to UNHCR, some of the refugees were trucked to the border in vehicles commandeered last Saturday by the Congolese military from a non- governmental organization in the region of Uvira on Lake Tanganyika. The trucks have since been returned to the non-governmental organization which is working with UNHCR in the DRC. Other refugees had been marched to the DRC/Burundi border.

"This is very worrying because it comes at a time when people keep leaving northwestern Burundi because of instability there," UNHCR Spokesman Kris Janowski said.

Over the past weeks, approximately 6,000 people, 85 per cent of whom are women and children, have fled Burundi's Citibitoke and Bubanza provinces for security reasons.

Initially, the local authorities in Congo-Kinshasa had allowed UNHCR to look after the Burundi refugees but in a policy shift last week, local military authorities instructed UNHCR to turn back all new arrivals.

"Every minute somewhere in the world a woman dies from complications of pregnancy and childbirth," noted Mrs. Clinton. "The tragedy that over 600, 000 women die every year in childbirth is compounded by the simple yet unbearable truth that the vast majority of these deaths and so much of that suffering could have been avoided."

World Bank President Jim Wolfensohn emphasized the need for governments to make safe motherhood a priority. "We cannot leave orphans, we cannot leave women damaged after they had had pregnancies," he said.

Mr. Wolfensohn noted that an estimated 300 million women are damaged in one way or another as a result of pregnancies. He called for ensuring that safe motherhood received budgetary allocations on a priority basis. "It is right socially, it is right morally, it is right economically, it is right in every way."

The Executive Director of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), Carol Bellamy, noted that girls aged 15 to 19 are at least twice as likely to die during childbirth than women in their 20s. She also pointed out that the children of teenagers are 30 per cent more likely to die before the age of 5 than those of older mothers.

"It is no accident that Afghanistan, where I visited just a few days ago, is distinguished by severe economic and social restrictions on women -- and by the highest maternal mortality rate of any developing country: 1,700 deaths per 100,000 live births -- a truly shocking number," Ms. Bellamy said.

Gabriel Aguilera Peralta told the Geneva-based Commission that after 18 years of scrutiny, the time had come to end its yearly consideration of the situation in Guatemala. During that time there had been a human rights rapporteur, a Special Rapporteur, a Special Representative, and an Independent Expert, along with other mechanisms.

According to Mr. Aguilera Peralta, Guatemala was now a normal country, although that was not to say that it did not have problems. Presidential elections had been held, the Government was democratic and politically solid, the long internal armed conflict had been ended, and there was peace. Guatemalan civil society, friendly countries, and the international community had participated in that positive transition, he added.

Mr. Aguilera's remarks came as the Commission began to discuss how to improve the promotion and protection of human rights and the effective functioning of its mechanisms. Under that agenda item, the Commission focuses on, among others, the role of national institutions for the promotion and protection of human rights, violence against women and mass exoduses and displaced persons.

Published by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), the Survey notes that while economic growth in developing economies had decelerated in 1997 as a result of the serious economic turmoil faced by several countries of South-East and East Asia, countries of South and South-West Asia maintained robust growth.

The Survey predicts that in the next two years, economic growth will remain sluggish. Among the economies most affected, among them Thailand and Indonesia, growth will be negative in 1998, with the growth rate of -3.5 per cent for Thailand and -1.5 per cent growth rate for Indonesia. The growth rates of Malaysia and Singapore will be cut back to almost half of the rates achieved in 1997.

Average economic growth in the developing East Asian economies is expected to be reduced to around 5 per cent in 1998 compared with more than 7 per cent growth in 1997, according to the Survey. The most serious reductions in growth rate will be suffered by the Republic of Korea. Economic growth in South Asia, by contrast, is expected to remain on a steady course at above 6 per cent to the year 2000.

The Survey suggests that an international debt strategy including rollovers and rescheduling, and external liquidity support for revival of export growth, are important steps necessary to deal with immediate crisis. In the long-term, the establishment of a system of global governance of private financial flows merits serious attention, according to the Survey.

According to a United Nations spokesman, more than 60 miners were reported to have been killed in the accident in the eastern city of Donetsk. On behalf of the United Nations, the Secretary-General conveyed, his condolences to the people and the Government of Ukraine.

Mr. Adeniji, who has had a long and distinguished public service career, served as Nigeria's Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York and in Geneva and as its ambassador to Austria, France and Switzerland. He was also Nigeria's Permanent Representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). From 1991 to 1994, Mr. Adeniji was Director-General of the Nigerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, after which he retired from the foreign service. Since then, he has been President of the Lagos-based African Strategic and Peace Research Group. He is author of numerous publications, particularly on disarmament and conflict resolution in Africa.

The Secretary-General expressed the support for Gerd Merrem's performance through a statement issued by his Spokesman. The United Nations leader said that he had been informed about a letter from Abdullo Nuri, leader of the United Tajik Opposition (UTO) criticising the manner in which Mr. Merrem had dealt with the recent crisis in Kofarnikhon area.

The Secretary-General said he wished to record his full confidence in Mr. Merrem and the men and women serving with the United Nations Mission of Observers in Tajikistan "who have performed admirably in very difficult and often dangerous conditions."

Mr. Merrem is about to retire from the United Nations after 25 years of "distinguished service."

The two libraries are the Biblioteca Central de la Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Peru in Lima, and the Farmington Public Library in Farmington, New Mexico.

Through its depository library system, the United Nations Dag Hammarskjold Library in New York has arranged for the distribution of United Nations documents and publications to users around the world. There are 364 United Nations depository libraries: 53 are located in Africa, 98 in Asia and the Pacific, 30 in Eastern Europe, 84 in Western Europe, 46 in Latin America and the Caribbean, and 53 in North America.

These libraries receive United Nations materials with the understanding that the materials will be maintained in good working order and be available to the public free of charge.

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

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