REGULAR PRESS BRIEFING BY THE INFORMATION SERVICE

Rhéal LeBlanc, for the United Nations Information Service in Geneva, chaired the briefing, which was attended by the spokespersons for the United Nations Refugee Agency and the International Organization for Migration.

Secretary-General’s visit to China

Rhéal LeBlanc, Chief of the Press and External Relations Section, United Nations Information Service, reminded journalists that on Saturday 1 September, the Secretary General would leave for a visit to China, where he would speak at the Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, being held in Beijing. During his visit, the Secretary General would meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Foreign Minister Wang Yi and other senior Chinese officials. He would also meet with the Chairperson of the African Union Commission, Moussa Faki, and other African leaders on the margins of the Summit. The Secretary General would be back in New York in the evening of Tuesday, 4 September.

Greece

Charlie Yaxley, for the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), gave the following statement:

“UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency is today urging the Government of Greece to address the situation in Aegean Sea Reception and Identification Centres (RICs), commonly known as ‘hotspots’.

Centres are severely overcrowded. This means that thousands of asylum seekers and migrants, including many children, live in squalid, inadequate and rapidly deteriorating conditions. Some have been living in these centres for more than six months.

UNHCR calls on the authorities to rapidly accelerate procedures for those eligible for transfer to the mainland; to increase reception capacity on the mainland to host them; quickly improve conditions in reception centres and provide alternative accommodation for the most vulnerable.

The situation is reaching boiling point at the Moria RIC on the island of Lesvos, where more than 7,000 asylum seekers and migrants are crammed into shelters built to accommodate just 2,000 people. A quarter of those are children.

An estimated 2,700 people, mainly Syrian and Iraqi families, are staying at the Vathy RIC on Samos, originally designed to hold less than 700. This is forcing many to stay in flimsy tents and makeshift shelters. This is likely to become a serious concern if not addressed before winter sets in. People in need of medical attention are being forced to queue for hours before receiving treatment.

Reception centres on the islands of Chios and Kos are close to double their intended capacity.

These levels of overcrowding have not been seen since March 2016, when arrival rates were far higher. Limited access to services prevails across all the RICs. UNHCR is particularly concerned about woefully inadequate sanitary facilities, fighting amongst frustrated communities, rising levels of sexual harassment and assaults and the increasing need for medical and psychosocial care. UNHCR commends the hospitality shown by local communities and is aware of the impact of this situation on them.

Children, including hundreds of unaccompanied boys and girls, are particularly at risk, as well as dozens of pregnant women, new-born babies, survivors of sexual violence, and other extremely vulnerable people.

More than 3,000 asylum seekers on the islands have been given authorization to move to the mainland, but transfers have been slow due to the lack of sufficient accommodation and reception on the mainland. Some 1,350 asylum seekers were transferred to the mainland in August however, this is failing to ease the pressure as more people continue to arrive on the islands. An average of 114 people arrived each day in August, up from 83 in July. More than 70% are families from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Despite receiving European funding, the Government has faced challenges in delivering on previous commitments to decongest the RICs on the islands. UNHCR urges the authorities to strengthen efforts to overcome administrative and logistical delays. In the meantime, extraordinary measures need to be considered, including the use of emergency accommodation or other alternative facilities – as well as encouraging the authorities to work closely with civil society and non-governmental organizations in specific areas such as delivering health care.

UNHCR remains ready to support the Greek authorities with building capacity and strengthening its operational response as well as with transfers of eligible people to the mainland. At the request of the government, UNHCR has exceptionally agreed to continue its support in transport of asylum seekers to the mainland in September in order to avoid further delays.”

Responding to questions from the press, Mr. Yaxley said that, by and large, people were staying inside the reception and identification centres; however, because of lack of capacity, some people were forced to make their own shelter, sometimes alongside the centres. In order to receive the services they needed, it was important that people should remain inside the centres to the extent possible.

Mr. Yaxley said that UNHCR was especially concerned about the insufficient psychosocial care available to people on the island. An increasing number of people, including children, were presenting mental health problems. If such issues were not addressed, they could be further exacerbated. UNHCR continued to urge that additional support and alternative accommodation be found for especially vulnerable groups, such as children. Support for the asylum seekers and migrants on the Greek islands was woefully inadequate in general – not only was there inadequate primary physical and mental health care, but sanitary problems were widespread and the number of sexual assaults was on the rise. One of the best ways to reduce overcrowding would be for the Greek Government to deliver on its commitment to speed up transfers to mainland sites, for which it had received funding from the European Union. While the sites on the Aegean islands had been hosting thousands of people for some time already, the daily arrival of some 114 individuals since early August had caused overcrowding to worsen. Where that option was not available, alternative accommodation needed to be looked into. The current situation was not sustainable.

Asked specifically about the eligibility of asylum seekers for transferral from the Aegean islands to mainland Greece, Mr. Yaxley said that in April 2018, the Greek Council of State had ruled that newly arriving asylum seekers were no longer obliged to remain in place until their asylum applications had begun to be processed. Nevertheless, even those individuals who were not subject to such geographical limitation relied on the Greek authorities for transfer to the mainland. There was therefore a general need to accelerate asylum procedures so that, where appropriate, refugee status could be granted or alternative measures pursued.

Asked about the possibility of transferring migrants and asylum seekers to other European countries, Mr. Yaxley said that UNHCR continued to call for other States members of the European Union to express solidarity with those countries that were at the forefront of receiving new arrivals, such as Greece, Italy and Spain. People continued to arrive, but in far lower numbers now than in previous years; in fact, arrival rates were down to pre-2014 averages. The numbers were now very manageable; it was therefore a question of political will. In the mid- to long-term, countries needed to come together in the spirit of solidarity and responsibility-sharing to receive a fair and equitable distribution of refugees and asylum seekers. The benefits that could be reaped from a collaborative approach had been evident in recent times.

Responding to a question about the profile of the recent arrivals in Greece, Mr. Yaxley said that there was a pre-screening upon arrival, but it did not involve much beyond registration. While movements to the Mediterranean more broadly was a mixed migration movement, there were many individuals who required international protection travelling alongside economic migrants. In Greece, there were typically more arrivals in need of international protection than economic migrants. The breakdown of nationalities was available on the UNHCR data portal (data.unhcr.org), as were many other types of statistics.

Libya

Paul Dillon, for the International Organization for Migration (IOM), said that early in the morning of Monday, 27 August, heavy clashes had broken out in southern Tripoli. As a consequence, 164 Malian migrants had been forcibly displaced and transferred to the airport, pending humanitarian return to Mali. The fighting had also forcibly displaced many Libyan families. IOM had recently provided mattresses, blankets and hygiene kits to families who had sought shelter in a school in Tripoli.

As part of a joint humanitarian response coordinated between the United Nations agencies and international organizations, IOM had provided blankets, mattresses, food and beverages to migrants who had been removed from detention centres in southern Tripoli and relocated to other areas. In close coordination with the Danish Refugee Council and the Somali Embassy, IOM had provided assistance in the form of food, water and non-food items to around 90 Somali migrants affected by the violence.

In a more recent update received from staff on the ground, in the early morning hours of Friday, 31 August, and during the previous night, sporadic clashes had continued in southern Tripoli, featuring medium to heavy weapons. The Libyan authorities had cited 30 casualties as a result of the ongoing actions over the past few days. The families who had taken shelter in the aforementioned school were still there as of the evening of 30 August; IOM would be reaching out to them 31 August, provided the security situation allowed it. IOM, in close collaboration with the Somali Embassy, would continue to distribute non-food assistance and hygiene kits to several hundred Somalis who had been released from detention centres and had taken shelter in various locations in Tripoli. IOM was working closely with UNHCR to try and speed up voluntary humanitarian returns. It was also planning to provide, on Friday, 31 August, additional food aid to the detention centre it had been working with over the past couple of days; individuals who had been identified as needing medical assistance would receive care at the same time. IOM staff on the ground had highlighted the extremely good cooperation between IOM, UNHCR and Médecins sans frontières. As for the two detention centres in southern Tripoli, at least one of them was now completely empty. The doors of the other centre were open and it seemed that a number of people had decided to remain there.

Responding to questions from journalists, Mr. Dillon said that it appeared that the two detention centres themselves had not been involved in the fighting. He had no specifics on which groups the violent clashes involved. The IOM displacement tracking matrix had identified 5,860 individuals from around 1,200 households who had been displaced by the ongoing fighting since Monday, 27 August. The response by humanitarian actors had involved assisting displaced persons from both the migrant and the local communities.

Nigeria

Paul Dillon, for the International Organization for Migration (IOM), said that 273 Nigerians returning from Libya had attended a business skills training in Lagos during the week of 27-31 August, as part of their reintegration assistance organized by IOM, the UN Migration Agency. The training on Business Skills and Cooperatives for Returned Migrants was the twenty-first event held in Nigeria targeting returnees who wish to start businesses in their communities of origin.

Announcements for Geneva

Christian Lindmeier, for the World Health Organization (WHO), recalled that Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of World Health Organization, would launch a theme issue of the Bulletin of the World Health Organization on health and the sustainable development goals on Friday, 31 August 2018, from 11.30 a.m. to 1 p.m. in the Executive Board room at WHO headquarters. The launch event would include a panel discussion followed by a question and answer session. It was open to the media and would also be webcast.

Charlie Yaxley, for the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), announced that a press release would shortly be issued regarding the Agency’s most recent edition of the Desperate Journeys report, which covered the period January to August 2018. The report, which was under embargo until 12.01 a.m. on Monday, 3 September, provided an overview of the trends of movements by refugees and migrants to and through Europe. He and other colleagues would make themselves able for questions and comments.

Rhéal LeBlanc, Chief of the Press and External Relations Section, United Nations Information Service, said that the Special Envoy for the Secretary-General for Yemen, Mr. Martin Griffiths, would hold a press briefing on Wednesday, 5 September, on the consultations on Yemen that were scheduled to be held later that week; detailed information would be sent to the press early next week.

Mr. LeBlanc said that the Special Envoy of the Secretary-General for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, was expected to hold a press briefing on the political process around Syria, and in particular the two upcoming meetings to be held at the Palais des Nations. This press briefing would probably be held on Tuesday, 4 September, and details would be provided shortly.

Mr. LeBlanc said that the next public plenary meeting of the Conference on Disarmament was scheduled for Tuesday, 4 September, at 10 a.m., under the chairmanship of Turkey. Before the closure of this 2018 session (scheduled for 14 September), the Conference on Disarmament was to adopt its annual report to the General Assembly.

Mr. LeBlanc recalled that the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination had closed its ninety-sixth session on Thursday, 30 August. The concluding observations on the seven countries reviewed during that session – Montenegro, Latvia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, China (including SAR of Hong Kong and Macao), Mauritius, Cuba and Japan – had been issued and were available on the Committee’s webpage (https://www.ohchr.org/EN/Countries/Pages/HumanRightsintheWorld.aspx).

Mr. LeBlanc said that the Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities would hold a brief public meeting on the afternoon of Friday, 31 August, at 5 p.m. to celebrate its ten years of activities. During the current session, the Committee had yet to review the reports of Bulgaria, Poland, former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Malta, and Philippines. It had already reviewed the reports of South Africa and Algeria.

Mr. LeBlanc said that the Committee on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their Families would open, on Monday, 3 September, at 10 a.m. (Palais Wilson), its twenty-ninth session, due to last until Wednesday, 12 September, and during which it would review the initial reports of two States Parties: Mozambique (afternoon of Monday, 3 September, and morning of Tuesday, 4 September) and Madagascar (afternoon of Tuesday, 4 September, and morning of Wednesday, 5 September). In the afternoon of Wednesday, 5 September, the Committee would hold a public meeting with States parties to the Convention.

Press Conferences

Friday, 31 August, at 4:30 p.m. in Room III
Second 2018 meeting of the Group of Governmental Experts on Emerging Technologies in the Area of Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems
Subject:
Outcomes of the meetings of the Group of Governmental Experts on Emerging Technologies in the Area of Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems held in 2018.
Speaker:
Ambassador Amandeep Singh Gill, Chairman of the Group of Governmental Experts on Emerging Technologies in the Area of Lethal Autonomous Weapons Systems

Tuesday, 4 September, at 2:00 p.m. in Press Room 1
World Health Organization
EMBARGO: Under embargo until 5 Sept 00:30 Geneva time/ 4 Sept 23:30 London time
Launch of the first-ever global estimates of insufficient physical activity among adults over time, from 2001-2016.
Dr Regina Guthold, Study lead author, Epidemiology, Monitoring and Evaluation , WHO
Dr Fiona Bull, Study co-author, Programme Manager, Management of Noncommunicable Diseases, WHO

Wednesday, 5 September at 9:15 a.m. in Press Room 1
Human Rights Council
Human Rights Council, 39th regular session (10 – 28 September 2018)
Speaker:
Ambassador Vojislav Šuc (Slovenia), President of the Human Rights Council (12th cycle)

Wednesday, 5, September at 11:00 a.m. in Room III
Human Rights Council / Commission of Inquiry on Burundi
The members of the Commission of Inquiry will present their conclusions and written report on human rights violations committed in Burundi in 2017 and 2018.
Mr. Doudou Diène, President of the UN Commission of Inquiry on Burundi
Ms. Françoise Hampson, member of the UN Commission of Inquiry on Burundi
The press conference will be broadcast live at http://webtv.un.org


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The webcast for this briefing is available here: http://bit.ly/unog310818