I'm Jennifer Fenton and I Welcome.
I'm Jennifer Fenton, and I oversee communications for the Envoy and his office.
Thank you all for coming.
May I kindly remind you to pick up your press badges if you haven't already, please.
Also now silence any cell phones you may have on the UN Special Envoy Mr Garo Patterson will be convening 150 Syrians for the launch of the Syrian Constitutional Committee this week.
The Special envoy will be able to answer your questions after his opening remarks.
Thank you so much Jennifer and good to see you all.
Also to those who are travelled far, good to see you here in in Geneva.
Actually as we are speaking, the 150 members of the Constitution Committee is arriving here in in Geneva.
As you know, we have agreed that this is to be a Syrian LED Syrian armed constitutional process facilitated by the United Nations.
And, and I think Jennifer already mentioned it will be launched here on Wednesday.
I I will get back to that.
The agreement to establish the constitutional committee with terms of reference and core roots of procedure marks the first political agreement between the government of Syria and the opposition.
My second point is that this marks a clear acceptance of the other as an interlocutor in the political process of line in Security Council Resolution 2254.
And three, it commits the government and the opposition and their nominees to sit together face to face in dialogue and negotiations.
And four, it also creates spaces for the voices of civil society and for them to be heard together with the voices of the government and the opposition.
And last but not the least, it could be a door opener to a broader political process.
But let me also emphasise, and we have done that from day #1 and that is, of course, we are very much aware of the fact that the Constitutional Committee alone cannot and will not resolve the Syrian conflict.
The Constitutional Committee can only really matter as a step in the right direction, a step along the difficult path of of this conflict and towards a new Syria.
For that concrete tangible progress in needed on other aspects of Security Council Resolution 2254 and for that we need to see meaningful progress on the ground.
And it will matter if it is launched.
And this work, it is accompanied by other concrete steps and confidence building measures among the Syrians themselves and among Syria and the international community.
And as many, many of you will have known, I have appealed from my first day when I took over this job that one issue in particular needs to be addressed and that is the issue about abductees, detainees and missing persons.
10s of thousands of Syrians remain detained, abducted or missing, and I have appeal in particular for the early release of women and children.
I believe that if this could happen, it will send a very powerful signal that we are indeed serious about making a new beginning for Syria.
Yet, for all these caveats, let me emphasise that I do believe that the Constitutional Constitution Committee's launch should be a sign of hope for the long-suffering Syrian people.
The creation of the Constitutional Committee under the auspices of the United Nations is a shared promise to the Syrian people to try in earnest to agree on new constitutional arrangements for Syria's future and new social contract to help repair a broken, devastated country.
Let me say a few words about the Constitution Committee itself.
The Constitution Committee's work is framed by key principles including respect for the United Nations Charter, relevant Security Council resolutions, serious sovereignty, unity, independence and territorial integrity and the Syrian led and armed nature of the process.
The principles also include the objective of UN supervised elections as envisaged in the Resolution 2254 based on a new constitute constitutions and the need for a broader political process to implement Resolution 2254.
The Committee is mandated within the context of AUN facilitated Geneva process to prepare and draught for popular approval a constitutional reform as a contribution to the political settlement in Syria and the implementation of Security Council Resolution 2254.
This is now agreed between the government and the opposition.
But above all, let me stress that the future constitutional Syria belongs to the Syrian people and to them along.
It's all about meeting the aspirations of the Syrian people, Syrians, not outsiders, withdraught.
The constitution and the Syrian people most popularly approve it.
the United Nations will be there to facilitate the process in a way that ensures its credibility, balance and inclusivity, and to help whenever it is needed.
We will deploy over good offices to provide full secretariat support and report to the Security Council on progress.
Let me also emphasise that we have aimed at the 30% representatives coming from women and that we are indeed very close to achieving that goal.
That is both for the 150 and for the drafting body of 45.
As I said, the Committee will be formally launched on Wednesday the 30th of October at 12:00 here in Nepalia at the ceremonial gathering where the Press of course will be invited and it will be myself and the two Co chairs that will then give speeches for the opening.
I don't expect that 150 members will begin their initial discussions the day thereafter on the 1st of November.
Thereafter, we aim to have the smaller drafting body of 4515 from the government, 15 from the opposition and 15 from the middle 3rd that they will then start their work here in Geneva.
As you may know, decisions will be taken by consensus where possible and if not by as majority of 75%.
This of course is to emphasise that no one block can dictate the outcomes and and it will create, we hope, incentives to reach out to the middle ground and across the divide.
The parties are committed to work expeditiously and continuously to achieve progress and to produce real results.
And I'm will now take your questions.
Just a quick note to say you should have all received the correspondence handbook with information about covering this week.
In addition to myself, my colleague Sasha and Caroline are both available to assist you.
Rial and Mckelly are here from the United Nations Information Services.
Our emails and cell phones are all available in that handbook.
When I call on you, if you can kindly say your first and last name in the outlet for which you work, as it may be Mr Patterson's first time meeting with you, James.
James Bae's from Al Jazeera Special Envoy.
Could you please give us your estimation of how hard this is going to be?
What do you think the chances of success of building a new constitution is going to be?
And how long do you think this process is most likely to take?
Well, since my ability to look into the future is still limited, I'd still like to share with you some of my, my views on this.
As you know, we have, as I just said, the committee will, has all the two parties have agreed to work expeditiously and continuously.
It's impossible to say how long it will take for them to conclude this work, but as long as it is done, you know, with serious intentions and we'll see progress.
And as you know, I will be reporting to the Security Council.
I'm optimistic that we will within a not too distant future that we will see tangible progress in the discussions.
After all, this is, and this is important to remember, as I said already, this is actually the first time that the two parties have an, an ownership to the process.
They have agreed on the Rules of Procedure, They have agreed to the 150 members.
So I think this gives promise for us to be able to move forward.
I, I do believe, as I tried to indicate in my introduction here, that the real question is, you know, one thing is for us to get 150 up and work seriously, but the other issue is also how we are able to move in parallel on the other important issues or how to implement Security Council Resolution 2254.
Please in the glasses, Catherine Fianconvo conga France Vancatra, Sir.
Could you please give us more detail, details if possible, about the constitutional?
Draught when you say that.
Prepared and and drafted.
Do you know, I mean, are you able to tell us if they are?
Constitution, or are they?
Sorry, as I tried to highlight in my introduction, this is led by the Syrians themselves and this will be up to the Syrians to decide how they're going to do this work.
And in the rules of procedure that we agree agreed to, it is said that you know, the IT it will could use as a reference point the 2012 Constitution and other constitutions as a basis for the work that they are doing.
But hope they're going to do this.
I'm currently discussing with the two Co chairs and I assume that they will agree on this before they then meet.
And I I also assume that they will have input from the 150 members of the committee on this here in.
The gentleman here in the middle.
The rules of procedure you just outlined, you said where possible it should be by consensus, otherwise at least 75% approval.
But isn't this basically a recipe for paralysis?
Because how can you possibly get consensus among representatives from the Assad regime and the opposition after eight years of bitter fighting and even 75% approval rate seems to be not very realistic.
Can you please elaborate on that?
No, I'm, I have received that question many, many times.
But I think, you know, I think, I think, as I said, it's important to remember that no, actually after 8 1/2 years of war and conflict, we actually have an agreement between the two parties.
But at the same time, I think you would agree with me.
I, I, I hope that it will not.
If you want to find a solution to the Syrian crisis, not one side can dictate the others.
It will have to be worked out with a common understanding on how to solve the conflict so that the huge divides within the Syrian society, the complete lack of trust, it needs to start to be built up.
And that can be built up through discussions like in the Constitution Committee and progress on other fronts.
But my hope is that we can see that the parties in the committee, we'd reach out to each others, that if we try to understand the other side of the argument and then move forward.
And hopefully it will take time before it will be necessary to to have a voting in the process.
And I actually believe it sends a strong message that it it will not be possible to dictate.
You will have to discuss and to reach a consensus.
Yes, the gentleman here on the right.
I'm Ahmad Chauki from the.
United Arab Emirates and News.
If you permit me, I'll ask.
Distinguished Special Envoy, There were a number of states that were important actors that can.
Can you hear the interpretation?
There were a number of actors that played a role in the Syrian crisis that took part one way or another in the preparation of this constitutional committee.
To what extent will they play a role in the upcoming stage in the constitutional committee and will you seek support from the states should the constitutional process face any obstacles?
You know, I've been working very hard, of course, with the government in Damascus and with the opposition, the SNC, to try to reach a deal on this.
But along the road it has been very good to observe and to see that I'm had full support and backing on this from United international Community.
I think actually this is the first time since the adoption of Security Council Resolution 2254 in December 2015 that we have all the key international actors agreeing on an important step forward within the the Syrian crisis.
That goes both for the so-called Astana 3, it goes for the the so-called small group.
And of course, as you will have noticed, the Security Council unanimously expressed its support to this process, and I count on the continued support from the international community also in the further work that I'm going to do on Security Council Resolution 2254.
Here in the middle, please hi Rakhi Davanam from Al Arabiya.
Of obscurity surrounding.
The selection process of the 50 delegates from the civil society.
And we heard that their names has been put in front of the Syrian government to veto or to accept the names of that delegation.
Can you confirm or clarify how?
Did the process of selecting those.
No, it's been a negotiated process.
As you know, this has been going on for quite a while.
There was in this December last year before I took office, there was a meeting here in Geneva where Mum tried to reach a consensus on it.
That was a meeting with me in my predecessor, Stefan de Mistura, and the three Astana foreign ministers.
And we have, since then, I have negotiated directly both with the opposition and with the government to try to reach a consensus on this.
And with that, I said with the help of other international actors.
And in the end, we managed through compromise to find a solution that I believe has been acceptable to all.
Of course, it's, as I said, it's a compromise.
So this you also obviously have to take into account Mahar.
Supposing that there will be agreement on the Constitution, what mechanisms can be used by the international community to implement it?
Listen, the, the Syrian constitution of course will have to be approved by, we, we say through popular approval by the Syrian people.
And then of course the question is about the implementation of, of the, of whatever they agree upon.
And that of course, is off to the Syrians themselves to make sure that that actually happens and hopefully with the support of the international community.
Sorry, Stephanie, no, thank you.
Stephanie Nabehay, can you tell us, Sir, do you have full agreement on the 15 people on the list, on the, on the small group, on on the?
The drafting committee group, the drafting group, is there agreement on the 15 members from the civil society?
I understand that that's been a hiccup.
And are you confident that you can that you have agreement on the 15 and that that can proceed after the big meeting please?
And also I just wanted to double check, the Astana 3 ministers are not invited to the opening ceremony, correct?
The no one, no international presence at the opening ceremony except for the, of course, the United Nations on, you know, as, as I said, we have 15 nominated by the from the 50 members of the government, 5015 from the 50 members of the opposition and 15 from the middle 3rd.
And I'm currently discussing this with both the the government and and with the opposition and with the different members of the middle 3rd and hopefully we will have a solution on this before the committee starts its work later in this week.
Will the drafting committee immediately start its work after the opening session?
And for how many days will it meet?
Will there be constitutional advisors from the United Nations to provide technical assistance?
Yes, the the 45 will meet immediately after the end of the meeting of the 150.
We expect 150 to be here for a few days.
It will be off to the two Co chairs in discussions with with the members to decide for how long they will be here and then we expect the 45 to immediately start meeting after that.
It has not been decided yet for how long they will stay.
There are different proposals.
One proposal is for them to meet for one week and then have two weeks off.
Another proposal is to meet for three weeks and one week off and another for two weeks meeting and two weeks off.
But this we will have to decide on the next few days.
The two parties have asked the United Nations to serve as a secretariat and we will obviously be doing that with all that and taste of secretarial support.
And we're very much looking forward, as I said in my introduction to the try to be helpful and to facilitate whatever the needs of the committee would be.
Hello Mr Patterson, Elizabeth Osaka from Russian News agency in Syria and Osti have a couple of questions.
First of one, as far as I know, on the opening session there will be 3 statements, one of you, one of one from coachers, like 2 from coachers.
How are you going decide who will be the first one to make the speech?
From the culture side will be the opposition of the government and the second question, are you going to have a meetings tomorrow with the ministers of Astana Group and how it's going to be?
Tomorrow evening I'm very much looking forward to have a meeting with the foreign ministers of Turkey, Iran and Russia.
And just earlier today I had a meeting with the envoys of the European Union.
And on Friday I had a pleasure meeting with the envoys of the so-called small group, the United States, UK, France, Germany, Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
And again, I think the good thing here is that they all express the full support to the work that we are doing and to the work of the Constitutional Committee.
And there we will have no problems, I can assure you, on, on agreeing on the order of the speakers for Wednesday.
But you will see when I see you on Wednesday how that will work out.
Looking forward to see you then.
First chair on the HI Nina Larsen, AFP.
There is no deadline from what I understand to this.
Are you afraid that this could just continue on and soak up a lot of resources without making any progress, especially considering the power balance imbalance?
Sides that and also if you could say something about why there are no representatives of the SDF, of the Kurds and.
You think that recent recent developments on the ground may complicate things?
You're right, there is no fixed deadline, but as I said, there is an agreement to work expeditiously and continuously.
And I will be reporting to the Security Council on progress of the work that we're doing.
We, we actually discussed quite a bit whether we should have a deadline or not.
But then we realise that there is a there are lots of experiences from all the constitutional committees where there have been deadlines that have frankly speaking, never been met.
So I think the important thing is to focus on that actually work is continuing.
Seriously, that's what we will be focusing on.
I think it's important to emphasise that this constitution committee has representatives from all communities in Syria.
It's, it's a remarkable, I think within the Syrian historical context, A remarkably representative committee.
We have obviously also Kurds in in the committee.
But you're absolutely right there, there are no SDF representatives on the committee.
I think there were many people who who were afraid of that the latest developments in the North East and also you know the fighting continuing Idlib that that of course would create challenges for the committee.
I think you know all the answer to that is that we are strongly appealing for, you know, the ceasefires to respect to be respected and that we have also been appealing for a nationwide ceasefire to come into effect.
And we do believe that the fighting going on is sort of is, is just another proof of the importance or get a serious political process in a way that can help sorting out the problems in all of Syria, including in the North East and obviously also in Idlib.
Think we have time for one more question, if there is one in the back on the left from the Japanese newspaper Azahi Shimbun.
Just on the logistical aspect of the meeting on the opening ceremony on Wednesday, do we know at this stage in which room it will take place?
And also if you could elaborate a little bit on the seating plans, Will it be like the government from one side and then the opposition and the civil society in between?
Can you just elaborate a little bit on that?
Regarding the logistics, we can get you more information in advance of the meeting on Wednesday.
But it's, you know, it's the main conference room where the CD is usually meeting that we will be meeting.
And we have had detailed discussions on seating arrangements.
So you will see them all unfolding on Wednesday.
Thank you all again for coming.
Again, we're all available to assist you.
Rial is in the back from Eunice McHale over here to my right, myself, Caroline up here in the front, and Sasha seated on the side.
Our cell phones are available in the handbook as well as our emails.
And you'll be hearing from Mr Patterson again on Wednesday.
Thank you all again for coming.
