Thank you for joining us for this press briefing here at the UN office at Geneva today, the 26th of April.
We have colleagues from human rights speaking about Iran and Sudan.
We have a colleague from the International Federation of the Red Cross who is going to address Afghanistan.
And then on the podium on my right, we have Mr Stefano Toscano, who's the director of the Geneva International Centre for Humanitarian Demining, and Miss Crystal Lupore, who is EU Unmasked, the UN Mine Action Service, head of the UN Mine Action Service here in Geneva.
They're going to speak about the 27th international meeting of Mine Action National Directors in the UN, the UN advisors, the otherwise known as NDMUN 27, which is actually taking place next week here in Geneva.
So over to you for brief remarks and then for questions afterwards.
Hi, good morning, everyone.
Yeah, it's my pleasure to announce that we have the 27 international meeting of the Mayan Action National Directors and UN Advisor taking place next week in Geneva on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.
It will happen at the International Conference Centre of Geneva.
And this is an event that we're organising to together with the Geneva Centre for Humanity and de Mining, our partnership here to represent this this endeavour.
And we are doing this with the support of the government of Switzerland.
And I take this opportunity to really thank them for for enabling us to do this event.
We have about 800 mine action leaders who are coming from all around the world to participate.
We're talking about national directors, national authorities, but also a lot of NGOs, private sector and of course all the UN advisors who are supporting national authorities and also humanitarian, you know, organisations to deliver mine action around the world.
We would like to welcome the journalist to come to the opening ceremony and the closing ceremony.
So the opening 1 is on Monday from 9:30 to 10:30 and the closing ceremony is on the 1st of May at 4:15 until 4:45.
So again it's in the Geneva International Conference Centre.
What's really important if you have two very important colleagues here in the room who can also facilitate interviews with some of those mine action programme managers coming from around the world.
So you can see here we have Lee Woodyer who is in charge of communication for own Mass and Laura Collier who is Communications director for the GICHD.
So please reach out to them.
We have 30 people to give you an idea.
You know the chief of our mine action programme in Afghanistan will be here.
The the advisor to the resident to the new mountain coordinator in Ukraine, advisor on mine action will be here.
So, so it's a good opportunity if you want to to discover a little bit more about mine action in some of those crises.
And I will just pass the floor to to Stefano to introduce a little bit more about the, the substance of the meeting.
First of all, let me start by thanking and emphasising the excellent cooperation we have with Ammas in organising this this meeting.
It's really a privilege to work with with you.
And I also would like to acknowledge, as Christel already did, the precious support by Switzerland to make that the meeting possible.
So in a world where conflicts we know are on the rise in number, size and complexity, my nation is a necessary response to a humanitarian imperative.
And today, still 60 million people are affected in their daily lives by the ****** of explosive ordnance, land mines, cluster munition and improvised explosive devices.
So 60 million peoples in more than 60 countries and territories are still living with this fear every day.
By simply going about their daily task, these people can put can be put in their lives and livelihood in danger.
And this is true during the conflict, but also after the conflicts and for decades.
So it's a really a significant ****** over the years and across the globe.
This shows that mine action also transcends what we typically consider to be A to be a humanitarian task.
When a child in Yemen cannot safely walk to his or her school or a farmer in Ukraine risk missing another wet season, it is clear that land mines and other explosive ordinance are a major barrier to human rights, a decent work and sustainable development.
As mentioned by Christella, we also very much look forward to welcoming more than 800 expert participants from around the world to discuss these issues at the 27 National Director meeting.
And really, this is the largest gathering in the sector and it really makes a difference.
The National Director Meeting is a technical event.
It is a meeting of practitioners, by practitioners for practitioners and it is our wish and hope that participant will leave the meeting with concrete ideas on our best to address their practical challenges, their practical everyday challenges in performing by an action and this based on the exchange with others.
And this really is in a nutshell what the National Director meeting is all about.
This year's team is protecting life and building peace.
The sessions will be delving into a broad range of range of topics, from global challenges like the role of mine action in food security and global supply chains, to new technology and mobilising resources to release the final square metre of land for countries to be declared mine free.
This latter point is particularly important.
We know there is a competition for France and many fronts and the sector as to focus on this in order to find innovative ways to ensure it's funding.
So we welcome you as Christel as Anmas very much to join us on Monday morning at the nearby CSG for the opening session.
And they've provided a list of GSCG expert who would be available for interviews upon request.
We do have a couple of questions for you, starting with Catherine Fiancan of France Vankat, who's online.
Thank you for being here.
I have a a couple of questions.
So first of all, could you be kind enough to send your press releases and list of participants to Eunice through Orlando in order for all the press to have access to the list of participants?
I have also questioned of access to the CCG.
Will or UN badge be enough to enter the the centre to meet the national directors and interview them and meeting them?
And also about the title of Madame Crystal Leuforess, what is your exact title at UN Mass?
And if you could be kind enough to share with us the contact detail, I'm sorry, the contact details of your communication officer in Geneva and for the notes, if we could have it as soon as possible.
Yeah, of course, I'll let Crystal give you her title, but just on housekeeping, since many of your questions deal with housekeeping, you do not require to recruit credentials to access the ICG.
However, if you are interested, do contact Lee Woodyear.
We did share with you this media advisory with contact informations for both Lee and Laura both in the room here along with the number of people, potential interviewees.
So you do not need to get additional credentials if you already have you.
Not bass, but do if you haven't received this, maybe either check with Lee if you're in the room with Lee and Laura.
Otherwise, we can gladly just resend this to you and maybe for your exact title over to Crystal.
Yes, thank you very much for this question.
In fact, I have two title.
I'm the officer in charge of the UN Mass Office in Geneva, the UN Mine Action Service Office in Geneva, but I am also the global coordinator of the Mine Action area of responsibility, which is a group of UN and NGOs that work together as part of the global protection cluster in the humanitarian response architecture.
So I have two titles and I'm taking this opportunity of having the floor again to let you know that today we put on on Mass website our annual report.
You can see who are funding on Mass and what we do with the money and how many people with how many lives we've saved by destroying explosive items.
And yeah, do take a look at the website.
It's got a lot of interesting facts and figures there.
We have a question from Ben from RTS in the room front row.
It's well noted now about the news.
Do you have any fresh data about any mine contamination or explosive remnants in Gaza?
We have a lot of data on Ukraine, of course, but if I'm not mistaken, still absolutely nothing about Gaza.
So maybe you have some fresh news.
I mean we ourself are not active at this point in time.
So I wouldn't have first hand news that or figures that I could share with you.
I understand my the Anma's colleague might might have more information on that pair if you want to come up and if you would like to jump up here.
So you actually, I mean UNMAS has a programme in in Palestine and has had one for many years.
And of course we are in the process of you know, providing as much assistance as we can and redesigning the programme to make it fit for purpose for the new situation.
And pair will give you more detail about that.
So concerning the numbers it is right now it's impossible to say.
We know that typically there is a failure rate of at least 10% of land service ammunition, ammunition that is being fired and fails to function.
What we know do know is that we estimate 3037 million tonnes of of debris, which is approximately 300 kilos of debris per square metre.
65% of the buildings that have been destroyed are residential buildings.
And two weeks ago or the week before this week, we had together with UNDPA workshop in Amman looking at explosive hazard management from the debris perspective and removing explosive hazards in debris, focusing on Gaza.
We did this together with the NGO community in order to prepare ourselves for what eventually might come.
And an intervention in, in Gaza.
I've worked myself in, in Iraq for the last seven years.
So I, I, I have seen this in the past, not to the same extent, but it is a very complicated situation with potentially deeper bombs also.
And as Kristel said, we've worked in Gaza for, for several years.
So we are familiar with the with the types of ammunition we're familiar with, with deeper bombs, but numbers I cannot give you.
And I should just mention that in the list of potential interviewees, we have a colleague from En Masse who is charged with looking into the situation in Palestine, Charles Birch, in fact.
And if you had, I know, I know, I understand that you don't have the phone numbers, but the full picture.
But if you have to take a guess, when we talk about Ukraine, we're saying that it will take like decades for Ukraine to get rid of explosives.
If you have to take a guess about Gaza, how many centuries would it take?
So first of all, I wouldn't guess because it's impossible to to to guess.
All I can say that at least 10% of the ammunition that is being fired potentially fails to to function and the number was 300 kilos per square metre of, of surface with with debris.
One number I can give you is that an estimation has been done based on the current number of, of tonnes of, of debris in in Gaza.
And with 100 trucks, we're talking about 14 years of work with 100 trucks.
So that's based on that figure 14 years to remove with approximately 750,000 work days, person work days to remove the debris.
So significant numbers when it comes to to debris.
Thank you very much up here questions in the Oh yes, Stefan, I wanted to add something, please.
If I may just add a comment on on Ukraine, because there are indeed many numbers out there.
I was in in Kiev last week and we had mine action donor coordination seminar.
I think it is important to stress that for example, the figure of 174,000 square kilometres suspected of being contaminated is of course a starting point.
And in my action, the hard work is really to move from the starting point to determining which surface exactly is contaminated.
And just to say that in, in recent months, the Ukrainian authorities have been able to release 18,000 square kilometre back to productive use.
So you see that the way my action functions allows you by the application of standards to clarify, you know, relatively speedily in certain cases which surfaces can be released to productive use and which cannot.
So this job needs to continue.
The figure will decrease.
It is still very massive, but it is the the task, the first task once conditions allowed to really determine with more precision which part of the country is contaminated and which is not.
I would just like to follow up on the fact that, you know, the media is very interested, of course, in the situation consequences for for, for the population and also what we call reverbating consequences.
As Pierre was describing the amount of time and energy and money and the risk of clearing explosive items in in rubbles, you know, in when you have buildings who have been destroyed, it's very difficult.
But I think the best thing would be for the colleague interested in Sudan to talk to our programme managers, Siddiq, who is actually a a former Afghan D minors, who is now the head of our programme in Sudan.
And I was just getting clarification.
Yes, indeed, Siddiq Rashid is the name of the person who's dealing with Sudan.
And then in terms of Zoom, I think you had a question, but no, it will not be Zoomed.
Therefore, we just do strongly encourage in person participation and do again, no need to get credentials, but do register through Leawood year and we'll make sure you get his contacts.
Really last two questions because we have quite a busy agenda afterwards, John Zaracostas and then we'll go to Yuri and then we'll have to wrap it there.
You can hear me there indeed are good.
Yes, this is a question for The Lancet.
I was wondering if you could give us some information on how many health facilities and ambulances etcetera have been damaged because of IEDs or cluster munitions.
And secondly, if I'm not mistaken, I think wind mass is involved in some of the emergency trips to some of the hospitals in Gaza.
Have you found unexploded ordinances in some of the hospitals and are you in the process of removing them?
So most of those questions I'm, I'm happy to refer them to to Charles RC map for Gaza, who will be here next week and who will be able to, to answer questions.
But what I can talk about are what is what we've done in, in Gaza so far.
So we are supporting humanitarian convoys from an explosive hazard management standpoint, supporting them, ensuring that they are safe.
We supported 97 convoys so far.
We are assessing critical infrastructure, looking at it from an explosive hazard management perspective, looking at the impact.
We're doing explosive hazard awareness for humanitarian workers so that they are safe.
We provided risk education for civilians in Gaza to 1.2 million people.
We're looking eventually at the multi sectoral assessment to be planned where we will be part and together with the rest of the humanitarian sector, we'll look at explosive weapons and their use.
And other than that, we are working closely with the the resident coordinator and the humanitarian coordinator in planning and preparing for what potentially will come.
And I also mentioned the workshop last week in Amman where we were looking at the problem with debris in urban populated areas.
And the final question from Yuri from Rio Novosti.
Rolando, this is more a request than a question.
Can we have a separate briefing on that?
Because as you say, there is a lot of topics today in the briefing of the UN, but we have a lot of questions still for in Mass.
So if we can organise something just only on this topic with you the next week for example, it will be really great because still a lot of questions.
Absolutely, I think of gauging from the level of interest we've just felt here and indeed this is something we can explore with Lee and Laura afterwards.
On that note, I'm sorry, John, we really need to wrap it up and move to the next.
If you can contact Lee or Laura afterwards.
So thank you for joining us here very much.
Good luck next few days and thanks to you for really shedding light on this very important issue.
So on that note, we will move to we're going to shift the order a little bit.
Tomaso, we have a colleague who's going to speak on Afghan.
Did you want to come up here and I can introduce him if you like?
So we're going to move to thank you very much once again.
So we're going to move to Afghanistan.
We have a colleague from the International Federation for the Red Cross, Mr Alexander Matthew, who is a regional Director for the IFRC, who is joining us from a Doha, who's going to speak to the long term and humanitarian development strategy in Afghanistan.
I've just concluded my fifth visit to Afghanistan since the autumn of 2021.
Each time through a combination of meeting the leadership of the Afghan Red Crescent, the ministers from the IEA authorities, meeting Afghan colleagues, Afghan communities, visiting disaster zones and service facilities, I tried to understand how humanitarian trends are evolving and what may be the best way to address them.
Over the last week, I was in Kandahar and Kabul, I met the acting Minister of Foreign Affairs, the acting Deputy Prime Minister, Abdul Kabir, the governor of Kandahar.
And I visited the transit stations, the Spinball, that transit station for attorneys from Pakistan, health facilities in Kandahar city and in the surrounding villages and mental health facilities in Kandahar.
And my visit culminates this week in Doha in a round table event together with the Afghan Red Crescent and the ICRC with the diplomatic community here in Doha who cover Afghanistan and then a partnership meeting on Sunday in support of the Afghan Red Crescent.
And I would like to just quickly share some highlights and recommendations from my visit.
But I will start by saying it is important to note some of the positives because while there are still plenty of security incidents going on in Afghanistan, everyday actually or most days, most days, the security on the whole is better than it has been for decades.
And on the surface it is peaceful and this is clearly deeply welcomed by a war ravaged population.
There is also a clear commitment to reduce theft and corruption that is also welcomed and mostly an openness to work with international stakeholders who want to work in and support Afghanistan.
So those are some positives.
Peel back a layer though, and the severity of the humanitarian crisis does become very apparent.
And I'm just going to raise two issues that came from my visit here and then make a few recommendations.
First, on the returnees from Pakistan, you will be aware that over half a million have crossed the border over recent months and it is likely that we will see large numbers of new arrivals in the coming months.
And I imagine this is probably the largest population flow in a short period of time in Asia since the population movement from Myanmar into Bangladesh in 2017.
So it's a significant event.
The humanitarian effort has largely concentrated on the transit stations in the border areas to help people on arrival at these transit points.
But the evidence that we looked at on this visit suggests that the real challenges start once people move away from those transit areas.
And the evidence of that was we visited clinics where they reported a real spike in cases of acute malnutrition coming from the arrivals from Pakistan.
We visited routine immunisation programmes of the IFRC and the Afghan Red Crescent in the villages.
And there it was clear looking at the children that as well as being anaemic, you could steal, you could see wasting and stunting amongst the children.
And whence we and when we interviewed the returnees themselves, it was also clear that, but most had no idea how they were going to settle in their point of destination or how they were going to build a livelihood with nothing.
And largely they expected to be living with distant relatives, which would actually make very, very poor people, some of the most poorest communities in the world, even poorer.
So I'd like to make just two suggestions on this.
What will be an ongoing response to about 2024.
One, that the programmes to support returnees focus not just on the transit stations which have received the bulk of the investment to date, but they also look at boosting the capacity of the health services in the areas where people are arriving and that there be a focus on economic regeneration of the people once they arrive.
Secondly, it will be important to work with the government of Pakistan in 2024 to to ask that if there are going to be returnees that they at least come in in a more staggered way, in smaller numbers at a time, just so it's more manageable on the Afghan side.
The second issue that I want to raise in terms of crisis is about the mental health crisis in the country, because a lot is said about hunger, education, exclusion and disasters in Afghanistan, and rightly so, because all of those issues are important and all of them, one way or another, IFRC is involved in responding to.
But beneath those crises, there is an invisible crisis of hopelessness, depression, desperation that stem from a collapsing health service, mass unemployment, barriers to education, and frustrated boys, girls, men and women who were stuck at home all day.
All of which is aggravated by decades of conflict, trauma.
And as well as hearing that in every conversation that I had, I did have the chance to witness that in its most extreme form, a place where you see the real terrible collateral damage of war in the mental health services of the Afghan Red Crescent.
And here I saw sort of yards full of men, former prisoners of war, people traumatised by violence, bombs, torture, who would witness the death of their loved ones in in a terrible state and no longer able to cope or be independent in life.
And women and girls also victims of violence, exposed to bombings and tragedies, living in cells with no exposure to the outside world and not even with blankets to sleep ones.
Now the doctors in the facilities, both male and female, are doing heroic work to try to make it functional and dignified behind despite their constraints.
But it was a reminder that how much pain there is behind the **** walls in what are now quite puzzling cities.
So in terms of recommendations, I would say that the first is how important it is to support Afghan institutions who are working with the most vulnerable people.
And there are still lots of reservations about this, but it is really the only way to sustainably help the country rather than constantly relying on parallel international organisations.
In IFRC that means supporting the Afghan Red Crescent, but there are plenty of other clinics and institutions who are desperately in need of support.
The second point is really how important it is now to be thinking long term and to focus on economic regeneration, not just for attorneys.
A huge amount of the international financing to date has focused on short term aid, including ours actually, which has a place.
But it is the wrong tool to deal with protracted and chronic poverty and a shift really needs to happen towards job creation.
Having said that, the Third Point is that Afghanistan is clearly highly prone to disasters.
We're responding to floods in the South of the country as we speak.
These disasters are constantly making poor people destitute.
And in those cases, we do need to step in with emergency aid as well as resilience work.
4th, with so many restrictions on education in the country, we'd need to find every opportunity we can to invest in youth, youth groups, learning opportunities, training opportunities, vocational opportunities for men and women.
Anything that helps people feel dignified, gives them a chance to learn and to be positive, which aid handouts tend not to do nothing.
Finally, the most important thing is, you know, not to forget Afghanistan.
It's off the headlines, the funding is low, but the needs are as great as ever and it's no less important than it was when it wasn't the headlines before.
Thanks to you very important message indeed, Christian from German news agency.
I stopped at the 1st things you mentioned how it's so welcome that the security situation has become better.
Did you speak to women, whether they are also welcoming the situation being being hit away and stuck in their homes?
And maybe you can say a few words on on this dilemma.
How do you deliver any help that targets women and girls?
How much are you restricted or how can you get around the restrictions?
It's you seem to be suggesting that it's necessary to work together with the with the Afghan authorities.
How, how do you do that if they treat half the population with disdain?
Well, thank you for the question.
I don't want to sugar coat it.
There are massive exclusion in challenges and there is massive exclusion.
I did speak to women, of course, more women than men actually.
We are very proactively trying to ensure that our workforce is gender balanced.
We employ women for all of our health services, mental health services, Primary Health clinic services, services for women.
Headed households would have headed households are run by women.
So actually I spoke to a lot of women and we have women and Afghan women here at the round table this week to speak about their experiences as well.
So I don't want to, you know, in any way, you know, not emphasise how important that issue is.
But it would not be true to say that there is no participation in humanitarian services or no participation in the workforce or no participation in being clients of services.
Because actually women are both delivering the assistance and receiving the assistance through the IFRC and the Afghan women present.
The security I think is welcomed by all.
Yes, I had a special, I spoke to women individually and I had a special session just for women to discuss what's going on in their lives, not just the IFRC.
Generally, I think nobody wants to be in an insecure environment or to feel unsafe when they go to the shops or go to the market.
So there is genuine sense that the security is better and people are no longer constantly living in fear of being collateral damage or a target to bombing attacks.
But that doesn't mean there are other things in life that are causing that terrible mental health crisis that I referred to, of which being excluded from many work opportunities and education opportunities for girls is clearly a key one.
We have a question now from Paula of Geneva Solutions.
So first of all, I'd like to know how many people you actually have deployed in Afghanistan, where they're deployed?
Are they deployed beyond urban areas?
And also, I guess you know, same question for the red Red Crescent there and beyond that, I think I have lots of questions.
I think I probably have have to speak to you directly.
But also in terms of, you know, you're talking about the need for more development type aid.
I know that, you know, there's sort of certain type of repackaging of of some of the aid in in in other terms that are used that is taking place.
And just wondering, you know, if that's already started within the I foreseen, you know, Red Crescent movements there and what specifically that would involve.
We don't have a large team, but we never, we almost never do because our model of working is to work through a national organisation and only keep the minimum, minimum capacity on the international side that's necessary for representation, Technical Support and quality, quality assurance and accountability.
So our our team is we have staff in two or three of the provinces of Afghanistan, but the team of around 40, of which are six or seven are expatriates, are in Kabul and the work is done through the national organisation, through the Afghan Red Crescent.
And that is our model for all its opportunities and risks.
It is our fundamental belief that the country has to take its response responsibility for managing its own crises and it needs strong institutions to do that.
And we try to support one of them through the Red Cross and Red Crescent Society in every country in the world.
Afghanistan is no different in terms of the livelihoods.
We have actually been working on it for years.
It's just not enough and we're not scaling it.
So one of our core programmes for example is for widow headed households.
There are, and this is a huge problem in Afghanistan, especially because of the restrictions in some of the workplaces that widow headed households then become destitute very quickly.
So we have centres where they can both stay and where they can get vocational skills and seek to become economically independent after one or two years of being supported in in these centres.
That is not big enough to go to scale.
You know, we had 500 graduates last year, for example, which is a drop in the ocean.
Other agencies I think are largely aligned with the idea that it is inadequate continuing, continuing continually deliver food or cash to populations who ultimately need to restore their livelihoods and become economically independent.
And if that were not self-evident, it becomes enforced in the sense that now the funding ceilings have gone down so much, the amount of people that can be reached through aid distributions is diminishing every single year.
So that places I think even more pressure to use the reduced amount of financing for longer term impact.
We have one more question from Nick of the New York Times.
There was a very active Afghan civil society free 2021.
I'm just wondering to what extent international sanctions continue to inhibit support to national organisations.
International organisations have international connections, but Afghan national societies, are they, is there any funding actually reaching them?
It is possible to get funding into the country and but there are restrictions on it and you have to get sanctions exemptions and so forth.
So we are we are getting funding into the country.
I hear that there are many smaller NGOs that are still struggling, not just because of the practical limitations of accessing financing, but generally interest in the context has gone down.
And I think that's what, you know, that is, that is the critical issue that the future is looking extremely bleak.
I, I mentioned a few points about the positives because I think it's only fair, only fair to do so.
Some things are improvements generally for people's life.
The fact that people feel safer for, for example, that's no small thing in a country that's been so traumatised by war.
But the future in terms of where will the next generation of female doctors and nurses come from?
Where will the next generation of female teachers come from?
Where is going to be the investment come from?
Where that will generate the employment opportunities for for families to be economically independent and hopeful about the future rather than desperate to leave or desperately depressed.
These these future projections are looking quite grim, which is why it is so important I think for a rethink about what type of investment is going to have the best impact.
What type of investment is, what have we learnt from the last three years?
Where do we think this is going?
And what type of investment is likely to be best?
Primarily for the people of Afghanistan, which is controversial because there is so much politics involved in decisions around allocations of aid.
But in the interests of people of Afghanistan, it's important to have this discussion and try to find the best solution possible.
Thank you very much, Alexandra.
I think that's the end of questions, but Tom also wanted to add something.
Thank you, Rolando, and of course, thank you, Alexander for this comprehensive briefing, not just because I'm saying I'm seeing some questions and journalists that are interested in.
We will have Alexander Indoa together with our Head of Delegation, Afghanistan available for interviews in the next coming days during the partnership meeting, but also in the next weeks to come.
So if you want to follow up, if you have any follow up question, if you want to talk to them, please feel free to contact us to the usual channel of the IFC media team.
Thank you very much, and thanks again, Alexander, very much for this important briefing.
And of course, feel free to join us anytime.
Jeremy Lawrence from the human rights, the UN human rights office says update on the Iran hijab law.
Thanks, Rolo, and good morning, everyone.
We have received information that uniformed and plainclothes police in Iran are enforcing a violent crackdown throughout the country against women and girls under the country's strict hijab laws, as well as men who are supporting them.
There have been reports of widespread arrests and harassment of women and girls, many between the ages of 15 and 17.
On the 21st of April, the Tehran head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps announced the creation of a new body to enforce existing mandatory hijab laws, adding that Guard members have been trained to do so in a more serious manner in public spaces.
Reports indicate that hundreds of businesses have been forcibly closed for not enforcing compulsory hijab laws and surveillance cameras are being used to identify women drivers not complying with the laws.
Our office is also very concerned that a draught bill titled Supporting the Family for Promoting the Culture of Chastity and Hijab, which impose imposes even stricter punishments, is nearing final approval by the Guardian Council.
While the latest draught of the bill has not been made public, an earlier version stipulates that those found guilty of violating the mandatory dress code could face up to 10 years imprisonment, flogging and fines.
Corporal punishment constitutes a form of cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment or punishment, and any detention imposed for the exercise of fundamental freedoms is arbitrary under international law.
We reiterate that this bill must be shelved.
UN **** Commissioner for Human Rights Volcker Turk calls on the Iranian government to eliminate all forms of gender based discrimination and violence, including through the revision and the repeal of harmful laws, policies and practises in line with international human rights norms and standards.
This week, we also received reports that the Isfahan Revolution Court sentenced to death rapper Tomaj Salahi.
He was convicted and sentenced for corruption on earth over views he expressed in the context of nationwide protests in 2022 following the death of Gina Masa Amini.
Massa Rimini had fallen into a coma in police custody after being detained by the morality police for not wearing a headscarf properly.
The **** Commissioner urges the authorities to overturn Tamarge Sally his sentence and calls for his immediate and unconditional release.
All individuals imprisoned for exercising their freedom of opinion and expression, including artistic expression, must be released.
Nine men have already been executed in connection with the 2022 protests.
The **** Commissioner urges the Iranian government to immediately halt the application of the death penalty and establish a moratorium on its use until then.
The death penalty may only be imposed for the most serious crimes, which refers to crimes of extreme gravity that result intentionally and directly in death.
And I see that the notes have been shared with us, so thank you for that as well.
We have questions for Jeremy.
Are they in the room or online?
I see Lisa from VOA has a question for you.
Jeremy, have all St protests ceased because of fear and do you have, I don't know, speak of bullies?
Why is it why is there such unmitigated hostility toward women?
Do you see a anything comparable in regard to other groups in Iranian society, or I mean, the revolutionary people, the Khomeinis and so forth, they seem to be very much afraid of women.
Are they afraid of women?
And then I'm wondering whether the **** Commissioner has received any response to his many calls, his interventions, or whether he's just kind of calling into the wilderness.
Yes, well, I certainly hope it's not into the wilderness.
We continuing to engage with the Iranian authorities that will continue and particularly when it comes to the issue of the hijab bill and the death penalty.
With respect to the to the protests, they do not appear to be taking place still in the context of the protest following Masa Rimini's death.
But what we have seen, what we're hearing is in the past months that the authorities, whether they be plainclothes police or, or or or the policeman in uniform, are increasingly enforcing the the hijab bill.
As you know, the hijab law has been in place since the 1979 revolution.
What we're also doing is taking this opportunity to raise our concern about the, the new form of this hijab bill, which as I mentioned is increasing, will increase the prison term to 10 years.
It had previously been about two months and the same with fines and, and incredibly floggings.
In fact, we, we, there was an instance in in January where a woman was flogged 74 times under this current legislation.
So it's there's only one answer for this and it's as we say in the statement, the the bill has to be shelved.
We have Nick, New York Times question.
Jeremy, I wonder if you have any more on the new organisation that you say is being set up.
And the second question is, do you have much detail on what it was that he said that has provoked this sentence and whether you think his death sentence is relating specifically to his comments on the protests or whether there are other aspects of his activities, his career that might have triggered such a severe response?
So this case actually dates back to he was initially imprisoned in October 2022 for public statements that he'd made in support of the nationwide protest.
Subsequent to that, there has been he, he had been sentenced to death.
Then there had been the Supreme Court over overruled that.
Now we've got this, the Isfahan court, the Revolution court re imposing the death sentence.
Now what I can say from what we understand is that there will be an appeal over the next 20 days.
Hopefully, common sense will prevail on, on that front.
Further questions for Jeremy on that.
Yeah, Jeremy, I was asking also about the new organisation that you say is being set up.
What information you have on that?
I'm afraid we don't have a lot more information that was in the what we had heard through through the channels coming from our sources coming from in inside Iran.
As you know that there is the, the existence of the morality police already.
They, their, their actions seem to, they seem to pull back slightly after that the protests.
But what we're hearing now is that they're, they're back out on the streets enforcing the hijab law itself.
We'll be following the situation obviously very closely with respect to to this new force and this new decree, which has been issued through the through the Revolutionary Guards.
OK, thanks very much for that.
Jeremy, further questions.
No, I don't see that's the case.
So thank you once again for highlighting this important issue.
We have on the line Saif Magongo, who I've also of the UN office, the human rights office who's speaking with us from Nairobi.
And thanks for your patience.
Safe is going to speak about Sudan and situation specifically in Alfasher.
Thanks so much, Rolando, and thanks for everyone and yeah, good morning the the UNUN HEA Commissioner for Human Rights worker.
Turkey is gravely concerned by the by the escalating violence in and around the fascia city North Darfur, where dozens of people have been killed in the past two weeks as hostilities between the Sudan Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces have intensified.
Reports indicate that both parties have launched indiscriminate attacks using explosive weapons with wide area effects such as motor shells and rocket fired rockets fired from fighter jets in residential districts.
At least 43 people among the women and children were killed as fighting was taking place between the SAF and RSF, backed by their respective allied militia.
Since 14 April, when the RSF began IS pushed into fashion, civilians are trapped in the city.
The only one in Darfur stayed in the hands of the SAF afraid of being killed, so they attempt to flee this This dire situation is compounded by a severe shortage of essential supplies, as deliveries of commercial goods and humanitarian aid have been heavily constrained by the fighting and delivery trucks are unable to freely transit through RSF controlled territory.
Since early April, the RSF has conducted several large scale attacks on villages in western Alfaro, mostly inhabited by the African Zagawa ethnic community.
RSF has burned down some of the villages, including Dorma, Shosh, Sarafiya and Uzbani.
Such attacks raised the spectre of other ethnically motivated violence in Darfur, including mass killings.
Last year, fighting and attacks between the Rizagat and the African mass elite in western Darfur left hundreds of civilians dead and injured and thousands displaced from their homes.
Their Commissioner calls for an immediate escalation of this catastrophic situation and ends to the conflict that has furnished the country for more than a year now and investigation of all alleged violations and abuses of international human rights law in violations of international mentarian law.
With a view to ensuring accountability and victims right to both justice and repressions.
He also urges both parties to the conflict and their allies to grant civilians safe passage to other areas, ensure the protection of civilians and civilian objects, and facilitate safe and unhindered humanitarian access.
Hi, Safe, the outlook appears to be very bleak.
I'm wondering if there is any, what shall I say, communication pipeline, whether what is happening, if anything, on the United Nations negotiating fronts.
I mean, there are a lot of organisations and a lot of people and your, or your own included, which are screaming about stopping this.
And, and is it even reasonable to believe that it's possible to have any kind of an investigation into abuses or whatever?
I, I'm sorry, it, it, it, it seems pretty hopeless at the moment.
How do you view the situation?
Do you see any opening to stop this?
Well, indeed, it's still a very catastrophic situation, bleak as you describe it.
There continues to be lots of human rights violations and abuses taking place across the country, not just in the four and the the deploy on the diplomatic front.
There has been hits and stats in the process but we as are calling indeed for talks to be ramped up and for both parties to engage meaningfully into the process to resolve this conflict politically because one year of fighting has only led to civilian suffering and devastated the country's economy, politics and everything.
Talks are continuing, but of course we see that there is need to ramp them up and try to push because at the end of the day this can only be comprehensively resolved through the end of the fighting and a return to civilian government in Sudan.
Do we have further questions for Saif on Sudan?
No, I don't see that's the case.
So thank you very much for highlighting this and colleagues first keeping Oh you have a OK, maybe another issue or OK we have a question on another issue.
But so thank you very much safe much appreciated is generally of Adefe is a question.
Yeah, I understand that Margaret from WHO is online Margaret is online.
You have a question for WHO Yeah, go ahead.
Just a quick one on the press release that WHO just released this morning regarding the widespread overuse of antibiotics during the COVID pandemic.
I was wondering if Margaret, could you just specify apart from the resistance phenomenon, what is the, the, the harm that you're talking in the in the press release, the harm for people who are not, who are not in need of antibiotics, but did receive, what was the issue with, with them receiving this thing?
And, and can you specify across regions?
I understand that it's not the same in, in the different WHO regions.
Of course, I'm interested in, in Europe.
This this comes from our database from several years of clinical material collected from hospitals and it certainly indicates that there was quite a variation across regions.
The region that was we were reported greatest use over 70% was in Afro.
Euro started higher and then fell lower.
The and the Western Pacific region had the lowest use, but they were all much higher than you would expect, expect or want to see because the only use time you would use antibiotics when you've got a viral infection is if you had a secondary proven bacterial infection that was sensitive to those antibiotics.
So in other words, they were not being used appropriately.
And if you like the harm, the main harm of course is that if you're using antibiotics, you're unnecessarily, you're increasing the likelihood of antimicrobial resistance to those particular antibiotics so that when you do need them for your bacterial infection, they are no longer so useful.
But of course, every any individual can have allergic reactions or they can have a response to a medication that's untoward.
So if you give somebody a medication that they don't actually need, you are always exposing them to an unnecessary risk.
Every time you treat a person for any illness with any medication, a doctor will balance will this medication do the job and prevent whatever the disease is and is that a more important outcome than any of the potential risks?
Just how do you explain the this?
I mean, after so many years of campaign, at least in Europe, regarding the use of antibiotics and all the medics were aware of this thing, how do you explain that 75%?
That's the, that's the number 75% of people received antibiotics in hospitals.
So is it the effect of surprise?
How, how do you how do you explain that?
And how many years of prevention have we lost in just two years, three years of pandemic?
And I'd only be speculating.
So that's, that's a very good question to look at what happened?
Why were these decisions being made?
Because the advice was not to do that.
And the advice was very clear right from the start.
This was a virus, so it wasn't that that there was any guidance or recommendation that that that clinicians go in this direction, but perhaps because people were dealing with something completely new, they were looking for whatever they thought might be appropriate.
But that you're quite right.
The advice has already always been do not use antibiotics unless for a proven bacterial infection that's sensitive to that particular antibiotic.
Thank you for the clarification, Margaret.
Do we have any other questions on this for Margaret?
So thank you for chiming in on this important note.
Just a couple of the last announcements from before we wrap up this press briefing.
As usual, just to highlight the treaty body meetings, human rights treaty body meetings next week, the Committee Against Torture on Wednesday morning will review the report of North Macedonia.
And the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination will close this afternoon.
After having reviewed Mexico, San Marino, Albania, Qatar and Moldova and press conferences, there are two.
I'm going to flag both on Tuesday, the 30th of April.
This coming Tuesday, in this room following this press briefing at noon, we'll have Philippa Lazzarini, who as you know, is on Rose Commissioner General, who will be updating you on the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.
He will be here for briefings, and he's taking time to brief you 12 noon on Tuesday, the 30th.
Later in the day, on Tuesday at 4:00 PM, we'll have an update on the humanitarian situation on the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Speaker is Bruno Le Marquis, the UN Resident Coordinator and Humanitarian Coordinator, who will be speaking with you here at 4:00 PM on DRC.
If you have questions for me, Christian, you have a question, go ahead.
There was a very quick one for Margaret.
Can you tell us at what time on Monday the pandemic treaty negotiations will resume and what is the expected finish of that round of negotiations?
I don't have an exact, sorry, Am I?
Yeah, I don't have an exact, but they normally resume in the morning, 9 ish, 10:00-ish and they go all day.
We want this to be ready for the World Health Assembly, which as you know, a starts at the end of May.
So that's really the the the timeline they're on.
It's a very fierce timeline, but I I can't give you anything tighter than that.
Thank you, Margaret, for the questions.
No, on that note, I wish you a good afternoon and a good weekend and see you here on Tuesday.
