Good morning, dear colleagues.
Welcome to this press briefing of UN Information Service in Geneva on Friday 30th of October.
I would like to start by reading an announcement that Rolando has asked me to read on behalf of the Human Rights Council.
The Human Rights Council Universal Periodic Review Working Group will hold its 36th session starting Monday for two weeks.
Rolando issued a background press release last night.
I hope you have all received it.
It contains all the details, the list of the 14 states who will be reviewed.
The session will now take place in the Assembly Hall because of the COVID restriction.
As you know, this will allow for social distancing and for respecting all the the COVID measures.
However, given the capacity, the maximum capacity of 50 people allowed in the room at any given time, we would like to encourage the journalist, if possible to cover the session on webcast.
As you know, we will webcast all the proceedings.
Rolando is available for any questions that you would like to ask.
And I, by the way, would like to ask if there is anybody who has a question on this particular issue looking at the room and online there is none.
So I will go now to Sophie Fisher, who I think is connected from my ILO.
Sophie, yes, good morning.
And my apologies to everybody for not using the video, but I'm working from home and my Internet connection is not so great.
What I wanted to tell you about this morning is that the 340th session of the Ilo's governing body will open on Monday the 2nd of November and run until the 13th of November.
This is the first governing body session to take place this year.
It will be a virtual event because of COVID, but it will.
We expect the sessions to involve GB members from all regions items on the agenda in addition to the usual sessions on policy development, legal issues, programme finances and admin.
On Friday the 6th of November there will be a **** level day.
Details of that will follow.
We'll be sending you a media advisory.
There will be the report of the Director General, a follow up on a range of ILO initiatives including the Centenary Declaration on the Future of Work, the Standards Initiative, the ILO Action Plan for Gender Equality, the Disability Inclusion Policy and Strategy and the report of the response of the International Labour Office to the COVID-19 pandemic.
In addition, there will be the report of the Committee on Freedom Association and items on some particular countries, who will be Guatemala, Qatar, Myanmar, Venezuela, Bangladesh and Chile.
Now if any journalist would like to follow the GB, please could you write to us at newsroom@ilo.org and we will try and arrange access via Zoom.
And indeed you have a question from Emma from Reuters.
Emma, you have the floor.
Sorry, Alessandra, my question is for.
Let me see if there's any question for Sophie.
Sophie, Emma, ask your question.
Yes, it was regarding your e-mail.
About the COVID cases amongst UN Secretariat.
It refers to and also where these cases emerged from.
It just seems like a lot.
A cluster or or were they from home?
Or did they happen in the workplace?
Idea of where transmission occurred?
I'm asking as a journalist.
I'm interested in the subject but also.
You know, for safety reasons.
This is a very legitimate question.
First of all, the, the 34 new cases that we have communicated have been made positive, I mean known as positive since the the last time we did the announcement which was the 19th of October.
So indeed it's a quite **** number of cases for such a short time.
But it's also true that this follows quite, let's say quite naturally the spark of case that we have observed in in many countries including in Switzerland.
The question on where as as we have said it's, it's we are only reporting cases in the Secretariat, but the, the secretariat is, is large.
So it's not only, you know, unis or the UN office at Geneva, but also the human rights Angktad ECE ocha, all the department that belongs to the Secretariat in terms of clusters.
This is also a very legitimate questions that we ask ourselves every time that some cases are are discovered, are confirmed.
The medical service does this on a systematic basis.
They look at each and every case.
If the cases come from the same department, they look whether there could be a possibility of cluster to the best of my knowledge, and we ask the question every time there has been no clusters identified on these cases.
But also I would like to make you all aware of the fact that if by any chance you had to be a contact case, you would be contacted by our medical service, even if you are not staff.
So this is something that I would like to make very clear.
When a case is discovered, is confirmed at the Parliament, we, our medical service contact the person makes a very thorough questionnaire analysis of the whereabouts of the person who was confirmed and contact everybody who could be potentially a a contact case.
And this include of course, delegates, journalists, everybody.
So I can confirm that we have not for the moment at least.
And I hope it won't be the case.
I found out that these cases correspond to any cluster.
But of course, we're very vigilant and we will continue to look into into this matter.
Thank you, Alessandra, Mike.
And this is a question, I don't know whether it concerns the UN, but according to a number of reports that the men's group is having a meeting in Geneva today involving Azerbaijan and Armenia.
And I was wondering if there is any UN involvement perhaps at this stage of the negotiations?
This is not AUN meeting and it's not happening at the Palais.
And for any question from the journalist request of every kind, please contact the French Permanent Mission in Geneva and in particular Mrs Mariboro, who is the new press officer of the mission.
If you don't have her contact, please contact Solange.
She will be able to give it to you, Frank.
Hi, I've got a question on Tanzania.
I don't know if human rights is available to answer that.
It concerns the fact that the opposition has reported widespread fraud and intimidation around Wednesday's elections, including the arrests and beatings of some of the opposition leaders, and the US has noted serious doubts about the credibility of the vote.
Is there any statements forthcoming?
Wait a second, sorry, just give me one second.
I don't see OHCHR among the people who are connected, but I know that Ravina is available for questions because she sent me a message before.
So so I, I, I'm, I'm pretty sure that if you contact Ravina, she'll be able to answer to you unless she's connected.
I can't seem give me a second because this platform takes a little bit of time.
No, she's not connected, but she she's yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's what I'm one second.
I apparently have a message on WhatsApp.
Yeah, she's available for answering questions.
So please ask this question to her.
If we have any further comments coming from New York, we would also, of course, distribute it.
OK, let me go back to my top of the list.
I don't have any other questions.
So let me go to the next speaker.
Who is Graham Graham here?
So Graham Alabastair from UN habitats, she he has a a briefing for you.
Thank you very much, Sandra.
Just really to I wanted to announce that this afternoon we have a press conference, an embargo released on our new global report which will be released tomorrow in Kenya.
This report is very interesting.
It's about the role of cities and the value in the global recovery of the COVID-19 pandemic.
And without wishing to tell you too much about what will be in the, in the, in the report, you can come this afternoon and hear about that.
There are four big areas about how cities can contribute.
1 looks at how when cities function more efficiently, they can be much more, they can generate much more in, in recovery, in the economic recovery in the post COVID.
The second thing relates to the second area relates to the environmental stability and the reduced carbon footprint of cities as we move out of the COVID pandemic.
The third is on on on social equity and how improvements in housing and services can contribute to the recovery.
And then finally, the the other finding of the report relates to the, the civic pride and the cultural aspect of cities and what they contribute.
So that the, that briefing is this afternoon at 1:30 here, here in the in the Palais and we very much hope that you can join us.
My executive director will be will be opening the, the session.
And I see that you have a question from Christoph.
Christoph, yes, Graham just would be possible to have the report before the briefing this afternoon, so.
Can actually have a better idea of what questions we.
Most most definitely yes that.
Yeah, following the report, will you also give us a press release?
I hope you have a press release because reports usually are quite lengthy.
Yeah, most definitely, Yes.
The press release is there, yeah.
And I also remind you on this subject that sorry that we have distributed to you the message of the Secretary General for World Cities Day and I would like to also ask you to to take this this into consideration.
The Secretary General said that on the World Cities Day, we recognise the extraordinary contribution made by grassroots communities in our cities and town, particularly during the this period of pandemic.
We have distributed the message in all languages.
So if there are no other questions on this matter and I don't see any, I'll go to our next speaker with Paul Dillon.
Paul, you have the floor.
You're going to brief us on COVID-19 in Kenya.
That's right, good morning.
Thousands of truck drivers across Kenya are being treated are being tested for COVID-19 by the International Organisation for Migration, one element of a broader effort to reinvigorate regional economies feeling the socio economic impacts of COVID-19.
Billions of dollars worth of goods begin the final leg of their inland journeys to Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan and Democratic Republic of Congo aboard transport trucks originating from the sprawling court in Mombasa and southeast Kenya.
Now, mobility restrictions implemented in response through the pandemic brought much of this cross-border trade in the region's propriety falls.
Truck drivers in particular were identified early on as a **** risk group for the spread and transmission of COVID-19.
So IOM sees the integration of COVID-19 testing and other health measures into border management systems as a critical to reanimating a national and local economies and blunting the socio economic impacts of COVID-19.
In July, the organisation staff conducted 2570 individual tests at the Malaba and Busia borders with Uganda in an effort to clear out a lineup of trucks stretching some 90 kilometres back from the border.
That's that time we've retested more than 14,200 other drivers moving freight out of East Africa's largest port bound for nations across the East, foreign and central part of Africa.
Now we've sent medical staff, lab technicians and a semi automated Thermo Fisher testing system to the Coast General Teaching and referral Hospital, which enables a testing of about 400 samples within a day.
The impact is measurable, reducing the turn around time for results to 24 and 36 hours, which is an important consideration for drivers to deliver their goods as as possible.
Now, one of the Kenyan drivers told us that since the virus emerged, he would wait for up to two weeks to cross the border between Kenya and Uganda, by which time his COVID-19 certificate had expired, meaning retesting more cost to the driver and further waits at the border.
Now, Iowa in Kenya has also conducted infection prevention and control training to more than 200 of the frontline workers at points of entry and provided personal protection equipment for 27 of those points of entry, including Joe Mckenyat.
Lisa has a question for you.
First in observation, you're the audio was terrible and actually when your audio usually is not really of **** quality, I'm sorry to say.
So if you could look into it, it would be very helpful.
And you didn't send the notes or we.
Haven't read feedback, I was I was unaware of some audio.
I mean it, it's, it's, I don't know if it's usable for radio.
I'm, I'm sorry, it's just if you could look at it because this happens a lot with your your audio.
If you could check into that, please, certainly.
And now a question since I missed a lot of it, I'm not sure I'm asking the right questions.
But anyway how many truck drivers are you?
I mean is this going to be an ongoing process and or is this just a one off testing that you're doing?
How many truck drivers are involved and how many have actually been been infected And and did you say they have to pay for the tests and if so, how much?
I would imagine that this would be a hardship for many truck drivers.
I mean the, the, the cost of these tests done in an ad on an ad hoc basis accumulates over time.
The total number of truckers that you've tested is under 17,000.
That's the July intervention on the border with Panda to clear out massive backlog.
This 90 kilometre long backup waiting enter into Uganda through those points of entry and in the last since the end of August until just last week, we provided these 2000.
Paul, Paul, you're really becoming unhearable.
Last sentence was not clear at all.
OK, that's really strange.
Nothing has changed from our side here.
I'll look into this right after the meeting.
Or maybe we can get a lav mic or something to improve the quality of the sound.
So the point is that, that the the focus since the end of August until the 23rd of October, I was on the 14,200 truckers were operating out of the port itself and these tests are ongoing.
Perhaps, Lisa, if you want to call me back bilaterally, I'd be more than happy to talk to you at greater length on this.
But I think the other journalists would also appreciate to have these numbers.
So if you could eventually maybe add if if there is any further information to add to your note, just distribute it to all the journalists.
I think everybody will be.
So the all the all the figures are there.
Thank you very much Paul.
Yes and let's look into this technical issues for further briefings.
Also on the line we have Thompson from WFP who has a has also had a briefing note on Kenya too.
A couple of weeks ago I, I, I briefed on, on, on how, on, on how COVID is having a much more severe impact on urban poor would depend on the informal economy for relieving.
And I used the example of Nigeria where the World Food Programme had expanded its assistance in into urban areas for the very first time such as Abuja, Kanu and Lagos.
Well, it would appear that hunger has really come to town and and and many families in the poor or low income urban settlements have either completely lost their incomes or are earning less, making an already tough life even harder.
Now in Kenya, in response to food shortages and hunger among the urban poor, the World Food Programme is rolling out cash and Nutrition Assistance for more than 400,000 people who are living in informal settlements in Nairobi and Mombasa.
In Nairobi, WFP is on course to provide cash and nutrition products to 300,000 people for the next four months, while in Mombasa, WFP is rolling out cash and nutrition supplements for over 100,000 people for the next three months.
Now, our office in Kenya tells us that an estimated 1.7 million people in informal urban settlements have been adversely affected by COVID-19.
Now with new cases that are surging across the urban cent is in Kenya, we hear that many more in COVID-19 hotspot counties may need our assistance.
The World Food Programme is providing 4000 Kenyan ceilings, which is approximately 40 United States dollars per month through mobile transfers to each eligible household to cover up to half of their food needs for an average family of four.
Now this is an activity that is in line with the Government of Kenya's own cash assistance programme and we hope to continue to expand this.
Unfortunately, unfortunately, once we have received funding from donors, we continue to engage them to mobilise more resources so that we're able to support the government.
Out of a 64,000,000 United States dollar requirement that the World Food Programme is included in Aun wide emergency appeal, we have only secured 36% of that which is currently being used to reach the most vulnerable families.
Our hope is that with adequate funding, we could provide food assistance to 725,000 people in Nairobi's informal settlements, but also in other hotspots that we are identifying on the ground, for example, Mombasa, Nakuru in the Kelifi counties, where we we can see that more and more people are in need of assistance.
I will stop here Alessandra and see if there are any questions.
And yes, Lisa has a question.
Yeah, I'm afraid I'm a big skull today.
I mean, it's just terrible.
I don't speak with you, Lisa.
Well, maybe he sounds, he sounds, he sounds very tinny and far away.
And maybe my radio ear is a little more sensitive than yours, but it's really very bad.
And also, it would be useful if you would send us your notes beforehand.
I I, I just honestly, I lost the plot and I I there's nothing I can do about this story.
Anybody else would like to ask something to tom-tom Song.
We actually heard you quite well.
But yes, maybe for radio, it's not enough.
Yeah, I hope you quite, quite well, Thomson.
I was wondering whether you had any boost in funding since you were nominated for the awarded with the Nobel Peace Prize.
There was some speculation or maybe some hope that this would trigger a boost in funding.
Thank you so much for that.
Yes, in Kenya, the United States of America was instrumental.
They provided as 22.8 million, which was critical in starting this assistance.
It was also critical in expanding it.
Also, we have had governments of Finland, Poland and Sweden coming in.
We, we, we, we have in tremendous goodwill following the awarding of the of the of the Nobel Peace Prize.
We continue to hope that this will, this will translate into more dollars and cents in time for us to meet the needs.
But it is, it is a terrible time for the World Food Programme.
The needs are outstripping the available resources.
We have more and more people in need of assistance now than they that than in the previous years.
Mombasa, as you know, is a tourist resort and, and, and tourism has headed southwards in, in, in, in Kenya.
These are areas we didn't have to provide so much assistance before, but we have to do so now due to COVID-19.
Kenya, for example, is Africa's third largest economy, coming after Nigeria and South Africa, but we are having to expand assistance there and, and a few weeks ago I briefed the House on expanding assistance for the very first time to the urban centres of Nigeria, which is the biggest economy.
So if these things are happening in some of Africa's biggest economies, you can imagine the situation in the poorer countries and not only in Africa but also in Asia, the Roy, Asia, in many other protracted crisis that we have had to assist over the years.
Indeed, any other question for Thompson, don't see any.
So thank you very much Thompson, for for this briefing.
And yes, please, if you could send the notes to the journalist, that would be appreciated.
So I am left now with a few other announcements.
First of all, I would like to remind you that we have just sent you a note to correspondent on the Geneva Peace Week that this year will take place from the 2nd to the 6th of November.
This is the 7th edition of the Geneva Peace Week and it's going to be an online one.
The week is jointly organised by UNORG, by the UN Office of Geneva, but also the Geneva Peace Building Platform and the Graduate Institute of International Development Studies.
This year's theme is rebuilding trust after disruption, pathways to reset international cooperation.
The aim of this week is really to galvanised leadership, building trust and contribute ideas to transform international cooperation in the wake of COVID-19.
As I said, the week, the five days during week which we, we will organise a lot of events, topics for discussion will go from the role, the new role of cyber peace, environmental peace building, harnessing the economy for peace in a COVID-19 area.
All together 70 or 9 events which will bring together 280 partner organisations.
You should have received the note, which contains the full programme and also the information on how to connect.
And I think that is all I have for you because the other two committees that we've already announced, the Human Rights Committee and the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, are meeting in in private until the end of their sessions.
If you don't have any other question, thank you very much and we'll see each other on Tuesday.
