Good morning, Welcome to the press briefing of the United Nations in Geneva.
Today is Tuesday, 22nd of April.
I hope you have spent a good long weekend and we start this shorter week with a short briefing, but an important one too.
I have the great pleasure to welcome Zlatan Mileage, who is the country Director of the World Food Programme in Ethiopia.
Mr Milisic is coming to us from Addis Ababa to tell us about the situation of hunger, malnutrition in Ethiopia.
I'll give him the floor straight away.
And we also have Mashrin Birunji online or companies him.
So Mr Milisic, you have the floor.
Good morning to all and thank you for the opportunity to brief you today.
I am the country director of the World Food Programme in Ethiopia.
Ethiopia is facing a rapidly deteriorated humanitarian situation.
Hunger and malnutrition are on the rise.
They're mainly driven by a deadly combination of climate shocks, conflict, economic instability and displacement.
WFP is responding, but without urgent funding, our ability to deliver life saving food and nutrition support is severely at risk.
Over 10 million people in Ethiopia are acutely food insecure.
This includes 3 million people displaced by conflict and extreme weather.
Malnutrition rates are alarmingly ****.
In total, over 4 million pregnant women, breastfeeding women and young children are emergent need of treatment for malnutrition.
In some areas, Somali, Oromia, Afar and Tigray regions, child wasting has passed the 15% emergency threshold.
The risk of another drought looms, particularly in the Somali region, where families are still recovering from the devastating drought of 2020 that lasted until 2023.
Instability in neighbouring countries is also increasing humanitarian needs.
In Ethiopia, WFP already supports 800,000 refugees in the country, including 100,000 Sudanese refugees.
The deteriorating security situation in South Sudan's Upper Nile state could drive even more refugees in Ethiopia.
In fact, some have already come despite our underfunded response and against the odds, if I could say, which several other organisations are also facing.
In the quarter one of 2025, WFP has provided food and nutrition support to over 3 million people.
We have already treated 740,000 children and pregnant and breastfeeding women for malnutrition and also provided 50,000 families with fresh food vouchers.
We're scaling up our anticipatory action in drought prone areas with early warning messages, cash transfers and also rehabilitating the rangeland.
We're delivering daily school meals to nearly half a million children, prioritising those areas that are hit by conflict and hunger now.
We've been stretching our resources as far as we can to reach only the most vulnerable communities and mostly with reduced food rations.
For example, 60% Russians or most of the 800,000 refugees for the past 18 months and 80% Russians for the displaced and food insecure, some severely in the in Ethiopians for the past nine months.
But now we are at the breaking point.
We've been left no choice but suspend completely the treatment for 650,000 malnourished women and children simply because we've run out of commodities and funding by June food and cash assistance for 800,000 refugees, we'll also run out.
We risk losing our ability to support new arrivals.
Violence in Amhara continues to disrupt our operations too, threatening access to over half a million people.
We are now operating with just about 50% of last year's funding.
This means that 3.6 million vulnerable people could lose access to WFP systems in the coming weeks unless funding arrives urgently.
This is half the number that we have planned to assist and reach in 2025.
dollars between now and September to maintain our operations and actually scale up to reach our target of 7.2 million people in the year.
We have the teams, the logistics, the capacities in place, partners, our staff.
What we lack are the resources to act at the scale that this situation demands.
Ethiopia is absorbing crisis after crisis.
What is particularly worrisome is that drought, ongoing conflict, refugee influxes are looming shocks which could push communities over the edge.
Our resources and people with resilience are becoming exhausted.
We therefore urge donors to step up support to WFP so we can continue delivering life saving assistance and prevent a further deterioration of this humanitarian situations.
WFP is ready, we have the capacity, we know where the needs are, We have the systems in place to ensure that most vulnerable are reached and on time.
But without urgent donor action, we will watch this crisis accelerate.
Millions of people are just one shock away from falling into a catastrophe.
Thank you for your attention and I'm very happy to take any questions.
Thank you very much, Mr Miricic.
I open the floor to question.
I'll start in the room with Nina Larsen, AFP English.
Thank you very much for doing this briefing.
I was just wondering talking about the severe lack of of funding, if you could could connect that to the US cuts and say sort of how those specifically have have impacted your operations?
Well, I would connect our financial situation and our funding problems to all our donors.
On one hand, we're very proud to have between 50 and 20 donors in this country, which means that we have a broad based support from our donors.
However, many if not most have been cutting the assistance to Ethiopia and to WFP lately with the US specific funding.
We are very happy to receive these exceptions from the stop orders.
So all the contracts that we have, we have been implementing and we hope that the contributions for 2025 would come, but they haven't yet.
With other donors, we have had some who provided some assistance to us at the end of last year and beginning of this year.
And that was mainly the reason why WFP was one of the organisations in Ethiopia who probably did most compared to its targets, compared to all the other UN or NGOs.
We know many who have stopped because of some stop orders.
We continued, we had to cut Russians, but we didn't have to cut numbers.
But now situations reaching the point where all those resources are coming towards the end in June, maybe July.
And that's why we feel that it's very important that we try to improve the situation to make sure that in the second-half of the year, some country, parts of the country will have their lean seasons for very important time that we will be able to deliver at scale to all our beneficiaries.
So I just to make sure that I understood correctly, you say that the US funding cuts, you've received the exemptions for that.
But if I understood correctly, you haven't received any of the funds yet.
So I just wanted to from the US.
And also, if you could just say a little bit more about what the impact will be on people if you are actually forced to, to dramatically cut back your, your activities in Ethiopia.
Sorry, as I tried to to explain, we haven't cut our activities in Ethiopia drastically yet.
We have been cutting food Russians because of the overall funding situation, as I said, refugees 18 months, others nine months.
So situation hasn't been great, but we have been you know going through and we continue and we still continue.
Now what is particularly important now is that our nutritious foods are running out.
So we're stopping that programme unless something comes really fast and we're looking and we're hopeful, but nothing has come yet.
And also other programmes will be coming towards the end of the resources, the food commodities we have such as refugees in about June and some other emergency programmes as well.
Now we have received and those exemption for all the contracts for 2024 from the US donor and those are still being implemented and finalised.
We have even received one for 2025 towards the end of last year.
So that one has also helped to keep us where we are as well as many of our 1517 donors contributions during 24 or even those in 25.
But now we're reaching the time when we could certainly do more and more urgently and fast.
And that's why it would be really good if some of these donors would really speed up their decisions for Ethiopia for the World Food Programme.
So we can really resume or continue some of these important assistance programmes in emergency for refugees or nutrition, but also anticipatory action and resilience because investing a dollar there saves $5 later when the crisis hits and so forth.
Sorry, Thank you very much.
I I did understand that you hadn't yet cut, drastically cut your operations.
I was asking what the impact will be if you end up having to do that.
If you could just describe the impact on the people, for the people on the ground.
I mean, are we going to see people starving to death?
You know, if you could just explain a little bit more of what will happen.
Well, I can certainly do my best, but I cannot really be very specific because I don't know what.
Number one, the government of Ethiopia leads humanitarian response in their country and they put noticeable resources into different humanitarian programmes, including food.
There is also a few NGOs in a consortium that are also a food actor or player in Ethiopia.
So between the government, them and us, we really try to cover the whole country.
What I can tell you is that if we stop assistance, hopefully some others might be better with resources and can stop in just step in the same way as we stepped in when some of the NGOs had a break and could not assist.
What I can say is that 4 million people plus women, pregnant women, breastfeeding mothers and malnourished children, all malnourished, will not get assistance.
Now this assistance to them is already a treatment, almost like a medicine.
So if you have a malnourished person, a child that are becoming more malnourished, not giving them nutritious assistance and food, you know, will certainly put them in quite a desperate situation.
Similarly, people who are on the edge of availability of food and access to them, if you don't give them food, they will be facing significant hunger.
So I don't want to predict what's going to happen.
I would hope that we will get the resources and put in place measures to really do our best to assist them.
But if they don't receive assistance, we will have serious consequences.
Any other question in the room?
Let me let me see if there's anything else from Ethiopia or on the platform.
So Mr Millicich, if it's OK with you, our journalist from the university would like to ask you a question on another matter and not to him.
So I can, I can free Mr Millicich.
So thank you very much Mr Millicich for alerting us on this very dire situation.
Good luck with your work.
Thanks again for being with us and maybe Mashrim can can help us sending your notes, your briefing notes to the journalist.
Thanks again and good luck with your important work.
You had a question for whom?
It is the same question for Tariq Babar and Jens, just in the yeah, just for the perspective of different agencies, how they think and how they feel that they felt it.
We had a small ceasefire in Ukraine during three years.
I wanted to know if WHOUNHCR and ocha have seen that on the ground, what it changed for them during the ceasefire, if they were able to do more job and if their people on the ground felt it.
OK, so I'm looking at my colleague virtually Yens, Tariq or Babar who would like to I see Babar as put his camera.
Dez, I I don't have any updates as such, but we can check Tariq or Yens maybe you have more on that.
Tariq, I see your face on the on the screen.
I would I would need really to check with our with our colleagues in in our country office.
So happy, happy to connect you with them and and they will tell you if we have anything more in detail.
Yens, do you have anything you would like to come to?
Yuri, I think you're you're going to have three as full strike of three.
I also have to check with the with the office if there has been any discernible impact of of of of this.
Yeah, that, that is that is thank you very much to the colleagues to take in, to take notes and answer.
Yuri, we have indeed note of these and of the announcement, but also on the of the resumption of some findings, as as it has been noted yesterday by the spokesperson of the Secretary General.
What we really want to see is an end to the war in line with relevant UN resolutions, international law and the territorial integrity of Ukraine.
That's what I can tell you on my side, but I'm confident that colleagues will will come back with a little bit more.
I see lots of questions for all these virtual briefers, so I'll start with Mohammed.
Alessandra, My question is for yes, yes.
As you know, there has been no aid into entry into Gaza for over 50 days.
What is the latest situation of people over there, how they feed themselves and their children?
Can you share with us the latest situation on the ground, please?
Yes, thank you very much, Alessandra.
So indeed, I think it was yesterday, it was the 50th, 50th, 50 day without any humanitarian aid coming in to the Gaza Strip and for an even longer period of no commercial supplies entering the Gaza Strip.
As you know, we, we sent you everyday lines on what is what is happening there.
I think if you read through just the past few days of the past week, you can see a clear tendency towards total disaster.
We have said and we've said that because it's true, that right now is probably the worst humanitarian situation we have seen throughout the war in Gaza.
Mohammed, you have a follow up.
My question goes to Tariq from WHO it is.
It is related to what happened 3 days back when the US in its newly established website, thecovid.gov laid heavy criticism on the WH OS, saying that his response to COVID was an abject failure.
And in addition, it also said that the pandemic agreement, which everyone tried very hard to make breakthrough, which everyone knows is a major achievement, harms they say in an I quote, harms the US interest.
So my question to the Tariq is whether WHO plans to make any response to such remarks with regards to the pandemic agreement?
Well, I think the, the, the, the, the, the, the answer has been provided by by member states who agreed last week on the draught proposal for the pandemic agreement.
So it showed that that if we work together, if countries work together with W tracking a secretariat, the agreement can be reached.
Now we have to wait for the World Health Assembly for this.
A, a, a draught proposal to be to be adopted.
Countries are also working on a resolution that will accompany this, this draught proposal.
So I, I think really member states have shown that that the issue of pandemic preparedness and response is really important and that some lessons have been learned SOWHO, throughout COVID-19, all of you have been following us.
We have been providing guidance, information, support to all those countries who, who asked us.
We were really trying to help everyone and try to tackle the, the, the virus.
So, so we will continue to do so.
And the lessons learned are basically something that guided member states to, to, to, to work on a, on a pandemic agreement.
And just to touch really on the on the issue of the origin of the of the COVID-19, because it was also on this website that you mentioned, we have been consistently saying that we did not have, we had not received the necessary information to determine the origin.
And until we have information and we constantly kept asking China and anyone else who has information to provide us.
So all the hypotheses are are still on the table, Nina.
First, how, how concerned are you that a well, I guess still a member state for a while is unilaterally, you know, declaring what the what the source of the pandemic was just on that question.
And then also I wanted to ask you about the cuts at WHO because of the the US withdrawal and cuts.
And I understand that there are some decisions being made about different divisions that are seeing cuts.
I was wondering if you could give us an update on on what you're seeing there?
Well, on the issue of the origin of COVID-19, as I said, the only thing we have, we can say that, that for the time being we have not received all the information we would need to determine the origin.
You know, we have established say the scientific expert committee on the origin of the pathogen that had two missions.
1 is really to look into origin of COVID-19 and second one to, to prepare a framework on how in the future the issue of the origin of any outbreak should be, should be dealt with.
So they have issued the framework that that gives countries a sort of a, a, a, a, a lead how to, how to respond the next time there is outbreak on looking into the, into the origin of, of the outbreak.
Now they are working on the, on the, on the report on COVID-19.
You know, they issued A preliminary report, but again, we have not really received all the information we, we kept asking for China or anyone else who has information to come forward.
So, so we can collectively try to find what was the original cognitive because it is, it is important for several reasons.
And, and, and unfortunately we have we have not been there.
So, so far from our perspective, all hypothesis are still still out there and, and, and we cannot really determine which one is the, is the right one when it comes to, to, to effect of, of, of funding cuts.
You've heard that Director General and we've been saying that we are looking into cost saving measures on operational level, on the staff level.
So discussions are ongoing.
I don't have details, but you have heard, for example, that there was a there was a hiring freeze and then we are looking into how to how to deal with with this decreased budget that that we have right now.
Don't see other hands in the room, so I'll go to Antonio.
The date for the funeral of the Pope Francis has been just announced.
It will be this Saturday.
I want to know if any leader of the UN based agencies is planning to attend.
Maybe you don't know yet, but if you decide later, any of the agencies, can you please let us know?
Yeah, Well, on, on the side of the secretary general, the spokesman said yesterday that they they were looking.
I, I, I read what he said is let's see when there is a date.
Now we have a date and then we will update you on that.
But we're fully aware of this possibility.
But I don't know if any of my colleague knows if any of their bosses.
Maybe it's a little bit early to know to to say that.
I don't see anybody volunteering.
So probably it's still a little bit early.
Antonio will will update you on that.
Any other question before I read my announcement to me or to colleagues?
So let me tell you a few things.
So first of all let me start with this because it's this morning and it's happening at the Palais.
As you may have seen from the messages that we have sent you, there is an event taking place this morning at the Palais called the Third dialogue on Artificial intelligence for one humanity human centred AI.
This is organised by the UN Alliance of Civilisation.
It's taking place in Room 20 and we'll conclude this afternoon, I think at 2:30, if I'm wrong.
There is also an afternoon, an afternoon session.
Some of us, some of you have asked me if this was open to the press.
Yes, you can go with cameras.
I've checked with the the organisers and of course you're very welcome to, to, to listen to the very numerous speakers, quite **** level speakers that have been listed, including your colleague Catherine Fianco as President of Akano and also speaking about events happening in these days.
Let me inform you, as we've told you in writing, that as part of their joint mobilisation strategy leading up to Cup 30, the President of Brazil was Inacio Lula da Silva and the Secretary General Antonio Guterres are convening a small but representative group of heads of States and governments for virtual closed door meeting on 23rd April tomorrow at 8:00 New York time to discuss strengthening global efforts to tackle the climate crisis and accelerate a just energy transition.
Today, ahead of this closed door meeting, we will host an embargoed background briefing for international media with the 2 with the the Cup 30 President Designate, who's Andrea Correa del Lago and special Advisor to the Secretary General Climate Action Selwyn Hart.
And this is to preview the upcoming meeting and provide you with relevant context.
This is a background briefing.
It's online, so everybody's welcome to participate also from Geneva.
And if you want to, to join, we have the address on the invitation we've sent you.
But of course it's, it's easier to, to, to do it.
You have to contact my colleague Martina Donlon from our Department of Global Communication in New York at Donlon at un.org.
And you still have the time to do it this morning as they're sleeping.
She will find it when she wakes up.
So don't hesitate to connect with Martina if you want to listen to this background briefing with Selwyn Hart and Andrea Correa Dolago.
Also staying on climate issues, you I think all know that the third UN Conference on Ocean Social Conference will be held in France in Nice from the 9th to the 13th of June.
It's Co hosted by the government of France and the government of Costa Rica and the overarching theme of the conferences accelerating action and mobilising all actors to conserve and sustainably use the ocean.
The reason for which I'm already telling you this is that the media accreditation for the press for the conference has now open and we'll be open until the 17th of May.
So please apply if you are intending to go.
There is an online connect link that we have sent to you and the accreditation is done through our accreditation colleagues in New York.
But if you need any further information about the conference or about the accreditation and don't hesitate to ask us here at Eunice in Geneva.
Just a reminder, staying also on issues related to conventions that the Basit Rotterdam and Stockholm Convention secretariats are holding a press conference for you.
This is Friday at 12:00 PM, just after the regular beefing.
And we will have the Executive Secretary of the Basit Rotterdam and Stockholm Convention, Rafael, also the Deputy Executive Secretary, David Ogden.
And then we will have Christine Fuel as executive secretary at the interim of the Rotterdam Convention.
This is going to be held on Friday.
As I said, last but not least, the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination open it's 115 session this morning.
The countries that they will review are Ukraine, Mauritius, Republic of Korea, Gabon and Kyrgyzstan.
They will also hold any formal meeting with the state parties to the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination and 1/2 day of general discussion on a proposed general recommendation for reparations.
This is going to be Thursday and Friday this week.
The Committee against Torture is continuing to review countries report.
They will have took many stand on the 23rd and again Ukraine on the 24th.
And this is what I have for you as announcements.
Is there any other question brief briefing?
No, I'm looking at the journalist here or on the platform.
So thank you very much and we'll see each other on Friday.
