 Hello and good evening. I'm not a Zigrit Carg, although I'll be introducing her shortly. I'm Dan Plesch and I'm the director of the Center for International Studies and Diplomacy here at SARS. We're delighted that Zigrit Carg has agreed to be with us this evening to speak on a rather long title of her experience in multilateralism in the Middle East from the Chemical Weapons Elimination Program in Syria to UN engagement in the Lebanon. I want to say a word or two about the Center and about why I'm particularly pleased to have her here speaking on this topic at the Center. We, on the teaching side, have half a dozen different programs and some 330 master students. I'm distraught that having looked at our speaker's biography, she's taken master's degrees, I think at most every other university in England apart from SARS, but we have to forgive her for that. I think she said she had a place here but went to Oxford instead, which I guess we have to forgive her for. So, if you have anybody contemplating further study or indeed research, then encourage them to think of us and if you are a bachelor studying for a bachelor's at SARS, also think of us. I came to this role about seven years ago, having worked both as a commentator on the evolving war on terror and, subsequently, the war in Iraq. One of the things which I was encouraged to do by old colleagues who said, have you forgotten your interest in arms control and disarmament was to begin a number of public and private discussions on weapons and mass destruction in the Middle East. Which bore small and unfulfilled fruit or probably ungrown fruit in the form of a resolution of the UN to hold a conference on making the Middle East free of WMD. And, as part of our research, we also sought to think, well, if we are going to get back into the disarmament business as a whole, might one think about what is the best practice from the past. And that brought us to the scrap project, the leaflets for which you'll find outside, which I will not talk about more this evening. Save to say that as we saw the period of crisis around Syria a couple of years ago, that there emerged, and we will perhaps hear more about this, on the eve of very strong domestic pressure for the United States to take military action in Syria, there, suddenly, there emerged a treaty in which almost no one had heard, the Chemical Weapons Convention, a treaty one of which a great many people, certainly in the international relations academic community, regarded as one of a batch of treaties that were agreed during the period around the end of the Cold War and negotiated to no very good purpose except to consign the Soviet Union to the dustbin and could easily be forgotten once and for all. And yet it was this treaty and at least some of its provisions which arguably stopped a necessary war, arguably stopped a dangerous and unnecessary one from getting even further out of hand. So, went through one of our research associates at Richard R. Cuck, we discovered we had a connection to a person in the middle of all of that, it seemed a very good idea to invite her to come and speak. But of course this evening she will be speaking about her work and experience in general in the Middle East rather than specifically about that particular aspect of it although I'm sure she will respond to questions. And of course her experience in the region is extremely considerable. She is currently the special coordinator for United Nations in the Lebanon. She has worked in senior positions for UNDP, for UNICEF and in Palestine in a career of so on 20 years in the UN prior to which she worked both for the Dutch Ministry of the Foreign Affairs and for Shell. So, I hope you will join me in giving Ms Karg a very warm welcome and inviting her to address us here this evening. Thank you. I have Dan's notes here but I think I'll have to look for my own. Great. Well, good evening. I'm delighted you're actually all here. I know it's a fairly warm spring going into summer evening in the UK and in London so I'm very impressed. I would like to first of all acknowledge my predecessor, a special coordinator in Lebanon, Sir Derek Flumley. I'm delighted he's taken the time and I'm very happy to be here to discuss with you because I've structured my notes in a way as a contribution to a discussion with you. I hope an interaction. I'm aware that some of you are experts in a field, be it a diplomacy, international affairs or the Middle East so I also hope to learn from you. The United Kingdom of course has a particular relationship along historical tie that binds itself to the Middle East, ranging from the echoes of Lawrence of Arabia, Sykes-Picot and of course also the Balfour Declaration. These echoes are still being heard, we feel them and the repercussions are also still amongst us. So what's happening in the Middle East today has an impact, has an effect on the United Kingdom but also wider Europe. The clear examples we see today of course are the UK citizens who are fighting to join ISIS or other extremist groups. The other side of the coin is of course the crisis in the Mediterranean which maybe from the UK across the channel you don't acutely feel but I think it's a European dilemma and European dimension and it's a humanitarian and human responsibility. I will speak today not on Syria chemical weapons but I will gladly answer any questions you have, criticism you want to voice on this. I want to speak on the region in three different aspects but my premise is that a number of the crisis we see in their profoundest forms are the absence over decades of citizenship, human rights, inclusive governance and a failure collectively by the international community to seize different opportunities. I also want to speak to the importance of engagement but the fact that engagement is complex and going after the symptoms may be important but it will not address the fundamental root causes of many of the situations we see today in the region. However coming from the UN and I'm speaking in my personal capacity hopefully drawing on experience I also want to point to a number of roles and aspects the UN can lead on or ought to lead on and I believe we are also working on that. But let's start if we just look back a few years ago. I want to go back to the famous so called so called because it was more of a Western label Arab Spring and we now know when we take stock we're really looking at an Arab winter. We looked at a quest as an eruption of opportunities voices youth who took to the street to really look for proper democracy. Not just elections stilted elections but stolen elections but proper forms of democratic process freedom of expression economic reform and above all equity for all the citizens and as I mentioned before the notion of citizenship has been severely lacking. How did we end up so quickly from a period of a struggle to end oppression systemic oppression to a very short period of hope maybe overrated hope maybe we read too much into it to continue to a new entranced movements which also produced further forms of radicalization. As I just mentioned I think the backdrop to the present trajectory in the Middle East is the widespread absence of full and enjoyed civic rights continuous human rights violations. Resentment and dissatisfaction over the way the question of Palestine has been handled over decades but also coupled with deep economic and social economic resentment. I want to take you back to two particular reports that UNDP produced in 2004 and 2009. The statistics and the analysis in there are very interesting. It talked already then and Arab intellectuals have done so over decades as well about the shortcomings in the achievement of political rights, women's rights, the absence of inclusive governance in a context of worsening employment opportunities for the overall population of the region and growing economic pressures with no place to go. And in this context you also have to be very mindful that the Middle East is the region where we speak of a so-called youth bulge. Youth is basically the majority in some countries of the population if you look at the age group 6 to 24, if you look at children up to 18. But the youth bulge has contributed to increased unemployment in skilled and unskilled workers. You will also know the education attainment rates in the region have been quite high if you take the LDCs out of the equation, the middle income countries, but also countries such as Egypt and others. Those who managed to go into school, do primary education, secondary education, there is a constant stream of university graduates who aspire something to fight them their way out of the family or the social economic level they were born into to achieve something. But there is no opportunity. In Lebanon, for instance, unemployment stands at 24%, but youth unemployment at over 35%. These are extraordinary high statistics with no change in the economy and certainly not an approach to create meaningful employment for youth. Women's employment, of course, and unemployment rather, stands at a staggering high 20% in the MENA region. If you take it country by country, you'll see the statistics even more diverse and negative for women, be they skilled, be they highly educated, or be they less educated. Women's employment is primarily in the informal sector rather than the formal sector. And if you look at the economy, in most countries you know that has been very state driven public sector, but no growth and certainly no economic dividends that can be redistributed if we're looking at equity. This is the context. Now, if we're looking at conflict, if we look at recent years, both the crisis in Syria and of course Iraq predates that, they were triggered in different settings on different occasions. But above all, the takeaway again is the absence of viable citizen focused policy responses to the conditions of the people the state is supposed to serve. The steady deterioration of situations has resulted now, if we look just at the Levant alone, Syria and Iraq in particular, at failing or near disappearing state structures. A proliferation of non-state actors of extremist nature alongside the expansion and establishment or consolidation of power and access by sectarian militias. And in Iraq you've seen this if you've also followed the news in the last two years. But also a deep and proxy warfare amongst the major powers. So we had a brief Arab spring descended quickly into an Arab winter, lack of opportunities, we have failing state structures and we have disappearing state structures. Over and above these challenges we are now confronted, all of us I think, and we see this in Europe with asymmetrical warfare, the state against its citizens. But also transnational conflicts which have taken hold. And this is fairly new for a region where the Arab state was emerging, where Arab identity, there was the aim to establish an Arab identity, suddenly we see something quite different. And our traditional policy instruments, particularly for those of you who aspire to work in international affairs, the toolkit we have to date just doesn't serve, it doesn't take us far enough. We're working in a system where it's member state to member state, it is a rule of law applied by the member state or the state and increasingly so the actors are non-state actors. They have an appeal to individuals further afield beyond the borders of the countries or the geographical settings where the crisis takes place. We have a divided security council more than ever before and we have an absence of an integrated approach to deal with the complexity of the problems we face today. Very often the temptation is to go after the military or the security component as we also see in the battle against ISIS. My premise is, and I think that is quite clear, it's not rocket science, this won't suffice. It certainly won't suffice when we're looking at the victims. In Syria alone we're looking at well over 225,000 innocent people, victims and 1 million injured or maimed with very little chance of rehabilitation or return to normalcy. The corollary damage of all these types of conflicts is a tremendous human toll, not just the present, it is also the future. We often now speak when it comes to Syria of lost generation of Syrian children of Syrian youth. The prospects of a nation have truly transformed into a very bleak one. The price of our inaction is also a loss of the international community's credibility and reputation and I will come back to that. If the Arab uprisings are rather particularly in Syria and other places were about emancipation and empowerment, we're talking about unmet expectations, selective support from the international community and truly a lack of options to channel the discontent and new forms of resentment quite easily emerge and I think the quick answer of course is partly to that the radicalization. However my premise is that radical movements did not appear overnight. This is why I started with the overall setting of discontentment and oppression and absence of rights. They've however transmorphed themselves and they have radicalized and become more extreme and are monopolizing the use of violence prior always only in the hands of the state. So the nature of opposition has changed significantly which has also made our response significantly different. We're now faced with gross violations of human rights and international humanitarian law by a plethora of actors. Any of you follow particularly the beginning of the Syria crisis if you looked at the different opposition groups from moderate opposition to the more extremist ones. The numbers and the types of groups that over a period of time emerged from locality to locality alliances, tactical more strategic, the shifts that were taking place. It was very difficult to know not only who is who but who is reliable enough to maybe have a dialogue with and have a conversation with when you look at access let alone a political solution to the crisis. But in the absence of directed international engagement against clear policy objectives and I think this is extremely important radical forces have been set free. And there's a gravitational pull by by actors such as Isis and Jabata Nosra for the disenfranchised. If everything else or if you feel everybody else has failed you and you're under threat and as the conflict continues, those looking for meaning in conflict may just feel themselves or find themselves compelled to join. And last but not least, because the financial incentives, be they very short lived are also part of it. If you're starving in Raqqa, you may in the end actually decide to join in the absence of anything to give meaning to your existence where you are. But I want to state that from my personal perspective and I would gladly hear from the audience, I don't go with the notion that it is all about sectarian strife. This is fairly new. In the absence, however, of options, the most marginalised will go to a new form of identity or channel. This is quite normal. Europe tends to retrench too. If the citizen feels alienated, let's say from Brussels, suddenly you find that you discover your old province or your old language. To go to a level of your identity doesn't mean that you work and think in sectarian forms. There is a political drive, there is an interest by a number of actors to present it in this way. But to my mind, citizens over the history of the Middle East have not necessarily organised themselves. The region has been known for its coexistence, for its tolerance and the ability to have very heterogeneous societies more actually potentially than Europe has witnessed in its own history. We've however come at a breaking point and it's so important therefore that we offer alternatives and we take the region back to what is meaningful civic engagement. Of course in the region we're also looking at shifts and changes and these are both opportunities and significant risks. On the one hand, if you look at Libya, you look a little bit further afield, the number or the risks of the rise in number of potentially failed or failing states, and I refer to Libya, is very real. On the other hand, Saudi Arabia has taken on a new role as a regional ascending power with obviously limitations on its ability but also limitations on its own domestic track record on other key issues. Equally so, the Iran nuclear deal may open a new opportunity and a window. The jury is out as we know whether an Iran post nuclear deal means that there is a broader dialogue on a broader range of topics or rather whether this means that Iran will have access if sanctions are lifted to greater funding and support and therefore its influence will be exercised differently. This is I think a matter for debate and analysis and the proof of the pudding will be in the eating. This means however also that actors and actors such as Hezbollah particularly active in Lebanon but now also in Syria as you know very early on reports of Hezbollah assistance both in Iraq but also Yemen. These are only reports. It means that a number of other entities that prior worked only on a given agenda for Hezbollah. This was very much its resistance against Israel are now also looking or continuing to maintain their engagement in the region beyond the borders of Lebanon. All these factors create new scenarios for a region if we look at it through a peace and security lens. That means new uncertainties about the rules of the game. It also means that more and more that we're dealing what I mentioned with an identification of transnational conflict with actors who go beyond their borders and asymmetrical engagement coupled with asymmetrical engagement in conflict. From our side and the UN and the international community the message is always clear any actor needs to avoid any risk, any action that could lead to escalation but also we call on all actors to disengage from those countries where they should not be. In this case Hezbollah's role in Syria of course the Secretary General has spoken as a Security Council on consistent occasions but all in all I'm painting this picture to show the volatility of a region which a few years ago may have seemed stable. Your average tourist would have happily travelled to many countries it may have seemed stable but it was probably a very fragile stability because peace security stability can never be built can never be consolidated if the citizens rights are not respected and equity is not realized for all of the people in the country and we have seen that. Now with proxy battles in space in the region there's also a new hope I think for regional diplomacy that's why I mentioned Iran and possible changes the role of Saudi Arabia it's engagement so not everything is bleak it is always the choices one makes which comes back to my point on engagement, engagement, engagement. There is no solution to any conflict other than through political dialogue through smart diplomacy through talking to all actors and this is a unique place we have as UN of course we talk to everybody except those who are on a Security Council list named as terrorist actors but other than that we speak and engage with everybody be through humanitarian assistance throughout development interventions but also on the political track through the good offices of the Secretary General. But if we look back at where the region is now beyond the politics we're dealing with the largest displacement human displacement crisis that we have ever seen in the region. 14 million people alone have been displaced over time and the impact of displacement is very real due to the interlinked crisis in Syria and Iraq. The number of Syrian refugees registered in Lebanon alone would be the equivalent I'm sorry I don't have a UK statistic to bring it home but the 22 and a half million people coming to Germany or 88 million arriving in the US so obviously the call for burden sharing coming out of the region is very real. And in this context and those of you who've worked on humanitarian issues know that as always women and children bear the brunt in any conflict situation also in displacement. We see and we observe and we note and we express concern about the rise of dangerous coping mechanisms from survival sex for young women and actually women of any age, young girls, child labour, the children being withdrawn from school for either security risks, the sheer cost of school access, all in all the statistics are very very bleak. This also means we erode the capacity of a society. This is a frontal attack on anyone's human dignity and the most vulnerable here are most at risk. The quality of life for those affected by the Syria conflict but also in Iraq is quite dismal. The millions that rely on limited and almost minimal basic food assistance is almost too hard to keep up. It's hard to sustain and we have 600,000 refugee children between Syria and Iraq or the neighbouring countries that are not in school. You can only imagine if from a western perspective we look at the risk of an extremist attack or a terror attack. Anyone, a percentage of 600,000 people that would have had a future under different circumstances but are now not in school, they are very vulnerable, they are future at risk. They are also prey to anyone for manipulation and incentivisation because if life has no meaning, if you have no prospects, death may actually become equally compelling. This also means that the impact on Europe is very real. Whilst we talk about the countries themselves about Lebanon or Jordan or we talk about Syria and Iraq as the crisis affected countries, we can and must do significantly better. The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights writes about this, speaks about this but we just know from the recent statistics that just since January 15,000 people have attempted to cross the Mediterranean. These are all desperate people that are willing to risk it all for the chance, not the real likelihood but the chance to maybe arrive and the chance to build a better life. About 18 or 1900 people have died already in this process and naval missions are important, border control is important, it is relevant. However, in the absence of an integrated approach, you will not stop people. Not only do we not address the root causes of the problem, people will always risk it. In the Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, for instance, they speak of the Sufenon mode, the death boats. A lot of people are so desperate, they're happy to chance it. And I think if we were in their shoes, we may do the same. So what do we do? What do we do if we think this is not a sustainable situation, the largest displacement crisis, violations of human rights, not yet a political process that has been taking off but there are significant efforts to take it forward. What can we do as an international community? Now, there are many scenarios as you know that emerge. In recent days and weeks there is talk of future options around Syria. I think most importantly is to await the findings of my colleague Stefan de Mistura who is in Geneva to talk with all the parties and beyond that with civil society groups, with women representatives, with the diaspora, with representatives from within Syria. But above all, whichever outcome there is for Syria, the political process is primordial and we must equally be mindful of any future geographical divide to Syria or in Syria that not every scenario is an outcome that one wishes. The only one that we can aim for is a political solution which will allow Syrian citizens and their descendants to go home, to return where they want to be and to rebuild their lives in dignity within properly governed structures with access to services but also the ability to express themselves. Anything that is short termish will not be sustainable and I think you just have to look at other crisis situation where this has been tried, it miserably fails and actually creates another chain and cycle of violence. In this context we need parallel and sequential efforts. That means humanitarian needs need to be met. We need to look at early recovery where we can but we need to drive home the need of a political solution. That involves all regional actors and players. That also involves the international community and particularly the security council but also the international financial community. Any hope of rebuilding Syria post this crisis will need a significant and large scale approach, a marshal plan which will look at Iraq, which will look at Syria but will also look at the needs of the neighbouring countries which have become increasingly fragile because of the sheer coping need to cope with the presence of a large refugee population and the fragility that the presence of extremist groups have created. We are of course always reminded and particularly in the UN that there is always donor fatigue. There is also political fatigue. Nobody likes a crisis that looks quite intractable, quite difficult to solve whilst there are many other situations. We noticed it even in Lebanon when we looked at the very sad earthquake which occurred in Nepal. Suddenly everybody was busy with that as if there weren't a thousand people dying in Syria that week. For me every human life is sacred. It's not whether you die in Nepal or in Syria. We owe it to everybody when we can to be there to rescue them. However with intractable, complicated and complex crisis when you put a touch of radicalism or radical Islam as you can imagine in many European countries your average citizen likes to turn off the tally and say they've been at it for hundreds of years. It won't get solved. Let's just go somewhere else. Let's give a bit of money to humanitarian crisis. It will make me feel good and I absolve myself of the responsibility. But we need to remind, we need to engage, we need to focus precisely because peace and security in a global world, I mean it says here somewhere, think globally or act globally, problems elsewhere have become global. They're transnational, they will come here too. So even if you want to be very self-serving or self-centred it's even in Europe's interest to look at a long term strategy to deal with the problems of the Middle East. Not just through the security lens from a human rights perspective, from a fairness, equity and equally so as these are the only profound and solid building blocks for peace and security. Now where are we as a UN in this regard? There's a lot of talk over time maybe for decades now of the opportunity and the need to make the UN fit for purpose. Maybe like any old sort of international organization, maybe we're not always ahead of the curve. We are also after a product of member states' ability, political will and financing. However there's a broad review going on of the United Nations role in peacekeeping, peacebuilding and peace engagement. And this is precisely because the world around us has changed so much that our own, our old tools, the establishment of large peacekeeping operations no longer suffices. There is no point to mount a large operation if you're going to work in an area where actually you're asked to keep the peace but there is no peace to keep. The actors around you do not want your type of peace, they do not want your type of solution. So we need to think about how we can engage, what type of paradigm risk we are ready to accept and how we can leverage the strength and influence of regional actors who primarily have to lead on the change. We also need to work around a divided security council. Let's hope that we can see a turn of that particular chapter or rather turn the page in that chapter. We need to also expect more of the council. Many of you are of course very familiar with Valerie Amos who until very recently was the emergency relief coordinator for the UN. That means she is the senior official of the system in charge of all of the UN's global response to crisis, complex, manmade crisis and natural disasters. She spoke of her frustrations at the council in her last briefing particularly with regard to Syria but also Iraq, speaking to the fact that the number of humanitarian resolutions that were passed were not followed through. The council was unable to impose a decision or require implementation and if implementation wasn't wholesome or complete proceed with follow-up action in the way the council ought to under its mandate. So the protection of civilians has been failing, has been missing in this entire equation and this comes back to my point of human rights. At the end of the day the charter of the United Nations is about we the people. It is not about we the states, it is we the people and we are living in a day and age where citizens vote with their feet, they have the choice to become an extremist, they have the choice to become a peace activist. And the grey zone, the silent majority in between still awaits support and assistance by others. Now what can we do? There is a growing role to my mind for the UN in its good offices and preventive diplomacy. But preventive diplomacy means that you don't come when the crisis has occurred, you come way ahead of time. You have the courage to speak out, we have the courage to flag human rights violations but also to engage. We also need to look at a more multidimensional approach as I mentioned before. Peacekeeping just with military assets may not be the way to go. We need to invest much more in actual diplomacy and I hope this is a point well received here. Preventive diplomacy can avoid significant disasters but the council needs to be behind that. We also need to equip ourselves as an international community much more to have a flexible response. Anticipating challenges and change and this is where I'll make the only reference other than questions you may have. The Syria chemical weapons mission which I led was an unprecedented effort. It hadn't been tried before. You do not eliminate a chemical weapons program in a country at war and actually no one had done it before so we were sort of building the plane, flying it, trying to learn how to fly it and also land the plane with all the passengers on this case the load on board proverbially. This means risk taking. It means accepting you are trying, accepting you are most likely to fail but in the absence of any leadership or normative alternative you must do it and this is one way I think all of us need to work more. We've gotten used in the last decades to work on a way that if everybody supports this, meaning there's the lowest common denominator, everybody's behind it, we have consensus and we might achieve very very little. Change, transformation, voice, courage, political courage requires something very different from the lowest common denominator and this is an era where I think this is needed more than ever before. The radicalization agenda is one perhaps such is a mirror for us as well. Why do people radicalize? It is potentially partly also a response to the absence of any other compelling model in town. We need to work at that. We need to provide the alternative but it needs to be credible and it needs to be matched in follow up. Principles to engagements I think are key. Politics is always a dirty game but for the United Nations and I think for diplomats as well it must be about principles, be they conventions, be they the charter, be it also the importance that we attach to the responsibility to protect. There is a framework and we need to learn to balance how we are prepared to accept the price of our inaction if you look at Syria or rather the price of our delayed and staggered responses versus the end result which may be a divided Syria but certainly it means a country destroyed. We need to of course be mindful of the importance of the sovereign rights of affected countries but also the rights of refugees and the rights of all the citizens and in this case the Secretary General has launched a new framework which is human rights up front which is really trying to promote the human rights agenda as a lens through which we calculate and calibrate all our actions. But we also need to build institutional capacity. A failed state is nothing to future citizens. A failing state is equally weak and in a vacuum as we have seen in Libya but also in Iraq and Syria a lot of things can go dramatically wrong and the cost of rehabilitation or the so called cure is long, is protracted and it will not be linear. There will be many disappointments on the way. So looking at my last point, the need for western engagement. There is a natural tension between critical security needs which we hear a lot of in the west combating extremists on the border and universal human rights. To my mind however, they need to go together and they can go together. So that needs to guide our engagement. It also needs to build our policy and we look to rebuild a culture and set of institutions in the countries where we seek to work that respect human rights and fundamental human freedoms. But also looks towards socio-economic change, prospects, education, health, the basic indicators of well-being and the basic indicators of society and progress in society. Now looking back, we may be stretched but I think we have a lot of opportunities because I certainly don't want to sound pessimistic. I think it's complex the region we work in today. We're looking more and more at partial successes. I personally consider the elimination of Syria's chemical weapons program. It should have been an enabler. It should have been a stepping stone to allow the international community to come to the table once this was off the table to have a proper dialogue on the political solution because of political events, security changes, delays and lack of uniformity or lack maybe of a shared vision and direction on the process around Syria. This did not happen. But there's always an opportunity to catch up. There's an opportunity to do much better and we owe it to the citizens of the region. A safe and secure Middle East is in everyone's interest but first and foremost I think it's also our duty and particularly speaking to the UN. Now last but not least, democratic society can have many, many different meanings. In different countries they'll give a different shape but I think you can measure it on people's ability to thrive, to build the lives the way they want, respect for women and men, respect for diversity and respect for the status of all the individuals in that society. That is a true I think yardstick. A battle can't be won alone and I do believe, otherwise I wouldn't be working for the UN, that multilateralism is one of the approaches. It's not the only one. You can work multilaterally in a region. Regions can work across and more and more we see that solutions within a region can only be carried by the region and this may be the hope of change in the Syria conflict now that we know that Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia are in dialogue. Iran is invited in Geneva. There are many new opportunities to change. However I sincerely hope that all those who have lost their lives waiting for the international community and whose lives have been lost or deeply affected can forgive us so we need to really up our game and have the courage of our convictions. Thank you. Thank you so much. I will take questions and does not need me I think to act in between so please say your name and where you study or what you study or where you work. Please introduce yourselves if you take questions and I will need you to take them. My question is about those chlorine barrel bomb of the category A chemical weapons and chemical materials was a tremendous trial but we all knew that they were still using or somebody was still using chlorine. Now please give us a factual assessment of who is using the chlorine and how much is using the chlorine, how much is being used and how much killing is it doing. Well factual I'm not sure because I don't think I have the facts. First of all back to basics chlorine is not a chemical weapon is not doesn't fall under the convention this has always been the confusion. The use of chlorine and this is of course the tricky part the use of chlorine as a chemical weapon is forbidden under the convention and this is where the violation kicks in. There is however never no one in Syria rather the Syria is a state party to the chemical weapons convention was under no obligation to declare chlorine because you use it in your hotel using your swimming pool. It is an important ingredient. It's a chemical product and I just also want to recall another chemical weapons expert that a lot of the materials that is required to produce a chemical weapon are actually your very ordinary daily chemical industrial materials. It's the combination which makes it toxic and highly dangerous. That said there's been a long standing debate OPCW that was not a joint mission has sent a first fact finding mission which proved chlorine was used but I think that wasn't a surprise. It did not point to culpability as such in its three subsequent reports which are public and which have been reviewed by the Security Council. Since then fortunately at long last recently a Security Council resolution was passed and there will be follow up. The number of victims due to chlorine attacks I am not sure I do not have them. There are different reports as you know the moment an attack has occurred on the city barrel bombs have been launched some civil society activists point to smoke which may be chlorine yes or no it's important to document the symptoms and the number of victims. It's critical critical critical that there is follow up and I believe now the Security Council is at last behind that we know that the where the divide lie and they'll be follow up how easy it is to access the areas where the barrel bombs fall and where the victims are is another matter. To document the effects or rather to be in a position to credibly and scientifically document where the chlorine was used requires fairly timely information and it's sort of a perishable type of product. I think the for me the bottom line is that all violations all use of weapons against the civilian population are gross violation of human rights international humanitarian law. It has to stop and it should have stopped years ago. I think this is the fundamental point. There are many ways sadly to die in Syria. One of them is by chlorine but most people have died from conventional weapons and I think we should not we should bear that in mind. There needs to be an end to the maiming and the killing and the day of accountability needs to come. There should be an end to the impunity and this is why also I reference the right to protect as a very important framework. You know much more than I do. You are unable I think structurally to say who is dropping the barrel bombs even though only one side has aircraft. I suspect you are also unwilling unable to say who was killed by Sarin. The 1500 people from Sarin two years ago are much worse chemical than undoubted chemical weapons. You cannot say that and I understand that. You cannot say that because great power and P5 determinations and rivalries restrict very much what the UN can do in this and many other areas. And this needs to be remembered doesn't it as a corollary a corrective for all the things you're calling for greater engagement smart diplomacy who could be against smart diplomacy but smart diplomacy will ever be conducted by the UN within the confines of P5 interest. You've said it would be nice if you could turn the page from worsening P5 rivalries but that doesn't seem very likely and I suspect you like anyone else doesn't have a solution to that. So I'm struck by the earnestness and precision of your analysis of what's going wrong. But I'm very skeptical that you have described any way in which we could expect the UN or the international community if there is an international community to do any better. Final point it ain't just the P5 isn't the problem. It's a question about the plausibility of the diagnosis and the prescription that we've been hearing. My final point isn't there a structural problem within for the UN as well in talking about the kind of states who do the things you don't like. You want to move forward on the human rights agenda. But my experience in the UN and others watching it much longer and greater than mine was that the UN is structurally incapable of talking about the failures of the kind of states which have gone so badly wrong in the region. I remember the obsessive concern for the sovereignty and decent dignity of the Iraqi people which was the formula for protecting the Republican palaces which Saddam had built. The failure of the post-colonial state in which I agree that former colonial powers are somewhat bound up in has created a kind of system in the region which the UN is incapable by its very basis of criticising. Every state is wonderful. Every state has legitimacy. It must be given complete equality of respect even though that's utterly incompatible with the way some of those states treat their own people. I mean aren't these encumbering paradoxes and structural difficulties which actually make it very difficult for one to believe in the kind of program you are now proposing? No, I think actually the opposite for a simple reason. First of all I think the UN. Let's make a difference here. Let's be honest. Let's make a difference between member states and civil servants. It's a little bit like blaming Brussels for everything and the member states themselves want to walk away from Brussels, some yours or no, or the citizens. So let's be fair. Let's separate a little bit the civil service from the system that is established by member states and truly cherished by member states for its own reasons. However I think change in the offering is in the make. I think an example is the open campaign to question the P5 decision making around the appointment of a Secretary General. Climate change, another example. If we always accept that it won't happen because it won't happen we wouldn't have had all the NGOs that are busy with it. Policy changes can happen by citizens, by public awareness, by advocacy and the system can do better. I think our reporting on human rights violations in Iraq and Syria have been very clear. The inability indeed for the Council to come to a resolution under Chapter 7 to address it is what I'm talking about. But we have the right to protect. There are UN civil servants, all of us, working in Syria at great risk, at great personal risk. We're there. No one else is, not the member states. The member states observe. Secondly, yet changes are slow. We have to accept it in an international system but the sovereignty debate is much less sacred now than it was maybe the time you remember from UNSCOM. I think that has shifted significantly partly because a lot of states failed to be sovereign because borders disappear and in the Middle East above all we're looking to debate in a way the disappearance of what was Sykes-Picot. Maybe an imperfect solution at the time and now we're dealing with the consequences. So I think the system, member states, civil servants, diplomats are very much struggling but it doesn't mean we can't come at it. Humanitarian assistance cross border. We've never had a cross border resolution to provide humanitarian assistance under Chapter 7. It's imperfect. It's not necessarily happening but the resolution was passed. The fact that the gap is still very real is another matter. So it depends on if you look at the glass half full half empty. You can do like this but it's not about the mastery. I think actually we have to call it. Probably a decade ago you wouldn't find somebody speaking like me. I actually don't speak at UN vocabulary at all. It's actually quite disappointing if you think I speak at UN vocabulary. I don't think so. I think you wouldn't find many officials 10, 15 years ago coming to a podium. They would come with a prepared speech, not speak to the resolution. They would sort of point the finger to either member states or indeed the sovereignty. That is no longer applies. It is very much about who the citizens are, what the charter means and how we can get there. The fact that it's difficult, that it's imperfect is another matter. But the what is very clear. The how is fraught with dilemmas and in that I think the pace of change around us is so significant that our ability to catch up renders and creates new dangers. But your traditional mission, I don't know. And when it comes to if we can call who is what, unfortunately no I can't but for a very simple reason. I was not part of the first report on Alruta. The report was inconclusive. I advise you to speak to the authors. Well that's a I will leave that to you. And equally so there is a follow up fact finding mission by OPCW. It's actually quite complex. I understand what you're saying. But I think ultimately, if you look at the destruction of the state of Syria now and where we are on the scale of things, the issues are very clear. We just can't delay by another day what the responses are. Unfortunately political processes are slow. And they're just as slow amongst the parties. And we need to come to a point where everybody understands that their shared interest is significantly greater because the risks are even greater. Politics is not necessarily clean. I wouldn't put that on the UN. I would put that to politics and geopolitical interest. Thank you. Such as Hezbollah were now working beyond their borders and going into countries such as Syria and were operating there. But sources like what I've been reading in the news recently told me that apparently Hezbollah was fighting ISIS. And I don't know. I believe that there could be a value in that. And you also refer to trying to restrict the influence of Hezbollah into going into these other countries. But surely if they are operating in a manner that is detrimental to ISIS's flourishing, then surely that is a value in itself. So I was just wondering if there was actually a value in using these kinds of organizations. Well, no one's using them. Hezbollah has decided on its own or rather in consultation, so to speak, to engage in Syria. There's a state of Lebanon. There's a government of Lebanon. And the government of Lebanon and also the government of the current prime minister is committed to what is called a policy of disassociation and neutrality. That means non-engagement in the conflict of others partly because Lebanon has only fairly recently in its history come out of a very protracted and cruel civil war. And its policy of neutrality predates that. However, Hezbollah has engaged in Syria in quite an open manner for reasons of interest that I will leave you to determine. And its argument is indeed that it is fighting an extremist threat. It has gone there to defend Lebanon. The Security Council, however, as well as Secretary General and International Support Group for Lebanon calls on all those who are engaged in Syria to step away from that engagement and to believe, to express a strong belief in determination that the stability, security and territorial integrity of Lebanon can only be shielded by non-engaging in any conflict. It's beyond Lebanon's border. Lebanon is a mosaic. It's a beautiful country. It has 18 different sects. It is a complex operation to run a country of that nature. But it's also still a model of coexistence and diversity. And it's the only model that we currently still have left. So it's very important to shield that. Do you believe that there will be a role for Bashar al-Assad in any future multilateral talks, or is he person on grata? I heard it. I heard the question. I don't think it's relevant. But I believe my colleague, and here you'll get a UN answer, my colleague Stefan is in negotiations and dialogue with all the parties. It's not for me to judge or to speak on. Hi there. Jouzu Antonio from International Development Officer with the International Society of Ultrasound and Obstruction Gynaecology, which is affiliated with WHO. The International Society of Ultrasound and Obstruction Gynaecology. I am the International Development Officer. It's affiliated with the WHO. Going back to Lebanon question, but on a different scope, I work very strongly with, in my organisation in general, worked very strongly with a few partners based in Tripoli, which conduct worked in providing ultrasound training to midwives. Predominally was just for the under disadvantage Lebanese community, but now it's gone into the Syrian refugee camps. From my understanding from my colleagues there, they have indicated that there has been aggression as time progresses between radicals such as, for example, ISIS affiliated people and also, of course, the Lebanese military engaging and trying to back them up a little bit. My question is that obviously no one wants the conflict to spill over into neighbouring countries, especially as you've indicated Lebanon has always been more peace neutrality and what not. And as you said, it is most definitely a Mosaic country and a beautiful one at that. My question is, is there concern within the international community that this would spill in and what particular actions would they be willing to do to make sure that nothing happens to Lebanon? Nothing happens to Lebanon. Nothing happens to, let's say, the other neighbouring countries, as for example, what happened with Iraq and Syria? That's all. Thank you. You're actually speaking to the heart of a number of the Security Council sessions, which also my colleague Derek sort of lived through and shepherded and led on before I came to Lebanon. And actually there are a number of messages and decisions in there. One of them is, as I just mentioned, the policy of disassociation and non-engagement neutrality. Secondly is to focus on the institutions of state in Lebanon. And a third component is, as an example, to invest in the Lebanese armed forces. So to only act and support and accelerate support to the Lebanese armed forces to indeed to be the ones to shield Lebanon, to protect, to deal with issues of extremist in-country, but also to shield the borders. When it comes of course to the blue line, the line of disengagement between Israel and Lebanon, in this case South Lebanon, we rely very much on the role of UNIFIL to work with the LAF. So these are very practical examples. And last but not least given the fact that Lebanon has over one third of its current residents are Syrian refugees who don't live in camps. There are no such things as camps because the Lebanese did not want what they themselves call want to repeat the Palestinian experience. These are informal settlements and the majority of Syrians are scattered across. I mean they are in areas, but they live in informal dwellings initially with relatives, low cost housing, etc. To help Lebanon cope with the stay, not just the influx, but the stay of 1.2 million registered refugees. Schooling, health services, it's weighing heavily on already very poor and under invested infrastructure. So there are two things here to help deal with the consequences, but also make sure that the Syrian refugees are not marginalized further than they already are and to look at ways of looking after their rights. It's fragile. So you're looking at humanitarian assistance, development assistance for the Lebanese poor because we should not forget it's not all glitz. There's life outside Beirut or within Beirut. We have very poor areas. Unemployment rates are very high. But also looking at the security dimension to work with the institutions of state that is critical. Without that, you will not have a state. You just point to it. Some years ago, not many years ago, the UN Security Council, if I'm right, passed a resolution to the effect that there should be a greater role for women in peacekeeping and post-conflict resolution. Can you, as a matter of interest, say whether you've observed any practical effect since that resolution was passed? It's an interesting question. You're talking about security council resolution 1325 and we've recently celebrated, I believe, a decade or rather marked the decade of 1325. In a number of conflict situations, there is greater attention to the role of women either in dialogue, in peace building and their role as leaders of their community. So basically make women and power them to be part of the solution at local level, national level. That can mean in elections, I mean Rwanda was one example. Actually Rwanda is a shining example of female representation in parliament, but there are many other countries. Work with women community leaders, but also at the national level, as I mentioned, on issues of corruption, governance, but also women's rights. So to review legislation, a lot has happened, but we have a long way to go. And the last point is women in leadership positions in peacekeeping or peace building operations. Still not enough. We're only 20% and I'm the only one in the region. But that's not the issue. It's about women in the country's conflict affected countries. A long way to go. Now a last question, actually it's interesting so you triggered something, it's about war as a rape as a weapon of war. And I think security council resolution 1325 in a way is also pointing to that. Since then, of course, as we've seen in Iraq, but also other countries, sexual exploitation of women and the threat of sexual exploitation. The dishonoring of women and therefore rendering their return, if returned at all to their family, almost impossible. The shame factor is so big that a lot more psychosocial trauma counselling needs to be prioritized and support for women to deal with the situation needs to be seen almost as a peace and security tool. It cannot just be left for the social welfare pocket. It's about the primacy of human dignity. And I think we've come to realize that much more sadly because of the incidents, the reporting, but also the availability of information. The only good thing in this entire tragedy I think is as sadly the number of victims, the number of women that have fallen victim to such practice is so significant. For me, let's say the girls abducted by Boko Haram or in Iraq, the Yazidi women, it's so significant. Everybody realizes this is not an exception and entire communities need to be prepared to deal with this. And that requires a lot and I think that's also at the heart of 1325. But we cannot separate security as a sort of a military component. All these are part, I think, of a newer response. I was working in the UNDP office in Jerusalem in 2006, January, when Hamas won the elections. And you had mentioned something that one of the positive things about the United Nations is the ability to speak to different groups except for those on the terrorist list. So don't you think it's time that this terrorist list is put aside so that the UN can actually speak to the increased number of non-state actors that you also mentioned that are playing a much larger role in order to at least begin to build bridges for future reconciliation in years to come? And is that list, I mean, when is it time for that list to be put aside and the UN to actually be able to speak to different groups? Thank you. I think, thank you. In process terms, the list is subject to constant review. Now that doesn't mean you get, review doesn't mean you get taken off it. However, since 2006, the Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process has maintained dialogue and contacts with Hamas, for instance. So in your time I know that wasn't necessarily possible, but since then there's been an evolution. Same as we've always maintained contacts with Hisbola in different levels. And it's very important, I think, precisely because you tend to not be able, you know, you can facilitate contacts with your friends very easily. It's the ones you need to sort of bring a bridge with that is more relevant. However, ISIS is on the list, I believe also Jabhat Nusra. So I think the review has to be very precise and has to be real and we have to know what we're looking at. The violations that are on lists are very, very important and the Security Council I think has criteria and parameters, but I think we need to assess that all the time. But I think the situations we're dealing with then and now are quite different and the actors on the stage, the extremist elements, some of them are obviously also of a different batting order. I'm not comparing A, B and C, I'm just saying that there are contacts with Hamas and for humanitarian access, of course, you have the humanitarian country team that will always try to reach out to everybody, same as ICRC or NGOs. They will risk and go a long way to make sure that those who need food, who need assistance, medical support will have access to that. It's very important that the humanitarian community be they local or international that they continue to be able to sort of work on what is called, as you know, the humanitarian imperative at the end of the day that goes beyond everything and that this is also not clouded under the political umbrella. That's been very hard I think also in the last decade. The political field, the sort of the politicisation of humanitarian assistance and we've seen that in Syria too, which is why these resolutions were passed. A government that actually restricts doesn't give access, doesn't issue permits, doesn't issue visas and whereas it's the Syrian citizens that suffer. So we need to continue to push that and Valerie Amos has done a brilliant job and I hope her successor will do as well I'm sure. Thank you very much Richard Guthrie and I am a chemical weapons and chemical and biological weapons specialist. But I want a question that's a bit more general than that. I mean hopefully Syria will be a one-off, an experience we can put behind us eventually and hopefully there won't be any similar cases. However there are still half a dozen countries outside of the chemical weapons convention, some of which we might be quite concerned with about currently having certain types of weapons such as North Korea, some that historically have used them in the past such as Egypt. In terms of lessons learned, is there any of the skills or expertise or resources that have been developed during the Syria situation that should be retained for future cases and indeed is there anything that was lacking in the start of the Syria operation that you would have liked to have had that would be useful for any similar operations in the future? No, I actually think we started with the premise that failure was not an option and truly meaning it. We didn't have a choice, we had a deadline and so we had that dechéance as well that things would change dramatically. I think we were blessed, we worked hard for it to maintain it to have actual unity of the Security Council. This was the sole topic on which in a very critical time Ukraine was about to happen and then the situation deteriorated further. The Security Council agreed that this needed to be implemented and it speaks to the significant powers on the team. The Russians and the Americans agreed to this, Syria became a state party, but that was about it. We had a declaration, we sort of had a list, not a game plan, not an implementation ability, a country at war, ISIS proliferating itself, Jabhat Nusra, other groups, no access to some of the sites where chemical weapons material was stored and also no way to know how you're going to destroy the material because normally as you know you destroy it in country and the state party is responsible. I think it's incomparable. I sincerely hope it will remain unprecedented for one reason that chemical weapons are best destroyed in peacetime. That's the OPCW and Chemical Weapons Convention recipe. If in another situation it is to be destroyed by the international community or with a lead role under a Chapter 7 resolution, it means that we've really already hit a very dangerous situation. So there are many lessons learned in terms of international response, negotiations, mobility, access to technology, finance. We weren't short of it. It was almost embarrassing compared to the humanitarian needs. Political will we worked at but we maintained it and then dealing with the cynics and the media. So there's a lot of hype out there, a lot of speculation, a lot of invention. At the end of the day the proof of the pudding was at least in what we know we've achieved. But to suggest that non-proliferation of chemical weapons in this case is the major factor for peace and security, no. Non-proliferation is important in and of its own right. It's a norm. There's an international standard. So it's important regardless. But the moment the situation changes, I think biological weapons is of serious concern. Because people have access to it a lot more than states do. Come and join us upstairs for our reception. You'll be able to stay with us a little longer. It's my great pleasure to thank you for any time with us this evening. I think it's been a model of engagement if I may say so. I'm not resorting to formally in speeches which I hopefully other officials can copy in the future. And I want to first thank you for your exemplary leadership. And if our students go on to do harm as much as you had, I think the world will be in a considerably better shape. Thank you very much.