How an individual country commemorates the honour of UN staff who have perished in the service of the United Nations

Mongolia Memorial Ceremony

By the time the UNDAC team left Mongolia last January, some two weeks after the helicopter accident, everyone had agreed that a Memorial Ceremony in honour of our perished colleagues should be organised at the crash site during the summer. The families, the UNDAC team, the Japanese NHK News Agency, Mongolian colleagues and the UN team had spent time discussing the idea of a ceremony. It was as if the need to plan something was providing everyone with an activity they needed, something they knew would sustain them and help them through the next few months. Something creative, a plan involving all those affected by the tragedy, was needed. So, the idea of the monument was born.

It was decided that a simple memorial would be build, in line with local custom and available material, inscribed with the names of the accident victims. The work would start as soon as the snow melted and the ground thawed in Malchin County. An official ceremony would be organised to unveil the monument during the summer, when travel to

the remote, barren area of Malchin County would be possible.

Focal points were appointed in Geneva and Ulaan Baatar to co-ordinate between the families concerned, who had to agree on the character and design of the monument. Families, the United Nations and Government of Mongolia officials as well as local diplomats were consulted on their summer schedules. The Government of Mongolia established a special Task Force to deal with the planning and local distribution of tasks. They also pledged to finance the monument. The Resident Coordinator appointed staff to deal with Government counterparts and with OCHA Geneva.

Discussions were ongoing with regard to the shape of the monument. In line with the local tradition, the design was suggested by the Mongolians and drawn up by a local artist. The text to be inscribed on the monument had to be also agreed. Drafts were circulated between Mongolia, Japan, the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Switzerland. A team of engineers and designers was sent to the crash site by the Ministry of Infrastructure of Mongolia to locate the best site for the monument. The date for the ceremony was set for 20 June 2001 (later the day was changed to 22 June due to the inauguration of newly elected President of Mongolia).

On 31 May, the Logistics Cell in WFP Rome announced the winner of the international charter bid. A company had been found, willing to position an aircraft in Ulaan Baatar, fly participants to Ulaangom and then back to Ulaan Baatar. This for an agreed sum, which the participating UN agencies would share. The participants were then given the green light to make their travel arrangements. The UNDP Office in Ulaan Baatar, which has been working hard since January on accident-related activities, would now need to start making on-the-ground arrangements for a large number of foreign visitors. Cars and drivers would have to be hired, hotels booked, meetings of families with the government and embassy officials arranged, speeches translated and published and itineraries arranged in detail. From Ulaangom, where the visitors would spend the night after flying from Ulaan Baatar, another five hours drive through deserted steppes was needed to get to the memorial site in Malchin County. The challenge of transporting such a large number of visitors to this remote, uninhabited area, could easily overwhelm even the most experienced logistical experts.

In Japan, Jersey, Switzerland, Denmark, France and the United States, travel itineraries were being arranged, visas requested and tickets booked. Finally, after five months of intense preparations, it was happening. Relief, mixed with a large dose of emotion was felt by all. Finally, some were going and some were returning to Malchin County, to the very placewhich claimed the lives of Sabine, Gerry, Matthew, Bayarmaa, and others. They would go to say their final good-byes.

Met up in Ulaan Bataar

We all met up in Ulaan Bataar, one, two, and for some, three days before the ceremony. It was a reunion of sorts, for those connected with the event and with those who were no longer among us. We met in small groups, and in large ones, talking, remembering and putting the final touches on preparations for what was to be a long trip even from Ulaan Bataar.

The next morning, before dawn, the convoy of nineteen four wheel-drive vehicles, with seventy two passengers, set off to meet up on site with Government officials and local authorities that were travelling either in other vehicles or by helicopter. The journey proceeded through countryside that was both beautiful and eerie; hours on sinewy, dirt, rock-strewn tracks, with only barren steppes in sight. We then arrived at the Monument, on a hilltop, some 300-400 meters from the site of the actual crash in a small valley below.

The army band on hand played the honour march. The Minister of Defence spoke, as did the Chairman of Uvs Aimag (district). Then the guard of honour stood at attention, and the monument was unveiled by the Minister, the DERC and the representative of NHK TV. The national anthem was played and speeches were made, by the DERC, family members, the RC and officials. All that was said that morning was beautiful, moving and a genuine tribute to those who were so present by their absence. Nine baskets of flowers were ceremonially placed around the monument by the honour guard as the wind from the steppes made the ribbons dance in remembrance of those in whose memory they have been brought. Words still echo in our ears, words of fathers and mothers, of husbands and wives, of sisters, brothers, friends, and colleagues; these were words of praise, of thanks, of immense sorrow. These were words of courage and of determination also and yes, of hope and tomorrows. The triangular monument, with its identical plaques in Mongilian, Japanese and English caught the rays of the midday sun and promised to be there forever. After its ritual circling, and the final notes of the band, participants moved to the crash site below where a miniature replica of the monument was set in concrete.

All then moved to the tents that had been erected nearby, for lunch, during which some quietly went back to either the monument, or its tiny replica, for a final farewell.

The way back to Ulaangdom and then to Ulaan Bataar, was somewhat slower and we were no longer looking at the landscape, but more into our souls. There we found there had been a closure of sorts, a meeting with the place from which we had derived both comfort and a degree of reconciliation with what is inalterable. We had found, as we think the families did too, that this endeavour, shared and performed as it was, had provided a much sought-after acceptance. Our colleagues, we are now assured, are in peace, in the surrounding which took their lives, while on a humanitarian mission in the service of the people of Mongoliaî.

(Material provided by Gerhard Putman-Cramer, OCHA).

About the Memorial

Dear Editor in Chief,

Further to your article in the 600th issue concerning UN Special proposed initiatives to create a memorial to honor those who lost their lives in the service of the United Nations, I wish to add the following information:

United Nations headquarters recently published a Handbook for Action in Cases of Death in Service.

After the crash of Swissair Flight 111 in October 1998, United Nations established a Working Group on staff Humanitarian Affairs, led by the Assistant Secretary-General for Human Resources Management, to make recommendations on how United Nations can respond in a caring manner when a staff member dies. The Handbook is the outcome of the Working Group. It is also a compilation of Regulations, Rules, Policies, Arrangements, Benefits, Ceremonies, Services, and Support Activities. It could serve as a tool-kit for those assisting the families of United Nations staff and others who have died in the service of the Organization, as it “brings together the myriad tasks that must be undertaken, from contacting the next of kin, initiating security management and notification procedures, arranging for repatriation and determining entitlements, to planning memorial services and interacting with the media. Its’ step-by-step lists of actions and other practical suggestions will enable those concerned to respond quickly while extending care and comfort to all bereaved families and individuals”.

This Handbook is issued by the Office of Human Resources Management of the Department of Management. UNOG Coordinating Council has a few copies for reference in office C-527.

Yours sincerely.

Shuibao LIU.