Press Conference

Following is a transcript of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s press conference held in New York today, 29 September:

At a Headquarters press conference this afternoon, France’s Secretary of State for Cooperation and Francophonie, Alain Joyandet, harshly condemned Monday’s attacks by Guinean soldiers on crowds of unarmed civilians at a pro-democracy rally in Conakry, Guinea’s capital, which left some 100 people dead and hundreds more injured.

The World Food Programme (WFP) and the Millennium Villages Project announced the launch of a new partnership aimed at dramatically reducing hunger and malnutrition across Africa, at a Headquarters press conference today.

In meeting after meeting, the intensity of activities on peace and security during the first week of the General Assembly’s sixty-fourth general debate had been incredible, the Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, B. Lynn Pascoe, said during a press conference at Headquarters today.

Among the highlights of several very busy days that had begun with the opening of the general debate last week, the head of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) mentioned the address by United States President Barack Obama and the adoption of a resolution on non-proliferation by the high-level meeting of the Security Council.

A diplomatic strategy by countries supporting the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) was urgently needed to persuade and pressure the nine remaining States required to ratify the treaty so it could enter into force, Jessica Matthews, President of the Carnegie Endowment for Peace, said at Headquarters today.

Roughly 20 years after last serving on the Security Council, New Zealand would again seek a Council seat for the 2015-2016 term, Prime Minister John Key said today during a press conference held after his first address to the General Assembly.

President Dimitris Christofias of Cyprus today called on Member States to use their influence in convincing Turkey to withdraw its troops from the island so that he could attend the next session of the General Assembly as a representative of the United Federal Republic of Cyprus.

President Johnson Toribiong of Palau announced today the creation of the first national sanctuary for sharks, encompassing the country’s entire exclusive economic zone, an area roughly the size of France.

Amre Moussa, Secretary-General of the League of Arab States, at a Headquarters press conference this morning, outlined his views on the situation in the Middle East and the prospects for resolving the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.