Press Release

Following is UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s message to the Asia Media Summit, delivered by Kiyo Akasaka, Under-Secretary-General for Communications and Public Information, in Beijing, 25 May:

The eighth annual International Day of United Nations Peacekeepers will be observed on 29 May — a particularly sombre occasion due to the heavy loss of life of peacekeepers in Haiti and elsewhere earlier this year. Since 29 May falls on Saturday this year, commemorative activities at United Nations Headquarters and many other United Nations offices around the world will be held on Friday, 28 May.

With pressures mounting on the world’s forests and drylands, the Secretariats of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification and the United Nations Forum on Forests have agreed to team up in addressing the important institutional gap between drylands and forests — an essential step towards more effective implementation of sustainable forest and land management.

The following statement was issued yesterday, 23 May, by the Spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon:

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s closing remarks to the conference on Somalia, held in Istanbul, Turkey, 22 May:

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s opening remarks to the conference on Somalia, held in Istanbul, Turkey, 22 May:

Following are UN Deputy Secretary-General Asha-Rose Migiro’s remarks to the seventh Council of Europe Conference of Ministers Responsible for Equality between Women and Men, in Baku, Azerbaijan, 24 May:

Following is UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s message to the annual meeting of the Association of Former International Civil Servants, delivered by Netta Avedon, Chief of Human Resources Services, Office of Human Resources Management, in New York today, 21 May:

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks, as prepared for delivery today, 21 May, at Bogazici University in Istanbul:

Declining numbers of fish stocks and the continuing deterioration of marine ecosystems in the world’s oceans will be the focus of concern at a Conference to be held at United Nations Headquarters in New York, from 24 to 28 May. The role of the Conference is to review the implementation of the landmark 1995 United Nations Fish Stocks Agreement that established a legal regime for the long-term conservation and sustainable use of straddling and highly migratory fish stocks.