The annual United Nations forum on indigenous issues opened today with Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon calling on Member States to promote development while respecting indigenous cultures and traditions, and with the Government of New Zealand taking the opportunity to announce that it would reverse its decision and support the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of the Indigenous Peoples.

Following is the text of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s message for International Mother Earth Day on 22 April:

Following is the text of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s message for World Malaria Day, 25 April:

The devastating impacts of logging, mining and land conversion had displaced indigenous peoples from their ancestral lands, commercialized their cultures and politically repressed their leaders, speakers in the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues stressed today, as they pressed the 16-member advisory body -– and their Governments -- for help in achieving equitable and “restorative” development in their countries.

The Holocaust and the United Nations Outreach Programme, in partnership with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, will hold its first video conference with students in seven countries in Latin America to help promote Holocaust education, today, 21 April.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has proposed to the General Assembly the re-election of António Manuel de Oliveira Guterres of Portugal as United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees for a further term of five years, effective 15 June.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has appointed Norman Girvan of Jamaica as his Personal Representative on the Border Controversy between Guyana and Venezuela.

Drawing on the lessons of responses to H5N1 avian influenza and H1N1 pandemic influenza, ministers and senior officials from more than 70 countries today agreed on the way forward in responding to avian influenza, preparing for pandemics and tackling newly emerging infectious diseases.

Following is UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s message to the People’s World Conference on Climate Change and Mother Earth Rights, delivered by Alicia Bárcena, Executive Secretary of Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), on 20 April in Cochabamba, Bolivia:

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon proposed for re-election by the General Assembly Achim Steiner as Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) for a four-year term. Mr. Steiner is currently serving as Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme for a four-year term -- 15 June 2006 through 14 June 2010.