By broadening the use of different media platforms including traditional means of communication, as well as new media, and partners in outreach, the United Nations Under‑Secretary‑General for Communications and Public Information, Kiyo Akasaka, today told the Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization), his Department was fulfilling its mission to “inform, engage [and] act.”

Following are Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks at the opening of a photo exhibition celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the Peace Corps and the twentieth anniversary of the Korean International Cooperation Agency (KOICA), delivered by Kiyo Akasaka, Under-Secretary-General for Communications and Public Information, in New York, 18 October:

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today announced the deployment of an assessment mission to the Gulf of Guinea region in order examine the scope of the increasing threat of piracy in the Gulf, and to make recommendations on anti-piracy, including in the broader context of organized crime and drug trafficking.

Gathering this morning to evaluate the work of the Economic and Social Council in 2011, General Assembly delegates upheld the 54-member body’s importance while urging that its coordination functions be strengthened, that it more fully address “hard core economic issues”, and press for reform of the global financial and economic system.

Following is UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks at the opening of “The African Continuum: Celebrating Diversity, Recognizing Contributions of People of African Descent”, in New York, 19 October:

Information – from both new and traditional sources - was integral to an interdependent and interconnected world, especially in times of rapid political changes, calamities, and natural disasters, the Fourth Committee (Special Political and Decolonization) heard today, as it continued to examine efficacy with which the Organization disseminated its message.

Recent events unfolding across the Middle East and North Africa underscored the pressing need to bolster human rights as the third pillar — alongside security and development — of the United Nations, the High Commissioner for Human Rights told the Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) today.

While there was no longer any doubt that globalization was impacting every country on the planet, the costs and benefits of this new era of interconnectedness should be more equally shared, delegates in the Second Committee (Economic and Financial) said today as they took up their agenda item on globalization and interdependence.

Following is the statement by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to the 125th Assembly of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, in Bern, 17 October: