Бан Кимун: Генеральный секретарь ООН (2007-2016)

UN Secretary General from 2007 to 2016

Ban Ki moon (hangul=반기문; ; born 13 June 1944) is a South Korean politician and diplomat who served as the eighth secretary general of the United Nations between 2007 and 2016. Prior to his appointment as secretary general, Ban was the South Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade between 2004 and 2006. Ban was initially considered to be a long shot for the office of Secretary General of the United Nations; he began to campaign for the office in February 2006. As the foreign minister of South Korea, he was able to travel to all the countries on the United Nations Security Council, a manoeuvre that subsequently turned him into the campaign's front runner. On 13 October 2006, he was elected as the eighth secretary general by the United Nations General Assembly. On 1 January 2007, he succeeded Kofi Annan. As secretary general, he was responsible for several major reforms on peacekeeping and UN employment practices around the world. Diplomatically, Ban has taken particularly strong views on global warming, pressing the issue repeatedly with U. S. President George W. Bush, and on the Darfur conflict, where he helped persuade Sudanese president Omar al Bashir to allow peacekeeping troops to enter Sudan. Ban was named the world's 32nd most powerful person by the Forbes list of The World's Most Powerful People in 2013, the highest among South Koreans. In 2014, he was named the third most powerful South Korean after Lee Kun hee and Lee Jae yong. In 2016, Foreign Policy named Ban one of the Top 100 Global Thinkers for his achievement of helping the Paris Agreement to be ratified and enforced less than a year after it was adopted. António Guterres was appointed by the General Assembly on 13 October 2016 to be the successor of Ban Ki moon as he exited on 31 December 2016. He was widely considered to be a potential candidate for the 2017 South Korean presidential election, before announcing, on 1 February, that he would not be running. On 14 September 2017, Ban was elected chair of the International Olympic Committee's Ethics Commission. Also in 2017, Ban co founded the nonprofit Ban Ki moon Centre for Global Citizens. He also currently serves as the Distinguished Chair Professor at Yonsei University's Institute for Global Engagement and Empowerment. On 20 February 2018, Ban was unanimously elected as the president of the assembly and chair of the council by the members of the assembly and council, respectively, the two governance organs of the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), a treaty based international, inter governmental organization dedicated to supporting and promoting environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive economic growth in developing countries and emerging economies. Since Ban's election as the president and chair, GGGI's list of Members has expanded from 27 to 43 Member Countries and Regional Integration Organizations. On 16 October 2018, the Global Commission on Adaptation was launched with Ban as co chair, together with Bill Gates and Kristalina Georgieva. The commission's mandate to accelerate adaptation by elevating the political visibility of adaptation and focusing on concrete solutions came to an end following its Year of Action in 2020, with its work showcased at the Climate Adaptation Summit hosted by the Netherlands on 25 January 2021. Ban currently serves as co chair for the Global Center on Adaptation, which is taking forward the commission's work through its programs. He became the first major international diplomat to throw his weight behind the Green New Deal, a nascent effort by the progressive wing of the Democratic Party in the United States to zero out planet warming emissions and end poverty over the next decade.

Ban was born on 13 June 1944 in the small farming village of Haengchi, Wonnam Township ( myeon), in Insei, Chūseihoku dō, Korea, Empire of Japan (now North Chungcheong Province, South Korea). He is of the His family then moved to the nearby town of Chungju, where he grew up. while he also became a star student, particularly in his studies of the English language. In 1962, Ban won an essay contest sponsored by the Red Cross and earned a trip to the United States where he lived in San Francisco with a host family for several months. At Harvard, he studied under Joseph Nye, who remarked that Ban had "a rare combination of analytic clarity, humility and perseverance". There have also been questions, however, regarding the extent of his knowledge of French, one of the two working languages of the United Nations Secretariat. After Park Chung Hee's 1979 assassination, Ban assumed the post of Director of the United Nations Division. In 1980, Ban became director of the United Nations' International Organizations and Treaties Bureau, headquartered in Seoul. Ban was appointed Ambassador to Austria and Slovenia in 1998, and a year later he was also elected as Chairman of the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO PrepCom). During the negotiations, in what Ban considers the biggest blunder of his career, he included in a public letter a positive statement about the Anti Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2001, not long after the United States had decided to abandon the treaty. To avoid anger from the United States, Ban was fired by President Kim Dae jung, who also issued a public apology for Ban's statement. In 2003, incoming president Roh Moo hyun selected Ban as one of his foreign policy advisors. Ban became actively involved in issues relating to North South Korean relationships. In September 2005, as foreign minister, he played a leading role in the diplomatic efforts to adopt the Joint Statement on resolving the North Korean nuclear issue at the fourth round of the Six party talks held in Beijing. As foreign minister, Ban oversaw the trade and aid policies of South Korea. This work put Ban in the position of signing trade deals and delivering foreign assistance to diplomats who would later be influential in his candidacy for secretary general. For example, Ban became the first senior South Korean minister to travel to the Republic of the Congo since its independence in 1960.

In early January, Ban appointed the key members of his cabinet. As his Deputy Secretary General, he selected Tanzanian foreign minister and professor Asha Rose Migiro, a move that pleased African diplomats who had concerns about losing power without Annan in office. The top position devoted exclusively to management, Under Secretary General for Management, was filled by Alicia Bárcena Ibarra of Mexico. Bárcena was considered a UN insider, having previously served as Annan's chief of staff. Her appointment was seen by critics as an indication that Ban would not make dramatic changes to UN bureaucracy. Ban appointed Sir John Holmes, the British Ambassador to France, as Under Secretary General for humanitarian affairs and coordinator of emergency relief. Nambiar later stepped down in 2012 and was replaced by Susana Malcorra of Argentina who served as chief of staff from April 2012 to November 2016. The appointment of many women to top jobs was seen as fulfilling a campaign promise Ban had made to increase the role of women in the United Nations. During Ban's first year as secretary general, more top jobs were being handled by women than ever before. Though not appointed by Ban, the president of the General Assembly, Haya Rashed Al Khalifa, is only the third woman to hold this position in United Nations history.

During his first month in office, Ban proposed two major reforms: to split the UN peacekeeping operation into two departments and to combine the political affairs and disarmament department. His proposals were met with stiff resistance from members of the UN General Assembly who bristled at Ban's request for rapid approval. The proposed merger of the disarmament and political affairs offices was criticized by many in the developing world, partially because of rumours that Ban hoped to place American B. Lynn Pascoe in charge of the new office. Alejandro D. Wolff, then acting American ambassador, said the United States backed his proposals. After the early bout of reproach, Ban began extensive consultation with UN ambassadors, agreeing to have his peacekeeping proposal extensively vetted. After the consultations, Ban dropped his proposal to combine political affairs and disarmament. Ban nevertheless pressed ahead with reforms on job requirements at the UN requiring that all positions be considered five year appointments, all receive strict annual performance reviews, and all financial disclosures be made public. Though unpopular in the New York office, the move was popular in other UN offices around the world and lauded by UN observers. Ban's proposal to split the peacekeeping operation into one group handling operations and another handling arms was finally adopted in mid March 2007.

The Secretary General of the United Nations has the ability to influence debate on nearly any global issue. Although unsuccessful in some areas, Ban's predecessor Annan had been successful in increasing the UN peacekeeping presence and in popularizing the Millennium Development Goals. UN observers were eager to see on which issues Ban intended to focus, in addition to his declared interest in reforming the United Nations bureaucracy.

Ban early on identified global warming as one of the key issues of his administration. In a White House meeting with U. S. President George W. Bush in January, Ban urged Bush to take steps to curb greenhouse gas emissions. On 1 March 2007 in a speech before the UN General Assembly, Ban emphasized his concerns about global warming. Ban stated, "For my generation, coming of age at the height of the Cold War, fear of nuclear winter seemed the leading existential threat on the horizon. But the danger posed by war to all humanity—and to our planet—is at least matched by climate change" (referring to Global Warming, see P:GW portal). On 3 September 2009 he further emphasized his concerns at the World Climate Conference in Geneva, when he stated, "Our foot is stuck on the accelerator and we are heading towards an abyss". In September 2014, Ban joined demonstrators in the People's Climate March in New York City, and also called together world leaders for the UN Climate Summit, in preparation for the United Nations Climate Change Conference to be held in Paris in late 2015.

On Thursday, 22 March 2007, while Ban was taking part in the first stop of a tour of the Middle East, a mortar attack hit just from where the Secretary General was standing, interrupting a press conference in Baghdad's Green Zone, and visibly shaking Ban and others. No one was hurt in the incident. The United Nations had already limited its role in Iraq after its Baghdad headquarters was bombed in August 2003, killing 22 people. Ban said, however, that he still hoped to find a way for the United Nations to "do more for Iraqi social and political development". On his trip, Ban visited Egypt, Israel, the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon and Saudi Arabia, where Ban attended a conference with leaders of the Arab League and met for several hours with Omar Hassan al Bashir, the Sudanese president who had resisted UN peacekeepers in Darfur. Ban Ki moon criticized Israel on 10 March 2008 for planning to build housing units in a West Bank settlement, saying the decision conflicts with "Israel's obligation under the road map" for Middle East peace. During a meeting of the UN Security Council on Wednesday, 7 January 2009, Ban called for an immediate end to fighting in the Gaza Strip. He criticized both sides, Israel for bombarding Gaza and Hamas for firing rockets into Israel. Although the 2009 Iranian presidential election was widely disputed, Ban Ki moon sent a traditional congratulation message to the Iranian president upon his inauguration. He kept silent over the request of Shirin Ebadi to visit Iran after the crackdown on peaceful post election protests by the Iranian police, which was perceived as a crime against humanity. More than 4,000 people were arrested and nearly 70 were killed, some while being held in prison. In another incident, several prominent intellectuals, including Akbar Ganji, Hamid Dabashi and Noam Chomsky, went on a three day hunger strike in front of the UN. The incident was followed by an official request by more than 200 intellectuals, human rights activists and reformist politicians in Iran for the UN reaction. Ban Ki moon however did not take any action to stop the violence in Iran. The Libyan Civil War began in 2011, the last year of Ban's first term, and dominated his attention and public statements that year. Throughout the conflict, he lobbied for peaceful solutions to the crisis. He frequently spoke out against military action in Libya, believing that a diplomatic solution would be possible and preferable. However, he conceded that if then leader Muammar Gaddafi refused to abide by a cease fire agreement, the international coalition of military forces would have no choice but to intervene to protect the human rights of Libyans. The Gaddafi government was eventually overthrown and Gaddafi killed in the conflict.

Ban took the first foreign trip of his term to attend the African Union summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in January 2007 as part of an effort to reach out to the Group of 77. He repeatedly identified Darfur as the top humanitarian priority of his administration.

Ban Ki moon flew to Myanmar on 25 May 2008 to guide a conference with international agencies aimed at boosting donations for the nation, which was struck by Cyclone Nargis on 2 May 2008. The conference was initiated after Ban had met with Than Shwe, the leading figure of Myanmar's government 23 May 2008. Ban toured the devastation—especially in the hard hit Irrawaddy Delta—23 May 2008 and 24 May 2008. Myanmar officials agreed to allow the Yangon International Airport to be used as a logistical hub for aid distribution.

On 6 June 2011, Ban Ki moon formally announced his candidacy for a second consecutive term as Secretary General of the United Nations. He announced his candidacy at a press conference, following a meeting with the Asian group of countries at the United Nations. Ban Ki moon's first mandate as the Secretary General was set to end on 31 December 2011. The five permanent Security Council members supported his candidacy. There was no declared rival for the post.

On 17 June 2011, he received the recommendation of the Security Council by a unanimous vote, and, on 21 June, his nomination was confirmed by a unanimous acclamation vote at the United Nations General Assembly. His new five year term as Secretary General commenced on 1 January 2012 and ended on 31 December 2016.

After beginning his second term in January 2012, Ban focused his public statements and speeches on peace and equality in the Middle East and on equality issues.

The aftermath of the Libyan Civil War and other events of the Arab Spring continued to command Ban's attention with the start of his second term. He focused in 2012 on what he termed "intolerance" in the Arab world. After travelling to Vienna to participate in the opening of the KAICIID Dialogue Centre to foster interreligious dialogue, Ban commented, "Many countries in the Arab world including Saudi Arabia are changing. Since the Arab Spring, the leaders have begun to listen to the voice of their people." He was however criticised in the Austrian press for associating himself with a project of Saudi King Abdullah, Saudi Arabia being a location of perceived religious intolerance. Throughout 2012, Ban expressed his concern about the continuing Israeli–Palestinian conflict, in particular the condition of the Palestinian hunger strikers in Israeli prisons and the movement restrictions imposed on Gaza Strip residents. On 16 August 2013, Ban Ki moon admitted that the UN was biased against Israel, stating in a meeting with Israeli students that there was a biased attitude towards the Israeli people and Israeli government at the UN. He described this as "an unfortunate situation." A few days later, he backtracked on the utterance. During an interview on 16 December 2016, Ban said that the UN has issued a "disproportionate volume of resolutions, reports and conferences criticizing Israel." On 26 January 2016, Ban made a statement in relation to the attacks by Palestinians against Israelis. Ban Ki moon said that "as oppressed peoples have demonstrated throughout the ages, it is human nature to react to occupation, which often serves as a potent incubator of hate and extremism". In rebuking Ban's statement, the Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu stated that "there is no justification for terror". saying: "Grave violations against children increased dramatically as a result of the escalating conflict". In June 2016, Ban Ki moon removed a Saudi led coalition from a list of children's rights violators. He later admitted that Saudi Arabia threatened to cut Palestinian aid and funds to other UN programs if coalition was not removed from blacklist for killing children in Yemen. According to one source, there was also a threat of "clerics in Riyadh meeting to issue a fatwa against the UN, declaring it anti Muslim, which would mean no contacts of OIC members, no relations, contributions, support, to any UN projects, programs".

On 26 June 2016, during a speech in Saint Petersburg, Russia, Ban said Russia "has a critical role to play" in addressing global issues "from ending the conflicts in Ukraine and Syria, to safeguarding human rights and controlling the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction". His comments were condemned by Ukraine's UN envoy Volodymyr Yelchenko, saying that he does not understand how the UN chief "can say such things which sort of praise the role of Russia in settling the conflict in Ukraine when the Russian Federation is the main player in aggressing Ukraine and in keeping this conflict boiling". He also noted that Russia is being accused of human rights abuses in Crimea and is "building up the nuclear potential" on the peninsula.

On 7 March 2012, Ban delivered a speech titled "The Time Has Come" to the United Nations Human Rights Council urging the council to place greater emphasis on combating homophobia and promoting LGBT rights around the world. The speech was met by a protest by a group of delegates, who organized a walk out protest during the speech. During a speech at the UN headquarters commemorating Human Rights Day, Ban condemned countries with anti gay laws, mentioning 76 countries that criminalize homosexuality. He said:
"It is an outrage that in our modern world, so many countries continue to criminalize people simply for loving another human being of the same sex." Ban has told senior managers that homophobia will not be tolerated. He pointed to countries such as Ukraine which has proposed criminalizing public discussion about homosexuality as threatening basic human rights. He further stated that governments have a duty to defend vulnerable minorities. In April 2013, he described LGBT rights as one of the great neglected human rights of our time. He also said that religion, culture or tradition can never justify denial of basic rights.

Ban has been organizing and moderating the Geneva II Conference on Syria.

On 25 January 2012, Ban announced that he would convene the world's first summit on humanitarian aid in order to "share knowledge and establish common best practices." Known as the World Humanitarian Summit, the event took place in the 23–24 May 2016 in Istanbul, Turkey. In preparation for the summit, Ban released a report on 9 February 2016 titled 'One Humanity, Shared Responsibility' in which he laid out an "Agenda for Humanity" based on consultations with more than 23,000 people in 153 countries. The Agenda for Humanity outlines what is needed to reform humanitarian action, including political leadership to prevent and end conflict, new forms of financing, and a shift from providing aid to ending need. The summit is scheduled to include 5,000 participants, including representatives from governments, NGOs, civil society organizations, and the private sector, as well as individuals affected by humanitarian crises.

According to The Washington Post, "some UN employees and delegates" expressed resentment at Ban's perceived favouritism in the appointment of South Korean nationals in key posts. Previous UN chiefs such as Kurt Waldheim (Austria), Javier Pérez de Cuéllar (Peru), and Boutros Boutros Ghali (Egypt) brought small teams of trusted aides or clerical workers from their country's Foreign Ministry, and South Korean nationals have been historically underrepresented at the United Nations. Former UN Under Secretary General for Oversight Services Inga Britt Ahlenius denounced Ban Ki moon after resigning her post in 2010, calling him "reprehensible". In particular, the two disputed Ahlenius's plans to hire a former prosecutor, Robert Appleton, who had carried out investigations into corruption in UN peacekeeping missions from 2006 to 2009. Ban's staff explained that Appleton's appointment was rejected because Ahlenius had not properly considered female candidates for the appointment, and said that the final selection should have been made by Ban, not Ahlenius. Ban's chief of staff Vijay Nambiar described Ahlenius's complaints as "a deeply unbalanced account", and also stated that "many pertinent facts were overlooked or misrepresented" in Ahlenius's memo. Nambiar further noted that Ban "fully recognizes the operational independence of OIOS, [but that] does not excuse [Ahlenius] from applying the standard rules of recruitment". Ban had refused to hand over confidential documents relating to the case to the UN personnel tribunal, despite repeated orders by the court to do so. In relation to another case, Ban was admonished by Judge Michael Adams for "willful disobedience" for again refusing to hand over key documents in an internal promotions dispute. In 2013, Ban was accused of undermining the collective bargaining rights of The Staff Coordinating Council, the union representing United Nations staff. Ban unilaterally eliminated the role of the union to negotiate on behalf of the employees and terminated talks when the union protested. Ban was named in a lawsuit challenging UN legal immunity on behalf of Haitians with cholera in the U. S. District Court of Manhattan. UN peacekeepers from Nepal are said to be the source of the 2010–13 Haiti cholera outbreak. Ban declared that the legal immunity of the United Nations before national courts should be upheld, but that this does not reduce the UN's moral responsibility to overcome Haiti's cholera epidemic. In January 2015, Judge J. Paul Oetken dismissed the lawsuit, affirming UN immunity. An appeal to Oetken's decision was submitted to the Court in May 2015. British magazine The Economist, in May 2016, called Ban "plodding, protocol conscious and loth to stand up to the big powers" and "the dullest—and among the worst" secretary generals. Japanese diplomat Kiyotaka Akasaka defended Ban's understated presence as more quietly Confucian, stating that "[Ban's] behaviour has been like that of the wise man, the sage in Oriental philosophy". One UN official claimed that while Ban would greet world leaders in their native language, he would then read directly from his talking points without small talk. The UN official opined, "Quiet diplomacy? He [Ban] displayed no skills for that." However, recent polls showed Moon Jae in of the main opposition Minjoo Party of Korea in the lead with a support rating of 32.8 percent, while Ban trailed in distant second with 15.4 percent. Moon was eventually elected president on 10 May. Although Ban repeatedly expressed his desires for running, a UN resolution in 1946 says "a Secretary General should refrain from accepting" any Governmental position "at any rate immediately on retirement." Exceptions to the rule have been made in history with the 1986 election of Kurt Waldheim to the post of President of Austria, although the position is ceremonial in nature. Contrary to Ban's public comments hinting at any likely run, private reports indicated otherwise. Kim Jong pil, former Prime Minister of South Korea, was reported to say that Ban Ki moon would announce his candidacy for the presidency shortly after his term as Secretary General ended. Ban was originally predicted to run under the conservative Saenuri Party, but President Park Geun hye's scandal cast doubts as to which party Ban would run under. Ban returned to South Korea on 13 January 2017. On 1 February 2017 he announced he would not be a candidate for president.

In 2017, Ban and Heinz Fischer, former president of Austria, founded, and are co chairs of, the Ban Ki moon Centre for Global Citizens in Vienna, Austria. The nonprofit group's mission is to support youth and women, working within the UN's Sustainable Development Goal frameworks. In June 2017, Ban joined The Elders, a human rights group composed of international statesmen that was founded by Nelson Mandela. In November 2018, he became a deputy chair of the group, serving jointly with Graça Machel. In 2017, he joined French President Emmanuel Macron in calling for a Global Pact for the Environment. In early 2018, Ban was elected to lead the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), a treaty based intergovernmental organization. Effective 20 February 2018, he is serving a 2 year term in the dual roles of president of the assembly and chair of the council. Ban supports the U. S. Democrats' Green New Deal. In 2020, Ban Ki Moon was appointed as the Official Ambassador of the GEMS World Academy Model United Nations.

Ban Ki moon met Yoo Soon taek in 1962 when they were both in high school. Ban was 18 years old, and Yoo Soon taek was his secondary school's student council president. Ban Ki moon married Yoo Soon taek in 1971. They have three adult children: two daughters and a son. His son Woo hyun was born in 1974 in India. His younger daughter, Hyun hee (born 1976), is a field officer for UNICEF in Nairobi. Ban himself is not a member of any church or religious group and has declined to expound his beliefs: "Now, as Secretary General, it will not be appropriate at this time to talk about my own belief in any particular religion or god. So maybe we will have some other time to talk about personal matters." His mother is Buddhist. In September 2018, Bahn Joo hyun was sentenced to six months in prison in Manhattan federal court.

During his tenure at the South Korean Foreign Ministry, Ban's nickname was jusa (주사), meaning "the administrative clerk". The name was used as both positive and negative: complimenting Ban's attention to detail and administrative skill while deriding what was seen as a lack of charisma and subservience to his superiors.

: Blue Stripes or 1st Class of the Order of Service Merit (1975), (1986), (2006).