Korea Herald: What is your assessment of the Group of 20 Seoul Summit?
Ban Ki-moon: First of all, I am very much encouraged by the fact that the G20 Seoul Summit has discussed for the first time in G20 history development agenda and adopted the Seoul Consensus together with 100 plan of action programs.
This is quite encouraging.
This would work as complementarily and mutually reinforcing the plan of actions adopted by the U.N. Millennium Development Goal summit meeting in September.
While addressing financial economic crisis, I have urged G20 leaders that I would welcome their taking stimulus measures and financial consolidation. But all these belt-tightening measures should not be made on the backs of the poor.
In that regard, it was highly appreciated by the international community, particularly developing countries, that the Seoul summit has taken leadership.
This was possible due to the visionary leadership of President Lee Myung-bak.
I also expressed my satisfaction and appreciation to that effect during my presentation on the development session.
I was pleased to play a prominent role. This was exactly what member states, particularly those developing countries of the U.N., wanted me to play.
I am returning with a sense of achievement. I really appreciate the Korean government and people for that initiative.
KH: The development agenda seems to have gotten lost in the G20 currency scuffle. What are your views?
Ban: The G20 leaders have agreed to establish a high-level panel as a way of implementing the Seoul Consensus and program of action plans.
This is quite encouraging.
We should appreciate how difficult this process has been, over the issue of currency wars and the framework guidelines over trade imbalances. Those were quite thorny issues. If not properly addressed by the Seoul government through the Gyeongju finance ministers and central bank governors’ meeting, these issues might have hijacked the whole Seoul process. We have avoided that.
We have agreed on many important issues that were deferred to Seoul from the Toronto meeting. If you look at the final communiqu in Toronto, most were deferred to Seoul for a final decision.
I believe this is a great success and the U.N. will work very closely with the G20 leaders. The G20 leaders also decided to carry the development agenda as one of the important agendas for France.
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| U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon (center, back row) and his wife Yoo Soon-taek pose with former Prime Minister Han Seung-soo (third from left), SK Group chairman Chey tae-won (second from right) and other officials during an event with child green leaders in Seoul on Saturday. (Park Hyun-koo/The Korea Herald) |
I met French President Sarkozy on the margins, and he said he will do all that the U.N. is doing to promote development agenda.
KH: You have called for a stronger U.N. to better deal with pressing global issues. How will a stronger U.N. cooperate with the G20, whose own status is advancing?
Ban: The U.N. and the G20 are in a mutually complementary relationship. It is not in any way a competing relationship.
The decisions by the G20 as the premier forum for world economic issues may have significant impact on the international economic order and the international economic situation. But all these decisions will have to be mutually reinforcing to what the U.N. has been taking as the most universal international organization with legitimacy.
What I have been urging G20 leaders is that while the U.N. welcomes all the decisions to address financial and economic issues, these consultations should be inclusive, transparent and internationally coordinated. Thus, their decisions and measures will have legitimacy.
Whatever important institutional decision should be legitimized by institutional decisions by the U.N. or other related international organizations. For example, it was decided by the G20 to give more voice to developing countries in the IMF.
Korea will be one of the beneficiaries, along with China, India and Brazil.
This will be decided and finalized by 2013 through the institutional decision of the IMF. The IMF has already taken that decision in their board meeting. It will have to be finalized in two or three years’ time. The IMF is part of the U.N. family. This is a very good example and regarded as a very important reform in the history of the IMF.
I would like to emphasize that the U.N. and the G20 will continue to work in a mutually reinforcing, complementary way.
KH: Give us your views on calls for U.N. Security Council reform and U.S. support to invite India as a permanent member.
Ban: The reform of the Security Council is one of the most important issues at the U.N. at this time. Considering the dramatic changes in international political scenes during the last six decades, all the member states agreed that Security Council should be reformed in a more transparent, representative, democratic way.
I believe there is almost a consensus that the Security Council should be expanded. After 15 years of discussions at the open-ended working group level, the U.N. General Assembly has taken accelerated pace in Security Council negotiations over the last two years. The General Assembly has taken an informal negotiation process, and five rounds have taken place. What they almost agreed is that the Security Council needs to be expanded. The exact modality has yet to be decided. This is what the member states should determine. As the secretary general, I am facilitating this process.
I believe at this time, the member states would need more time to discuss on text based negotiations, but we have not yet reached there. What U.S. President Barack Obama or other leaders of member states said is their position, and this is something which as secretary general I am not in a position to say anything about.
KH: Your focus has been on areas of green growth and climate change. However, developing and under-developed nations have little means to adequately address these issues. How will the U.N. empower them?
Ban: While the Copenhagen accord has not met every expectation of the international community, they have made a good foundation upon which we can build in Cancun.
I think we are making good progress.
Climate change is a global phenomenon that is impacting everyone in the world, regardless of where you are coming from. But unfortunately, developing and poor countries do not have any capacity to adapt and mitigate this situation. The U.N. is therefore trying to provide financial and technological support to developing countries.
To implement the agreement in Copenhagen last year to provide $30 billion annually to developing countries by the end of 2012 and to provide thereafter $100 billion per annum by 2020, I have established a high-level advisor group on climate change financing, which was co-chaired by the prime ministers of Norway and Ethiopia.
They brought to me the final report on Nov. 5, and submitted it to all heads of state of the member states.
This is to provide $100 billion per annum to developing countries. It’s going to be a challenge, but it is feasible. This will be discussed in forthcoming Cancun climate change conference. Climate change should be addressed by all the countries in the world, and I will continue with my leadership role.
KH: How different is your work as U.N. secretary general, compared to when you were South Korea’s foreign minister?
Ban: The scope of my work now is whole, global issues. Unlike Korean foreign minister who had been working on bilateral issues involving the Korean Peninsula, what I am doing now are global issues and challenges.
Starting from climate change, food security, energy security and how we can provide decent education opportunities to all children around the world, how to empower women, how to pursue environmentally sustainable development, how to forge partnerships between government and civil communities.
These are broad, but there are also many specific issues such as regional conflict issues.
It is amazing how many conflict issues we see in the world, which in many cases Korean people may not be aware of. There is also another very important area of promoting and protecting human rights.
There are millions of people whose human rights are not property protected. Let alone protected, their rights are abused and totally violated. These are unacceptable and intolerable cases. This is what I have to deal with.
Living in an era of multiple crises, these require multiple solutions through global solidarity. Not a single country or group of countries can do it alone without coordination and full support of the international community.
One very important theme of the G20 was internationally coordinated measures.
My main message is that this is a time for unity. Without unity, without unity of the G20, without unity of the 192 member states (of the U.N.), we cannot address these issues.
That’s what I am doing as secretary general of the U.N. Therefore you have to broaden your visions, you have to have a firm commitment that you have to do your work based on the principles of integrity, objectivity and fairness, reflecting all the concerns and plights and interests of each and every country and group of countries. It may be easier to say, but much more difficult to do.
I am always humble when I address these issues, but until now I think I have been doing my job properly with positive recognition from the international community. And I tried to lead by example that you have to sacrifice your own interests and well-being.
KH: Some of the media, including the New York Times, has criticized what they called your lenient stance on human rights issues, such as in China. What are your views?
Ban: Human rights are one of the three pillars of the U.N. Charter. It’s a universally accepted principle. I have a very important responsibility to promote and protect the human rights of everyone in the world.
As for the specific question regarding China, the U.N. engagement with China is broad and multifaceted. China is one of the important members of the U.N. It has been providing peacekeepers, actively participating in development agenda, and very actively participating in climate change and so forth.
If you look at the public record, I have been discussing in a public debate and private discussions with the Chinese leadership and Chinese public in Nanjing University. In Shanghai, in my address to a central party lecture, I have emphasized the importance of human rights and urged the Chinese government to give more political space to civil communities, and uphold human rights corresponding to human rights standards.
Last week during my visit to Asia, to Cambodia and Vietnam, I have also spoken very strongly about the importance of human rights. I have established a commission of inquiry for human rights situations in Gaza and Guinea.
All these have been public and very steadfast and strong efforts on my part as secretary general.
Therefore, what I have been doing to promote human rights should be viewed and seen from a more comprehensive and broader context of my job as a secretary general.
I will continue to fulfill my duty as secretary general and fulfill the three pillars of peace, security and development and promoting human rights. I believe the member states have been very positively recognizing and approving my performance as secretary general in doing and trying to fulfill those three pillars.
KH: Do you expect a second term?
Ban: That is up to member states to determine. If I continue to work faithfully to fulfill the three pillars of the U.N. charter, I believe or I hope I will be able to get positive recognition. But after all, it is up to the member states to determine.
The following are excerpts from the interview with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Ed.
By Kim Ji-hyun (jemmie@heraldm.com)
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