United Nations Radio

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has instituted monthly press conferences, the first of which took place today.

Mr. Ban covered a number of issues, but the financial crisis took center stage. Diane Bailey has more:

SG1: Everyone has felt the earthquake on Wall Street. But it has not shaken our resolve.

DIANE: UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon giving assurances that while the banks may be failing, the world's bottom billion can bank on the UN. As might be expected, much of today's press conference by the Secretary-General focused on the global financial crisis and how it will affect UN efforts to meet the needs of the world's most vulnerable. Mr. Ban pointed to recent commitments amounting to $16 billion dollars to meet the Millennium Development Goals and urged donors to honor these pledges. But there was skepticism about how quickly, if at all, the pledges would be honored in the midst of financial turmoil, as shown by this journalist's question:

"The Secretary-General made several references to need to "crisis-proof" UN priorities from international financial turbulence, especially with the organization dealing with the triple crises of climate change, meeting the Millennium Development Goals and the global food crisis."

DIANE: But he also spoke about the situation in Darfur, and the killing yesterday of a Nigerian peacekeeper, the 9th solider to die in Darfur in the last three months. He was asked whether he would support the Security Council voting to suspend the International Criminal Court's investigation of Sudanese president Omar Al-Bashir in order to get the peace process moving:

"First of all, the Sudanese government should fully cooperate to ensure that this peace process as well as the safety and security and deployment of hybrid operations progress as smoothly as expeditiously as possible, while also they look at this issue of taking very credible, judicial measures to meet the expectations and requirements of the International Criminal Court."

DIANE: Mr. Ban warned about food aid to Somalia ending later this month if no country volunteered to take over from Canada in escorting World Food Programme ships carrying food supplies to the country. He told journalists he would be visiting Geneva next week for talks with the European Union and the Oranization for Security and Cooperation in Europe on the situation in Georgia.

At the end, a journalist asked about some of the Secretary-General's personal interests, including what he was currently reading, a question Mr. Ban said would be better answered in a more private setting.

Producer: Diane Bailey

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