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One Of My Biggest Regrets Was The Fact That As An Institution And An International Community We Could Not Stop The War In Iraq. That Really Was Very Difficult And Very Painful. Every Fibre In My Body Felt It Was Wrong. I Spoke To Leaders, We Spoke To People, We Tried... We Couldn't Stop It... And We See The Results.

-Kofi Annan

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One Of My Biggest

Kofi Annan

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One Of My Biggest Regrets Was The Fact That As An Institution And An International Community We Could Not Stop The War In Iraq. That Really Was Very Difficult And Very Painful. Every Fibre In My Body Felt It Was Wrong. I Spoke To Leaders, We Spoke To People, We Tried... We Couldn't Stop It... And We See The Results.

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I Urge The Iraqi Leadership For Sake Of Its Own People... To Seize This Opportunity And Thereby Begin To End The Isolation And Suffering Of The Iraqi People.

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The Global Work Of The United Nations Is Not Without Reason Compared To That Of A Family - Striving For A Common Goal In Concert With All Members For A Better Future.

You Have To Develop A Certain Healthy Distance To Allow You To Keep A Clear Head, To Be Able To Analyse The Situation, Lead Your Team, And Move Forward With Them, Because There Are Times If I'm Not Careful... If You Get Too Involved, It Will Consume You; It Will Consume You, And You Will Not Be Good To Your Team; The Issues You Are Dealing With.

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Economic Globalization

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Justice Has Taken Its Course And The Authority And Legitimacy Of The Legal Process Must Be Respected.

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A United Nations That Will Not Stand Up For Human Rights Is A United Nations That Cannot Stand Up For Itself.

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Once You Are Really Challenged, You Find Something In Yourself. Man Doesn't Know What He Is Capable Of Until He Is Asked.

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Sometimes When You Take A Tough Action Against One Side In The Conflict, They See You As Part Of The Conflict And They Attack You.

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Literacy Is A Bridge From Misery To Hope... Especially For Girls And Women, It Is An Agent Of Family Health And Nutrition.

Intelligence Can Be Used To Manipulate.

Sadly, A Prize For Peace Is A Rarity In This World. Most Nations Have Monuments Or Memorials To War, Bronze Salutations To Heroic Battles, Archways Of Triumph. But Peace Has No Parade, No Pantheon Of Victory.

Reform Is A Process, And Not An Event.

The Question Is The Morning After. What Sort Of Iraq Do We Wake Up To After The Bombing? What Happens In The Region? What Impact Could It Have? These Are Questions Leaders I Have Spoken To Have Posed.

It Is Not In The United Nations That The Millennium Development Goals Will Be Achieved. They Have To Be Achieved In Each Of Its Member States, By The Joint Efforts Of Their Governments And People.

Normally When People Resign They Will Organise Their Champagne Farewell Parties... And Then They Resurface Somewhere.

World Health Day Is An Opportunity To Highlight The Problem, But Above All, To Stimulate Action. It Is An Occasion To Call On All Partners - Governments, International Donors, Civil Society, The Private Sector, The Media, Families And Individuals Alike - To Develop Sustainable Activities For The Survival, Health And Well-being Of Mothers And Children. On This World Health Day, Let Us Rededicate Ourselves To That Mission.

The Death Toll From Small Arms Dwarfs That Of All Other Weapons Systems — And In Most Years Greatly Exceeds The Toll Of The Atomic Bombs That Devastated Hiroshima And Nagasaki. In Terms Of The Carnage They Cause, Small Arms, Indeed, Could Well Be Described As 'weapons Of Mass Destruction'.

Hiroshima And Nagasaki

Mass Destruction

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I Think What Gives Me Hope Is I Have The Sense That The People Of Kenya Have Turned The Page. They Are Keen To Get A New Political Dispensation. They Are Keen To Fight Corruption And Impunity, And In That Sense They Are Leaving The Political Elite Behind.

We Must Bring A Message Of Solidarity, Of Mutual Respect And, Above All, Of Hope. Business Cannot Afford To Be Seen As The Problem.

The Millennium Development Goals Can Be Met By 2015, But Only If All Involved Break With Business As Usual And Dramatically Accelerate And Scale Up Action Now.

I Spent My Youth And My Most Formative Years In Africa. I Left Africa When I Was About 20, 21, And When Mo Says A Great African, I Was Really Moulded By My African Experience, Although I Had The Good Fortune That By The Time I Was 24 I Had Studied And Worked On Three Continents - Africa, The Us, And Europe.

Founded On The Principles Of Private Initiative, Entrepreneurship And Self-employment, Underpinned By The Values Of Democracy, Equality And Solidarity, The Co-operative Movement Can Help Pave The Way To A More Just And Inclusive Economic Order.

On This International Day Of Un Peacekeepers, Let Us Pay Tribute To The Men And Women From Countries Across The World Who Serve Selflessly, Tirelessly And Fearlessly In Un Peacekeeping Operations. Let Us Remember The Heroes Who Have Laid Down Their Lives In Lands Far From Their Own In The Service Of Peace. And Let Us Reaffirm Our Commitment To Building A World Free From The Scourge Of War.

We Have To Be Very Clear With The Population And The Countries We Enter What We Can Do And What We Cannot Do.

I Think That These Flows Of Refugee Are The Inevitable Counterparts To The Flow Of Capital And Goods. In Other Words, They Too Are By-products Of Globalisation.

The War On Drugs Has Failed In West Africa And Around The World

There Was A Time, With The Berlin Wall Down, That [it Looked As If] The Un Finally Could Do What It Was Set Up To Do, The Rivalry Between The Two Camps Would Dissipate, And We Could All Co-operate. And Then, Of Course, Iraq Came And Blew It All Apart. These Upheavals Will Always Take Place In The World, And The Design And Construct Of The Un Ideally Should Be Such That It Can Deal With These Upheavals, And Possibly Influence Them, And Survive And Thrive, But It Doesn't Work Out That Way, Because As An Organisation We Are So Dependent On The Same Member States.

I Think That In The West, Many Citizens, Especially Younger Citizens, Take Their Freedoms And Institutions For Granted And Focus On Their Frustrations With Their Governments' Inability To Solve Pressing Problems.

Change Is A Process Which Has To Be Managed. If It's Managed And Managed Well In The Interest Of The Nation And The People, The Likelihood Is That It Will End Well.

We Have To Choose Between A Global Market Driven Only By Calculations Of Short-term Profit, And One Which Has A Human Face.

Economic Globalization

Extreme Poverty Anywhere Is A Threat To Human Security Everywhere.

More Than Ever Before In Human History, We Share A Common Destiny. We Can Master It Only If We Face It Together. And That, My Friends, Is Why We Have The United Nations.

The Un Was Very Media-shy, And Its Relationship With The Press Was Very Controlled; Although Periodically I Spoke To The Press, The Rule Was, Only The Secretary-general Speaks To The Press; Only The Secretary-general Makes... So You Would See Many Situations Where Under-secretaries-general Would Come In And Speak. I Opened That, And I Encouraged All Of Them To Speak In Their Areas, Whether It Was Peacekeeping Or Humanitarian Efforts.

Depending On Where You Live, Your Threat Is Much Different From The Other Person. If You Ask A New Yorker Today, Because Of The Way The Press Plays It, He Will Say Terrorism Is His Biggest Fear. But For Somebody Living On A Small Island State, Then It Is Climate Change, The Rise Of The Sea Level, For His Whole Island May Be Washed Away. If I Go To Southern Africa, They Tell Me It Is Hiv/aids And Somewhere In Asia It Is Poverty. This Is Also Why You Will Find It Difficult To Find Agreements, Because If You Want Someone To Be Concerned About Your Threat, Then You Should Be Concerned About His.

On This International Day Of Peace, Let Us Dare To Imagine A World Free Of Conflict And Violence

Human Beings Are Not Property. On The International Day For The Abolition Of Slavery, Let Us Reaffirm The Inherent Dignity Of All Men, Women And Children. And Let Us Redouble Our Efforts So That The Words Of The Universal Declaration Of Human Rights - 'no One Shall Be Held In Slavery Or Servitude' - Ring True.

If We Can Come Up With Innovations And Train Young People To Take On New Jobs, And If We Can Switch To Clean Energy, I Think We Have The Capacity To Build This World Not Dependent On Fossil-fuel. I Think It Will Happen, And It Won't Destroy Economy.

[refugees] Cannot Be Stopped, But They Can And Must Be Managed Better, More Humanely, Protecting Migrants' Human Rights Whilst Accepting States' Rights To Control Their Borders.

Good, Healthy Democratic Societies Are Built On Three Pillars: There's Peace And Stability, Economic Development, And Respect For Rule Of Law And Human Rights. But Often, We Take Stability - Peace In Terms Of Security And Economic Activity - To Mean A Country Is Doing Well. We Forget The Third And Important Pillar Of Rule Of Law And Respect For Human Rights, Because No Country Can Long Remain Prosperous Without That Third Pillar.

No Nation Can Make Itself Secure By Seeking Supremacy Over All Others. We All Share Responsibility For Each Other's Security, And Only By Working To Make Each Other Secure Can We Hope To Achieve Lasting Security For Ourselves.

Democracy Is, In Essence, A Form Of Non-violent Conflict Management. If War Is The Worst Enemy Of Development, Healthy And Balanced Development Is The Best Form Of Conflict Prevention.

The Right To Development Is The Measure Of The Respect Of All Other Human Rights.that Should Be Our Aim: A Situation In Which All Individuals Are Enabled To Maximize Their Potential, And To Contribute To The Evolution Of Society As A Whole.

The United Nations Is Proud To Have The Adopt-a-minefield Campaign As A Partner.

Literacy Is, Finally, The Road To Human Progress And The Means Through Which Every Man, Woman And Child Can Realize His Or Her Full Potential.

I Am Often Asked What Can People Do To Become A Good Global Citizen? I Reply That It Begins In Your Own Community.

When We Talk About The Un, What Are We Really Talking About? We Are Talking About My Country, Your Country, Other Countries And Their Collective Will To Stand Together And Apply Pressure Or Offer Incentives To Steer Things In The Right Direction. When The Nations Of The World Come Together, With Collective Will, On An Issue And They Speak With A United Voice, They Have A Much Greater Impact. When There Is Division, Then The Impact Is Much, Much Less.

Sometimes In Peacekeeping Operations You Show Force In Order Not To Use Force - People Realise That There's A Pushback And There's A Solid Force There That's Not Going To Be Pushed Around, That Sometimes Helps.

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