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The Interesting Thing Is, Everybody Focuses On The Global Warming As An Environmental Issue, As Something Outside Our Daily Lives. But Actually The Impact Of Global Warming Is With Us Today. Communities Are Suffering. Communities In Poor Countries Are The Ones Paying The Price, They Are Not The Ones Who Are Polluting, And We Need To Help Them Adapt.

-Kofi Annan

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The Interesting Thing Is,

Kofi Annan

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The Interesting Thing Is, Everybody Focuses On The Global Warming As An Environmental Issue, As Something Outside Our Daily Lives. But Actually The Impact Of Global Warming Is With Us Today. Communities Are Suffering. Communities In Poor Countries Are The Ones Paying The Price, They Are Not The Ones Who Are Polluting, And We Need To Help Them Adapt.

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I Have Often Said That We Have Two Uns; The Un That Is A Secretariat, That Implements The Mandates Handed Over To It By The General Assembly And The Security Council, And The Un That Is The Member States Who Sit In The Council, Take The Decisions, Hand Over The Mandates, Or Take Decisions In The General Assembly.

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Most Governments Only Want To Deploy A Peacekeeping Force Where There Is A Peace Agreement And There Is Peace To Keep. They Are Very Hesitant About Putting Their Men And Women In Harm's Way. It Is Extremely Difficult To Get The Troops If You Do Not Have The Consent Of The Country Where You Are Deploying.

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Inside And Outside

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The Lord Had The Wonderful Advantage Of Being Able To Work Alone.

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There Are A Great Number Of Peoples Who Need More Than Just Words Of Sympathy From The International Community. They Need A Real And Sustained Commitment To Help End Their Cycles Of Violence, And Launch Them On A Safe Passage To Prosperity.

When You Have Difficult Issues On The Table For Discussion, Then Sometimes For Africa You May Have Burundi Or Gambia Representing Them On The Security Council; And Then For Latin America You May Have A Country Like Costa Rica, Which Is A Wonderful Country But They Don't Have The Same Weight As Others From The Other Regions. And Sometimes They Get Bullied. Sometimes Their Capitals Come Under Lots Of Pressure To Take A Position.

I Observe A Lot. I See A Lot Around Me.

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Un Is Made Even More Complex By The Constant Interplay Of Politics And Bureaucracy And Can Certainly Be Bewildering For A Novice.

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Let Us Work In Partnerships Between Rich And Poor To Improve The Opportunities Of All Human Beings To Build Better Lives.

Insecurity Is Love Dressed In A Child's Clothing.

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Making A Difference

As One Of My Predecessors Said, Our Objective Is Not To Take People To Heaven, But To Prevent Humanity From Going To Hell.

The U.n. Power Comes From Concerted Action Of The Governments.

I Have Always Believed That On Important Issues, The Leaders Must Lead. Where The Leaders Fail To Lead, And People Are Really Concerned About It, The People Will Take The Lead And Make The Leaders Follow.

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Iraq Has A New Opportunity To Comply With All These Relevant Resolutions Of The Security Council.

Nuclear Terrorism Is Still Often Treated As Science Fiction. I Wish It Were. But Unfortunately We Live In A World Of Excess Hazardous Materials And Abundant Technological Know-how, In Which Some Terrorists Clearly State Their Intention To Inflict Catastrophic Casualties. Were Such An Attack To Occur, It Would Not Only Cause Widespread Death And Destruction, But Would Stagger The World Economy... [creating] A Second Death Toll Throughout The Developing World.

Nuclear Terrorism

Most Governments Only Want To Deploy A Peacekeeping Force Where There Is A Peace Agreement And There Is Peace To Keep. They Are Very Hesitant About Putting Their Men And Women In Harm's Way. It Is Extremely Difficult To Get The Troops If You Do Not Have The Consent Of The Country Where You Are Deploying.

Perhaps The Single Most Successful International Agreement To Date Has Been The Montreal Protocol.

Children Are Our Future, And Their Mothers Are Its Guardians.

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.

The Report Produced By My Commission, The Global Commission On Elections, Democracy And Security, In 2012 Showed The Corrosive Impact Of Money In Us Politics, For Example, Which Undermines The Legitimacy Of The Democratic System In Citizens' Eyes. Such Perceptions Partly Explain The Rise Of A Phenomenon Like The Success Of Donald Trump.

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

Fierce National Competition Over Water Resources Has Prompted Fears That Water Issues Contain The Seeds Of Violent Conflict.

If One Is Going To Err, One Should Err On The Side Of Liberty And Freedom.

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.

When Women Thrive, All Of Society Benefits, And Succeeding Generations Are Given A Better Start In Life.

We At The U.n. Have To Take Some Of The Blame, Because We Have Not Lowered Expectations Creating The Impression We Are Here To Save People, Even When We Have Very Limited Resources.

For Everyone, Everywhere, Literacy Is, Along With Education In General, A Basic Human Right.

I Observe A Lot. I See A Lot Around Me.

Literacy Is A Bridge From Misery To Hope.

To Build A More Healthy, Peaceful And Equitable World The Classrooms Of The World Have To Be Full Of Girls As Well As Boys.

There Can Be No Doubt That These Attacks Are Deliberate Acts Of Terrorism, Carefully Planned And Coordinated And As Such I Condemn Them Utterly. Terrorism Must Be Fought Resolutely Wherever It Appears.

You Have Made People Listen. You Have Made People Care, And You Have Taught Us That Whether We Are Poor Or Prosperous, We Have Only One World To Share. You Have Taught Young People That They Do Have The Power To Change The World.

As One Of My Predecessors Said, Our Objective Is Not To Take People To Heaven, But To Prevent Humanity From Going To Hell.

This Is A Day On Which We Pay Our Respects To Those Who Have Endured The Unimaginable. This Is An Occasion For The World To Speak Up Against The Unspeakable. It Is Long Overdue That A Day Be Dedicated To Remembering And Supporting The Many Victims And Survivors Of Torture Around The World.

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We Will Not Enjoy Security Without Development, We Will Not Enjoy Development Without Security, And We Will Not Enjoy Either Without Respect For Human Rights.

More Countries Have Understood That Women's Equality Is A Prerequisite For Development.

One Has To Have The Strength Of Character To Say The Time Has Come To Move On... Unless You Are A King.

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.

One Has To Learn From History. Quite Frankly, It Is Almost Impossible To Have A Sense Of Vision Without A Sense Of History. If History Is Learned, Then It Doesn't Have To Repeat Itself Over Generations.

Having Worked My Way From The Bottom Of The Ladder To The Top [of The Un] Certainly Helped Me Navigate That Complexity, Both Political And Bureaucratic.

To Go To War Without The Security Council Will Not Be In Conformity With The Council.

In Their Greatest Hour Of Need, The World Failed The People Of Rwanda.

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It Is Impossible To Realize Our Goals While Discriminating Against Half The Human Race. As Study After Study Has Taught Us, There Is No Tool For Development More Effective Than The Empowerment Of Women.

Children Are Our Future, And Their Mothers Are Its Guardians.

It's Not That Easy To Quit. When You Look Back In The American System It Is Very Rare That People Quit On Issues Of Principle.

Without A Dream You'll Not Get Anywhere.

I Was An Ordinary Boy At School, A Young Man. In Fact, What Did The Headmaster Once Say? "you're Constantly Challenging Those In Authority; Questioning And Challenging Those In Authority." Which Was Not Really The Way I Saw It. I Felt There Were Questions That Had To Be Answered, And Things That Weren't Quite Right.

The Gap Between The Rich And The Poor Cannot Keep Growing Without Nothing Being Done About It.

We Often Hear A Lot About Subsidies, Because It's Often The Powerful Talking About The Poor; The Poor Don't Have Enough Voice To Question The Privileges.

Young People Should Be At The Forefront Of Global Change And Innovation. Empowered, They Can Be Key Agents For Development And Peace.

Drugs Have Destroyed Many Lives, But Wrongheaded Governmental Policies Have Destroyed Many More. I Think It's Obvious That After 40 Years Of War On Drugs, It Has Not Worked. There Should Be Decriminalization Of Drugs.

If Our Hopes Of Building A Better And Safer World Are To Become More Than Wishful Thinking, We Will Need The Engagement Of Volunteers More Than Ever.

I Think That Peacekeeping Can Do Quite A Lot, If They Are Given The Right Mandate With The Commensurate Resources To Get The Job Done.

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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.

Whether Our Task Is Fighting Poverty, Stemming The Spread Of Disease Or Saving Innocent Lives From Mass Murder, We Have Seen That We Cannot Succeed Without The Leadership Of The Strong And The Engagement Of All.

We All Make Mistakes.

Making Mistakes

We All Make Mistakes

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Business Cannot Prosper In Societies That Fail.

We Have The Means And The Capacity To Deal With Our Problems, If Only We Can Find The Political Will.

You Need To Be Careful Not To Over-reach And Also Assess The Capacity You Have To Work With.

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Extreme Poverty Anywhere Is A Threat To Human Security Everywhere.

This Is An Historic Step Forward In The World's Efforts To Combat A Truly Global Threat.

International Law Now Grants Rights To All Human Beings, Not Only To Citizens.

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There Is A Certain Tendency On The Part Of Some Americans To Treat The Un As A Multilateralism à La Carte Where You Pick And Choose Where It Suits You And When It Doesn't Suit You, You Pull Back.

The Happiness Of Any Society Begins With The Well Being Of The Families That Live In It.

When Women Thrive, All Of Society Benefits, And Succeeding Generations Are Given A Better Start In Life.

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.

It's Always A Difficult Time To Be Secretary General.

Difficult Times

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

I've Been Around Enough To Realise That There Are Two Things That Once People Have Them, They Don't Want To Give Up, And It's Extremely Difficult To Convince Them To Give Up: One Is Privileges, And The Other Is Subsidies.

A World Government Can Intervene Militarily In The Internal Affairs Of Any Nation When It Disapproves Of Their Activities.

World Government

Many African Leaders Refuse To Send Their Troops On Peace Keeping Missions Abroad Because They Probably Need Their Armies To Intimidate Their Own Populations.

All Our Efforts To Defeat Poverty And Pursue Sustainable Development Will Be In Vain If Environmental Degradation And Natural Resource Depletion Continue Unabated.

The Reality Is That No Group Of Countries Has Any Grounds For Complacency About Its Own Human Rights Performance And No Group Of Countries Does Itself Justice By Automatically Slipping Into The "victim" Mode . . . .

It Is Extreme Arrogance For One To Think He Is The Only One Who Can Govern His Country And Nobody Else Can Do It. We're All Human. After 10, 15 Years You Get Tired, You Run Out Of Steam And Ideas, You Have To Give A Chance To Somebody Else. And Whether You Yourself Are Inclined To Stay On, All Those Around You Are Pushing You To Stay On For What They Will Gain. One Has To Have The Strength Of Character To Say The Time Has Come To Move On...unless You Are A King.

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I Urge You To Celebrate The Extraordinary Courage And Contributions Of Refugees Past And Present.

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Slavery Was, In A Very Real Sense, The First International Human Rights Issue To Come To The Fore. It Led To The Adoption Of The First Human Rights Laws And To The Creation Of The First Human Rights Non-governmenta L Organization. And Yet Despite The Efforts Of The International Community To Combat This Abhorrent Practice, It Is Still Widely Prevalent In All Its Insidious Forms, Old And New.

You Need To Be Careful Not To Over-reach And Also Assess The Capacity You Have To Work With.

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.

I Don't See A Situation Where One Side Will Win Militarily, Take Over Syria, And There Will Be Peace And Quiet, A Clean Victory.

I Laugh A Lot Inside And Outside, And At Myself Sometimes.

Inside And Outside

Neutrality Is A Tough Call For The Weaker Ones.

If You Are Neutral In A Situation Where One Side Is Patently Being Mistreated, The Conclusion Is That You're Siding With This Wrong.

We Have Seen Recently, Almost Every Major Head Of State Goes To India And Says, We Believe India Should Be In The Council. They Go Back Home And Do Nothing About It. But This Cannot Be Sustained For Long. If They Want To Keep The Un As A Global Forum Where They Discuss Incidents And Take Some Meaningful Decisions, They Should [reform].

I Did Not Always Achieve What I Set Out To Do. Nevertheless, My Personal Example Certainly Suggests That Hands-on Experience Can Be Helpful To Future Leaders.

The International Community... Allows Nearly 3 Billion People - Almost Half Of All Humanity - To Subsist On $2 Or Less A Day In A World Of Unprecedented Wealth.

If The United Nations Is Not As United As It Should Be, That Is Because It Is A Reflection Of The World We Live In.

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.

National Markets Are Held Together By Shared Values And Confidence In Certain Minimum Standards. But In The New Global Market, People Do Not Yet Have That Confidence.

Peace Is Never A Perfect Achievement.

Young People Must Be Included From Birth. A Society That Cuts Itself Off From Its Youth Severs Its Lifeline; It Is Condemned To Bleed To Death.

I Used To Tell The Story About As A Young Man In High School One Of The Professors Came In And Put A Broad White Sheet On The Board With A Dot In The Right Hand Corner And Said, "boys, What Do You See?" And We All Shouted, A Black Dot. He Stood Back And Said, "not A Single One Of You Saw The Broad White Sheet, You All Saw The Black Dot." He Went On To Tell Us To Focus On The Broader Picture, Don't Focus On The Negative.

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. And Where All Three Are Present, You Stand A Very Good Chance Of Making A Go Of It.

It Is Within The Family That Children Learn The Values That Will Guide Them For The Rest Of Their Lives. It Is Within The Family That They Form Their Earliest Relationships, Learn To Communicate With Others And Interact With The World Around Them. It Is Within The Family That The Notion Of Human Rights Becomes A Reality Lived On A Daily Basis. If Tolerance, Respect And Equity Permeate Family Life, They Will Translate Into Values That Shape Societies, Nations And The World.

Remembering Is A Necessary Rebuke To Those Who Say The Holocaust Never Happened Or Has Been Exaggerated.

We Need To Ensure The Poorest In The Planet - Who Will Be Hardest Hit By The Financial Crisis - Are Not Forgotten.

You May Have Noticed Over The Years That The Un Became A Bit More Media-friendly, A Bit More Open To The Media Than In The Past.

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.

If You Are Neutral In A Situation Where One Side Is Patently Being Mistreated, The Conclusion Is That You're Siding With This Wrong.

If Globalization Is To Succeed, It Must Succeed For Poor And Rich Alike. It Must Deliver Rights No Less Than Riches. It Must Provide Social Justice And Equity No Less Than Economic Prosperity And Enhanced Communication.

Each Crisis Is Different, Has Its Own Specificities, And We Need To Look At It Critically; Look At Each One In Its Own Terms.

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.

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