Ban Ki-moon

Korean spelling
Hangeul	반기문
Hanja	潘基 文
Revised Romanization	Ban Gi-mun
McCune- Reischauer	Pan Kimun
See also : Korean name

Ban Ki-moon (born  June 13, 1944 in Injō , then the Japanese Empire , now South Korea ) is a South Korean diplomat and politician . He was the Foreign Minister of South Korea from 2004 to 2006 and the eighth Secretary General of the United Nations from 2007 to 2016 .

Life

Education and family

According to Ban's own statement, the decision to become a diplomat was made in 1962 when he won a trip to Washington, DC and a meeting with John F. Kennedy at an English competition at Chungju High School .

Ban studied international relations at the prestigious Seoul National University and received his bachelor's degree in 1970. At the same time he passed the state examination for foreign services, one of the four most important state examinations in Korea, as the second best of the year. He later studied administrative science at the Harvard Kennedy School of Harvard University and graduated in 1985 with a master's degree.

Ban has been married to Yoo Soon-taek, whom he met in high school in 1962 at a meeting of school officials in both schools , since 1971 , and has a son and two daughters with her. He speaks Korean , English , French , Italian , German and Japanese .

Career as a diplomat

His diplomatic career began Ban in the service of the military dictatorship Park Chung-hees (until 1979) and continued under President Chun Doo-hwan (1980-1988), who, like his predecessor Park, came to office through a military coup.

In 1970 Ban held his first post at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and began his career as a diplomat in 1972, initially as Vice Consul in New Delhi . After serving in the United Nations Division of the State Department, he served South Korea, which only became a UN member in 1991, as 1st Secretary of the state's permanent observation mission to the United Nations in New York. In November 1980 he received the post of Director of the United Nations Division . In 1987 he took over the post of Consul General and 1992 that of the envoy at the Embassy in Washington DC; in between he was director general for America affairs in the State Department.

In 1995 he became Deputy State Secretary and Head of Policy Planning and International Organizations . In 1996 he became Secretary of the South Korean President for Foreign Affairs and State Security and in 2000 Deputy Foreign Minister. From February 2003 he worked as a foreign policy advisor to President Roh Moo-hyun .

Ban was actively involved in South Korea's northern policy : in 1992, he served as vice-chairman of the South-North Joint Nuclear Control Commission . While he was ambassador to Austria in 1999, he was elected chairman of the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO PrepCom) .

Foreign Minister of South Korea

Ban with Condoleezza Rice , 2006

In January 2004, Ban replaced his predecessor Yoon Young-kwan as Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade . In September 2005 he played an important role in the so-called six-party talks in Beijing on the nuclear crisis in North Korea . After his government nominated him as a candidate for election as the new Secretary General of the United Nations in January 2006 , he was finally elected to the office on October 13, 2006 by its General Assembly. On November 1, 2006, he resigned from his South Korean ministerial office and was sworn in as the new UN Secretary General on December 14, 2006.

Secretary General of the United Nations

Ban officially took over the post from Kofi Annan on January 1, 2007. One day after taking up his duties , he declared in a statement on the execution of Saddam Hussein that any country was free to decide on executions. In doing so, he affected the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by his organization in 1948 , which secures the right to life of every person (see also Chapter IX and in particular Article 55 of the Charter of the United Nations ). Ban was then criticized. At her first press conference, however, his spokeswoman said that the United Nations continued to oppose the death penalty. Ban's native South Korea is a member of the United Nations that has not abolished the death penalty. However, 175 out of 299 MPs voted in favor of abolition in 2004, and a moratorium on executions has been in place since 1998. that is, no more death sentences have been carried out since then.

On March 22, 2007, Ban Ki-moon narrowly escaped a terrorist attack in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad. A rocket struck just 50 meters from the building where the Secretary-General was giving a speech, leaving a three-foot crater. His arrival there was strictly confidential, so it is assumed that the terrorists had inside information. So far, no organization has committed to the attack.

Ki-moon during the 2016 UN Climate Change Conference

In an interview with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung in July 2007, when asked how he could reconcile the United Nations' rift with the United States since its military operation in Iraq, Ban said: “We must appreciate this contribution by the United States and the sacrifices that it brings know. ”This was generally seen as a departure from the harsh criticism of his predecessor Kofi Annan of the military operation.

In 2007, Ban visited the Sudanese crisis region of Darfur . He was shocked after a visit to a refugee camp.

On July 19, 2007, a formal application letter from Taiwan's President Chen Shui-bian was returned unopened by Ban, referring to UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 . Contrary to the usual practice, the Taiwanese application for re-admission to the United Nations was not forwarded to the Security Council , but rather "dealt with" by the General Secretariat. Taiwan's application for UN membership should have been forwarded to the Security Council according to the rules of procedure. The Secretary General was then heavily criticized by several international lawyers and by the United States. Above all, his competence was questioned.

Ban Ki-moon in the Council of Europe on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the European Convention on Human Rights

As the first Secretary General of the United Nations, he took 6 August 2010, 65 years after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima , at the local Peace Ceremony in part. For the first time, an ambassador from the USA, John Roos, was also present. The day before, Ban Ki-moon met with survivors of the nuclear weapon explosions in Nagasaki and called for the abolition of all nuclear weapons in order to make their use fundamentally impossible.

In June 2011, Ban was re-elected to the office of Secretary General by acclamation by the UN General Assembly. His second term officially began on January 1, 2012 and ran until the end of 2016. The office was officially taken over on January 1, 2017 by his successor António Guterres .

After the end of his term in office on December 31, 2016, he was initially considered a promising candidate for the presidential election in South Korea in 2017 , but withdrew his candidacy on February 1, 2017 after his poll numbers fell.

Awards

Ban received the South Korean Government's Order of Merit in 1975 and 1986 . As ambassador to Austria , he received the Great Gold Medal of Honor with the Star for Services to the Republic of Austria in 2001. The following year he received the Great Cross of the Rio Blanco in Brazil . In September 2005 he received the Van Fleet Award from the South Korean Society in New York for his contributions to American-South Korean friendship. In 2006 the Peruvian government awarded him the Great Sun Cross (Gran Cruz del Sol) , Peru's highest diplomatic order of merit. Ban received the National Order of Merit of the Algerian Government and the Commemorative Medal of the Freedom Hero of the Republic of Hungary . Shortly thereafter, he was awarded another national order of merit, the Great Silver Cross Medal of José Matias Delgado , by the government of El Salvador .

In 2008 he received the honorary doctorate of Seoul National University . In 2013 he received the Grand Decoration of Honor in Gold for services to the State of Vienna . In 2016 he received the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany , the Russian Order of Friendship and an honorary doctorate from the Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne .

Ban Ki-moon Center for Global Citizens

On January 3, 2018, the facility jointly founded by Heinz Fischer and Ban Ki-moon was opened in Vienna. "The center should ... strengthen the right to self-determination and the social position of women and young people, increase the chances of education for all children in the world, and make contributions to the peaceful resolution of international conflicts."

Web links

Commons : Ban Ki-moon  - album with pictures, videos and audio files

• A mildly smiling strategist for the UN chief post ( memento from January 21, 2010 in the Internet Archive ), portrait of Martin Fritz on the Tagesschau website, October 6, 2006.
• For New UN Chief, a Past Misstep Leads to Opportunity , portrait of Warren Hoge in the New York Times , December 9, 2006.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Ban Ki-moon wins second term as UN Secretary General. In: BBC News. June 21, 2011, accessed January 5, 2012 . 
2. ↑ Saddam execution: New UN chief because of comments on the death penalty in criticism , Spiegel Online , January 3, 2007, accessed on March 20, 2008.
3. ^ South Korea Annual Report 2006 , ai Germany , accessed on March 20, 2008.
4. ↑ When the State Kills: The Death Penalty in South Korea (PDF) In: Amnesty International . April 6, 2011. Retrieved August 19, 2011.
5. ↑ Missile fired at Ban Ki-moon , SF Tagesschau , March 22, 2007, accessed March 20, 2008.
6. ↑ UN Secretary General - Ban praises US military operation in Iraq. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung . July 8, 2007, accessed July 14, 2012 . 
7. ↑ UN chief Ban "shocked" by Darfur , BBC , September 5, 2007.
8. ↑ Taiwan's UN proposal again not included in the agenda of the UN General Assembly ( memo of December 28, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), Radio Taiwan International , September 20, 2007
9. ^ UN sends back letter from President Chen ( Memento December 28, 2013 in the Internet Archive ), Radio Taiwan International , September 11, 2007.
10. ^ Serious errors in the process , Die Presse , October 1, 2007.
11. ↑ Focus Online : Hiroshima commemorates the nuclear attack (August 6, 2010), last accessed on August 8, 2010.
12. ↑ Japan: Ban meets atomic bomb survivors , DiePresse.com , August 5, 2010, accessed August 8, 2010.
13. ↑ Successor to Ban Ki Moon: These politicians want to be at the top of the UN. In: Spiegel Online . April 10, 2016, accessed October 13, 2016 . 
14. ↑ Ban Ki-moon to return home on Jan. 12; what will he do next? , Korea Times, Jan. 4, 2017
15. ↑ Ban Ki-moon eligible to run for South Korean presidency: state election watchdog , Korea Times, January 13, 2017
16. ^ Moon, Ban begin race for presidency , Korea Times, Jan. 15, 2017
17. ↑ Ban Ki-moon likely to join Bareun Party , Korea Times, Jan. 18, 2017
18. ↑ Ban Ki-moon drops presidential bid , Korea Times, February 1, 2017
19. ^ A Top Administrator and Disarmament Expert Takes the Helm ( Memento of May 6, 2009 in the Internet Archive ), UN Chronicle, December 30, 2006.
20. ^ UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon Receives Honorary Doctorate Degree from SNU , April 10, 2008
21. ↑ Big Golden Decoration of Honor for Ban Ki-moon: "I am a proud Viennese" on OTS from August 29, 2013, accessed on August 29, 2013
22. ^ Press conference by Chancellor Merkel and the Secretary General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon
23. ↑ Decree of the President of the Russian Federation N 268 of June 8, 2016 "On the award of Ban Ki-moons with the Order of Friendship" (Russian)
24. ↑ Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne: Doctorat Honoris Causa 2016. In: univ-paris1.fr. Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, accessed on August 28, 2016 (French). 
25. ^ Founders - Ban Ki-moon Center for Global Citizens . In: Ban Ki-moon Center for Global Citizens . ( bankimooncentre.org [accessed April 22, 2018]).
26. ↑ Van der Bellen and Fischer received ex-UN chief Ban orf.at, January 2, 2018, accessed January 2, 2018.

Note: This article places the family name before the person's first name. This is the usual order in Korean. Ban is the family name here, Ki-moon is the first name.