Africa Renewal Feature: Africa at the Millennium Development Goals Summit
African and other world leaders are meeting at the UN General Assembly in New York on 20-22 September to assess the Millennium Development Goals. Some selected speeches and coverage.
UN chief kicks off drive to save more than 16 million women and children worldwide
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today began a massive drive to save the lives of over 16 million women and children, with more than $40 billion already committed to scale up health services worldwide...
Secretary-General’s Report to the General Assembly — “Pulling Together in Testing Times: Securing a Better Future for All”
We, the peoples of the United Nations, are bound by certain sacred duties and obligations. To care for the welfare of others. To resolve conflicts peacefully. To act in the world with empathy and understanding. To practice tolerance and mutual respect as a bedrock principle of civilization...
Secretary-General’s press encounter about the MDG Summit
Today we close the most significant global development conference since the Millennium Summit ten years ago. And we open the final five-year push until 2015...
Secretary-General’s remarks to “Bridging the Malaria Gap : Saving Children — Supporting Women” Event — African Leaders Malaria Alliance
We are here to celebrate our success in the fight against malaria and to plan our response for the challenges that remain. We are witnessing an historic turnaround. Until recently, hopes for beating malaria had all but vanished...
Secretary-General’s remarks at launch of the Global Strategy for Women’s And Children's Health — “Every Woman, Every Child”
It is a great pleasure to see so many global leaders here in today's audience. Today we are witnessing the kind of leadership we have long needed. “Every Woman, Every Child.” This focus is overdue...
Secretary-General’s remarks to the Millennium Development Goals Advocacy Group
What a remarkable group we have here in this room. All of you, leaders in fighting poverty around the world. All of you, united in our quest to achieve the Millennium Development Goals...
Secretary-General on “Addressing the Global Water and Sanitation Challenge: The Key to the MDGs”
We are here because we know water is not only a basic necessity, it is a human right. Without water, there is no life...
Secretary-General’s remarks at Private Sector Forum on the Millennium Development Goals
Ten years ago, world leaders agreed on a set of ambitious targets to end poverty and hunger, expand access to education, enhance gender equality, improve maternal and child health, combat HIV/AIDS and foster greater environmental sustainability...
PDF: UN summit concludes with adoption of MDG action plan
Secretary-General secures more than $40 billion for women's and children's health...
PDF: MDG summit: final statement by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
This Summit has laid a solid foundation for the progress we need in our quest to achieve the Millennium Development Goals by the internationally agreed deadline of 2015...
Audio: The U.S. is changing the way it does business: President Barack Obama
The United States is changing the way it provides development assistance, according to President Barack Obama...
Madagascar declines the podium at UN development summit
General Assembly President Joseph Deiss today acknowledged Madagascar’s commitment to achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) as the African nation announced its decision to not take the podium at a high-level gathering on the eight anti-poverty targets...
Leaders at UN event pledge to scale up efforts to end malaria deaths by 2015
African leaders and global health experts rallied at the United Nations today to boost access to life-saving bednets and medicines as part of the fight against malaria, aiming to reach the goal of near-zero deaths by 2015...
Audio: UN summit launches drive to save lives of over 16 million women and children
World leaders attending the anti-poverty summit on Wednesday pledged over 40 billion dollars for women's and children's health. 16 million women and children will be saved by this drive...
Ban mobilizes his ‘superheroes’ to give added thrust to MDGs
Continuing his drive to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today rallied his “superheroes,” a group of eminent personalities he appointed to boost the effort to slash hunger, poverty, disease and lack of access to education by 2015...
Audio: President of Rwanda stresses need for ownership of development
The President of Rwanda Paul Kagame on Tuesday stressed the need for developing countries to take full ownership of the Millennium Development Goals or MDG agenda...
Audio: Liberian President calls for economic growth that creates jobs
The President of Liberia, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf has called for economic growth that creates jobs especially for young people, the poor and women...
Audio: UN summit on development goals continues to debate ways of combating global ills
Two days into the summit and it's clear, although progress is being made on reaching the MDGs in some countries, many especially in Africa are lagging behind...
Audio: A report on day two of the MDG summit
On day two of the UN Millennium Development Goals summit, Africa’s “Iron Lady,” Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, spoke about the universality of the MDGs...
African development strides propelled by policy innovations, says UN-backed report
Expanded social protection programmes and other innovative policies have helped to spur Africa’s progress in achieving the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), according to a new United Nations-backed report...
Secretary-General: Least Developed Countries, including 33 African LDCs, ‘at the epicentre of the development emergency’
With just five years remaining until the deadline for achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today sounded the alarm that the world’s least developed countries (LDCs) continued to be mired in poverty...
Audio: Malawi is confident to meet all 8 MDGs
Malawi is expected to meet all the Millennium Development Goals set by world leaders to combat poverty, hunger, disease and achieve universal primary education, according to the country's President...
Secretary General pledges continued UN support for stability in Central African Republic at MDG Summit
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks to the high-level side event on Addressing Peacebuilding and Development Challenges in the Central African Republic...
PDF: Remarks for Opening Plenary of the High-Level UN Meetings on the MDGs
Plenary Statement of World Bank President Robert B. Zoellick to the High-Level Meeting on the Millennium Development Goals 20 September 2010...
Ban urges world leaders to ensure blueprint to end poverty becomes reality
As scores of heads of State and government attend today's opening of a three-day summit at United Nations Headquarters in New York on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged them to provide the necessary investment, aid and political will to end extreme poverty...
Member States focus on reducing poverty ahead of UN summit
Member States today underlined the vital role that democracy plays in reducing poverty, just days before a major United Nations summit on how to advance the ambitious development targets world leaders have pledged to achieve by 2015...
Greater progress needed despite recent drop in maternal deaths
While the number of maternal deaths has recently dropped by one third, United Nations agencies today stressed that more must be done to save the lives of women given that 1,000 of them still die every day due to complications during pregnancy and childbirth...
Anti-poverty goals are ambitious but doable, Ban stresses ahead of MDG summit
The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are formidable and ambitious but still achievable, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said today as he urged the world's leaders to direct their countries' resources to the areas where they are needed most in the fight against poverty, hunger and disease...