Secretary-General's remarks to the UNA-USA 2010 Annual Dinner [as prepared for delivery]

I thank you all for coming here to show your support for the United Nations. This annual dinner is always meaningful but tonight is especially significant as it marks the start of a great alliance between UNA-USA and the United Nations Foundation.

Mr. Turner, it is impossible to sum up in words what you have done for the United Nations, so let me use a number: one billion. Your gift of a billion dollars to create the UN Foundation inspired a generation.

Tonight, you made it possible to pay tribute to four extraordinary leaders.

Simon Fuller. You know I was once on American Idol. I was there to support “Idol Gives Back.” What a tremendous initiative, bringing the United Nations into America's living rooms, and giving Americans a way to join the UN in saving lives around the world.

Senator Kerry, you are a powerful voice for US engagement on UN issues: ending violence against women, combating climate change? disarmament, Sudan, Pakistan, human rights, and more.

Microsoft is saving countless lives in the most creative ways. Using cellphones to monitor fetal heart rates? and making so many other contributions; not just major funds but vision and determination.

I am delighted that Michel Sidibé is honoured for his leadership on AIDS. He is out there speaking to HIV positive people, learning from them, and leading an effective global campaign.

We are celebrating an historic new alliance between the UN Foundation and UNA-USA. It is a marriage of the local and the global, UNA-USA's grassroots base and UNF's global reach.

Global warming, poverty and disease are testing international solidarity. Inequality is breeding instability.

Our mission, in these testing times, has never been so critical. And we have a greater responsibility than ever to be resourceful with our resources, accountable with our accounts, and answerable to the world's people, who look to us with hope.

Thank you.