Secretary-General's speech at Humboldt University

Professor [Jan-Hendrik] Olbertz, President of Humboldt University, Professor [Thomas] Bruha, Chairman of the United Nations Association of Germany, Professor [Peter] Eigen, Board Member of the Humboldt-Viadrina School of Governance, Ambassador Dr. Peter Wittig, Honored representatives of Germany to the United Nations, Excellencies, Ambassadors of the diplomatic corps, Distinguished guests, Dear faculty members, Dear students, Ladies and Gentlemen,

Guten Morgen.

Ich danke Ihnen fur diesen herzlichen Empfang. Es freut mich, heute wieder in Berlin zu sein. Danke schon.

It is a great pleasure for me to be with you in this world-renowned very historical university with 200 years of history.

Just before, forgive me for being one year late to celebrate your 200th birthday of your university.

Not many schools around the world can boast of such a rich heritage. Very few enjoy such global stature and can look toward such a prestigious future.

Walking in the footsteps of Einstein, Schopenhauer, and the pictures of many Nobel [laureates] - I understand 27 of your professors received Nobel Prizes - it's quite [an honour] for me to meet with them even in an historical perspective.

Humboldt has given us the very best that universities have to offer - remarkable advances in the sciences and humanities.

But Humboldt has also seen its share of tragedy. Book-burning during the Nazi era, an assault on academic values that you have memorialized on campus. And then a split in the university itself, mirroring that of the city of Berlin.

You have lived through great change and upheaval.

Today is another era of transformation, of dramatic change in the global landscape, with new economic powers emerging, and you have seen many countries like India, China, Brazil, a new generation of threats, and old ones taking new forms.

I am here to talk to you about those challenges, which we are commonly facing and to enlist your support to work together with the United Nations to address all of these global, challenges for the future of humanity.

Ladies and gentlemen, before I go into these substantive remarks, let me say a few words about what is happening in Egypt. I know that each and every one of you has been very closely following the situation.

In fact, in the last few days, wherever I went, whomever I met, the first topic was what do you think about the situation in Egypt? What are the implications of this situation?

Regrettably, the situation during the last few days has taken a deeply troubling turn. The violence and intimidation should stop. In particular, the restrictions on the international media, journalists and human rights groups are utterly unacceptable. Freedom of expression and assembly are basic human rights. These are the fundamental principles of democracy which have to be guaranteed. These are essential democratic values.

I renew my call as Secretary-General of the United Nations for calm and restraint, and I urge the Egyptian authorities to listen to the genuine voices of the people.

Recently since the beginning of the Tunisian situation, I have been stating publicly that leaders of the world should more attentively listen to the challenges of their genuine voices. What are their aspirations and what are their wishes? There is a need to define a process of national dialogue to work out an orderly and peaceful transition, a process that will allow the Egyptian people to express their wishes through free, fair and credible elections at the earliest possible moment, and that will pave the way for responsive, effective and accountable governance.

That process should start now, immediately.

Fundamental change and reform can wait no longer. There is no time to lose. What happens in Egypt will be crucial for peace and stability in the Middle East and the peace process in itself.

The United Nations since 2002 has been successively warning the countries in Arab through our United Nations Arab Human Development Reports. We have received a lot of protests, strong objections to those assessments, but now I believe that they will understand what the United Nations has been doing for the better future of the people.

The United Nations again stands ready to help the Egyptian people find the way forward.

Distinguished faculties, students, Ladies and Gentlemen and Excellencies, these are very serious challenges which we have to overcome.

I believe Humboldt is well-placed to contribute.

So is the United Nations Association of Germany. You are a good friend. All around the world we have many UN Associations who are true friends, true supporters of the United Nations. We need those supporters and friends like yourself and thank you very much.

I have seen in my own life what the United Nations can do.

I was born at the end of World War II. But my early days were with the Korean War. I've seen myself the ravages of the Korean War. The most troubling thing in my memory is that I had to look back at a burning village, my village - I was with my parents. That is still vividly in my memory. Fortunately we received a lot of very generous support from the United Nations, the international community as a whole. They helped my country to rebuild from a devastating war.

The United Nations fed me and my family, my entire nation. The UN brought hope, symbolized for me to this day by the UN flag.

That is what I am doing now as Secretary-General of the United Nations.

While travelling to many developing countries, poor countries, I still see from the faces of many young people that they want hope from me, from the United Nations, and that makes me quite humble. How can I bring hope to them?

There are still a billion people who go to bed hungry every night and there are still so many millions of young people who are dying needlessly, helplessly. They are desperately trying, wanting helping hands from all of you, from the United Nations.

This is what I seek to do for others today.

To stand for the United Nations and its work. To offer hope to the hopeless. To defend those defenceless people.

Everywhere in the world, people are looking to the United Nations. They ask us to do more than ever before.

And the scale of need is profound. I hope young students, in your future, please try to do some humanitarian work. You can be artists, you can be professors, you can take up public service, but if you do some humanitarian work you will understand what I am now telling you. That may be even more useful for your long-term career.

There are so many conflicts, repression, intolerance.

Natural disasters that hit with greater fury, and ever more frequently, as we have seen most recently.

Climate change, hunger and malnutrition, the financial crisis, the spread of deadly disease and weapons of mass destruction.

These challenges spill across borders. They do not respect borders. They have a global reach, unfortunately. No single country or group of countries, however powerful, however resourceful, however rich they may be - you are one of the richest countries in the world -Germany, European Union - but you cannot do it alone. We have to address this collectively, with concerted collective will and resources.

We must work in common cause for common solutions.

We must do this not just as a matter of pragmatic burden-sharing, though that is certainly reason enough.

No, we must do it because we are fated to live more of our lives in common, and because we must do more to pre