5-8 July 2015

The Secretary-General will leave New York on Sunday 5 July for Norway to attend the Oslo Summit on Education for Development and visit the Arctic region.

Upon arrival in Oslo, on Monday 6 July, the Secretary-General will participate in the global launch of the Millennium Development Goals Progress Report. He will first address via VTC the launch ceremony at Headquarters in New York, before holding a joint press conference with Paul Kagame, President of Rwanda, and Ms. Erna Solberg, Prime Minister of Norway, both members of the MDG Advocacy Group. He will also attend a humanitarian forum on the “Role of Civil Society in Humanitarian Emergencies” with Borge Brende, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Norway.

On Tuesday 7 July, the Secretary-General will participate in the Oslo Summit on Education for Development. He will also meet with H.R.H Crown Prince Haakon and other high-level officials. The Secretary-General will then depart for Longyearbyen, the largest populated area on the territory of Svalbard, located in the high Norwegian Arctic, to board the research vessel RV Lance. In the run-up to the Paris Conference, the Secretary-General will be briefed by scientists and observe first-hand effects of climate change on the region, which he visited in 2009. This visit will include an excursion to the Blomstrandbreen glacier to see first-hand the dramatic changes to the ice, as well as briefings at the Kings Bay Marine Laboratory and the Svalbard Satellite Station.

The Secretary-General will be back in New York on Thursday, 9 July.