UN chief to visit South Asia this week
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon is to visit India, Nepal and Bangladesh on his first official trip to the region, officials said yesterday.
He will arrive Thursday in New Delhi on the first leg of his tour and is due to discuss "regional and international issues" including pushing democracy in India's eastern junta-ruled neighbour Myanmar, officials said.
Ban, who began his diplomatic career in South Korea's embassy in New Delhi and has visited India as his country's foreign minister, will meet Premier Manmohan Singh and Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee, among others, Indian and UN officials said.
India, with its 1.1 billion-plus population and strong economic growth, will push for UN reforms including expansion of the Security Council. India has been pushing for a seat on the Security Council.
During a speech at the UN General Assembly in New York last month, Singh criticised scant progress made since world leaders decided three years ago to forge an "agenda for early and meaningful reform" of the UN.
India along with Brazil, Germany and Japan has been campaigning hard for enlargement of the 15-member council to make it more representative and reflective of today's global realities -- with no success.
The council's makeup has remained largely unchanged since the establishment of the United Nations in 1945.
A UN official, who preferred to remain unnamed, added the talks in New Delhi would cover the global financial crisis and the UN's peacekeeping operations.
India contributes 8,000 personnel to various operations, behind Bangladesh and Pakistan, a defence ministry spokesman said.
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