Ban to visit Italy, Switzerland and Spain on official trip starting late next week

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon heads late next week to Italy, Switzerland and Spain on a wide-ranging official visit that will focus on issues that include the global fight against climate change and the importance of water and sustainable development.

Mr. Ban will begin his visit late next week by hosting a two-day retreat for senior managers in Turin, which is home to the UN Staff College, UN spokesperson Marie Okabe told reporters today.

The retreat's participants will include several incoming staff members who are taking their oaths of office next week, such as the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navanethem Pillay; the Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, Alain Le Roy; the Controller, Jun Yamazaki; and the Legal Counsel, Patricia O'Brien, and her deputy, Peter Taksøe-Jensen.

Mr. Ban then travels to Geneva, where he will address the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) as it opens its latest session on 31 August, which will also be the twentieth anniversary of the panel.

The following day, the Secretary-General is slated to attend a memorial ceremony for the 19 August 2003 bombing of the UN headquarters in Baghdad, lay a wreath for the fallen staff and meet with survivors and the families of victims.

He is also expected to witness the signing of a memorandum of understanding between Iraq and the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) on science and technology cooperation.

The final leg of the trip will be in Spain, where Mr. Ban will give a speech at Exposition Zaragoza 2008 about the importance of water for social, economic and political security and meet Foreign Minister Miguel Ángel Moratinos. He then travels to Madrid for talks with Prime Minister José Luis Zapatero.