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UN chief to travel to Ethiopia, United Kingdom and Germany

UN chief to travel to Ethiopia, United Kingdom and Germany

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Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will at the weekend travel to Ethiopia, where he will attend the summit of the African Union in Addis Ababa before proceeding to London for meetings next week with senior United Kingdom officials and then on to Germany.

Mr. Ban will meet with British Prime Minister David Cameron and Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs William Hague while in the UK, deliver the Cyril Foster Lecture at Oxford University and address the UN International Maritime Organization (IMO).

From the UK he will travel to Berlin, where he will hold talks with senior German officials and speak at Humboldt University, his spokesperson announced.

The last leg of the Secretary-General’s trip will take him to Munich, where he will address the Munich Security Conference, and attend a meeting of the Middle East Quartet on 5 February. The Quartet, which is seeking to resolve the Middle East conflict, comprises the UN, European Union, Russia and the United States.

Yesterday, while in Davos, Switzerland, to attend the World Economic Forum, Mr. Ban met with Tony Blair, the Quartet’s representative to the Middle East, with whom he discussed the status of the peace process and the situation in occupied Palestinian territory.

Mr. Ban stressed the importance of continuing efforts to ease the suffering in the Gaza Strip and helping the Palestinian Authority build capacity in the West Bank.