(San Francisco, July 10, 2004) - At
the Global Compact Summit held at UN Headquarters in New York
on June 14th, 2004, UN Secretary-General Kofi Anan announced
that the Global Compact's human rights and environmental principles
will be adopted by the UN in key areas such as procurement,
investment management (pension fund), facilities management
and human resources.
In his concluding remarks, Secretary-General Anan added that,"
the United Nations itself is now fully committed to internalizing
the principles of the Global Compact. From the start, one
of the Compact's singular achievements has been to help renew
the United Nations from within. By adopting its principles
in our internal processes, we take yet another step in this
direction."
"We are delighted that the UN is going to start applying
the Global Compact principles to its internal operations,"
announced Bruno Schneider, Executive Director of UN observer.org.
"There is no better leadership than leadership by example"
"This step represents a major improvement for the UN
and a major victory for UN Observer.org which has been advocating
for the application of these Global Compact principles to
all UN internal operations for a long time."
"We now look forward to working with the UN system to
ensure that the implementation process happens smoothly and
efficiently," added Schneider.
UN Observer.org is a Non Governmental Organization inspired
by the vision of a strong and effective UN system guided by
human rights and environmental principles.
As an organization driven by the belief that leadership is
best achieved by example, UN Observer.org's mission is to
encourage and assist the United Nations family of organizations
to hold itself to the same human rights and environmental
principles that it promotes.
UN Observer.org publishes newsletters and issue-specific reports,
provides an on-line electronic forum, organizes advocacy campaigns
and maintains a resource and documentation center available
to the public on issues relating to the UN and human rights.
