 Good evening, everyone. My name is Suzanne DiMaggio. I'm a senior fellow and a director at New America, the host of this evening's event along with certain partners that I'll be introducing soon. Welcome to this conversation with candidates for UN Secretary General and welcome to our event space, Civic Hall, where we're proud to be a founding partner. For those who are new to New America, we are a think tank, a civic enterprise dedicated to the renewal of American politics, prosperity, and purpose in the digital age. If you'd like to learn more about us, please visit our website at newamerica.org. Tonight's event represents the first ever public discussion among candidates for Secretary General, and this is in the United Nations' 70-year history. And we're delighted to have with us four of the candidates for that process this evening. In addition to this more open approach, we've also seen a more transparent nomination process, as well as informal hearings with individual candidates for the first time, and that's been taking place at the United Nations this week. So who says change never comes to the United Nations? I'd like to thank our partners joining us this evening. First, the Guardian, with special thanks to Rachel White and Rebecca Ashton, United Nations Association of the UK, and the one in seven billion campaign, with special thanks to Natalie Samarasinga and Richard Nelms. Also, thank you to the future United Nations Development System, with special appreciation to their leadership, Stephen Brown and Thomas Weiss. And of course, thanks to all of you for joining us this evening. I have a few housekeeping points. First is to please place your phones on silent or vibrate. We'll have an audience Q&A that will be moderated by Julian Borja towards the end of the program. And if you decide to ask a question, please know that you'll be consenting to being video recorded. And we hope you'll continue this conversation online as well as by tweeting with the hashtag UNSECGEN. To give us an introduction to tonight's debate, please join me in welcoming Natalie Samarasinga, the Executive Director of the UNA UK. Thanks. Your Excellencies, distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen, it is an enormous privilege to welcome you on behalf of UNA UK and the future UN Development System Project at the Cooney Graduate Center to the first ever public interactive debate with candidates for UN Secretary General. Now, you have here, of course, your own election drama that is unfolding. And I hope you don't mind me saying that for some of us across the pond, we have been watching the process with, how should I put it, a little bit of bemusement. But of course, what's happening here is a reflection of broader global issues and trends. We've seen in recent years a series of crises that have converged and have demonstrated the need for global action. But across the world, I think governments have been reluctant to respond, turning inwards instead to their domestic constituencies. Many states have overemphasized their response to extremism rather than seeking to tackle root causes. Many have downgraded their international obligations, such as the universal ban on torture and the duty to uphold human rights. Growing numbers of refugees have precipitated a similar response with many states reluctant and shying away from their international obligations under the refugee convention. And I think it's fair to say there's a growing disconnect between people and governments and institutions as public trust in political and financial systems is being eroded. So the international system that we have built over the past 70 years, I don't think it will survive unless governments and people work to preserve and strengthen it. But political leadership is trapped in very narrow national agendas and international compromises of the type that made the UN possible in 1945 often appear much too costly when measured against the familiar criterion of national interest. And this is precisely why an open, inclusive and merit-based selection process for the UN Secretary General is so important. As Suzanne said, it shows that the UN can change at a time when it is needed more than ever, but it is overstretched and underfunded. For many people, I think the UN seems to be a very distant organization, one that is opaque, bit outdated maybe, and paralyzed often by power politics. Improving the selection process shows that the UN can become more transparent and inclusive, and of course we hope that it will lead to a highly qualified, effective, and visionary leader being appointed. Someone who can work with the permanent members of the Security Council, that is Vaito, but also someone who will represent the wider UN membership and the world's seven billion people. That was the starting point for the one for seven billion campaign, which UN and UK co-founded with partners such as the World Federalist Movement and the Friedrich-Eberstiftung New York. We felt it was simply unacceptable for the Secretary General to be chosen in secret, subject to all sorts of backroom deals by the five permanent members of the Security Council who do not, let's be frank, always have the best interests of the UN at heart, and who have traditionally been much more occupied by trying to find someone who will not upset them rather than the best person for the job. So we've worked really hard over the past few years to try and change this, and to institute a timeline, selection criteria, a list of candidates, hearings with candidates. All the sort of basic recruitment elements that you would expect would take place in any organization, let alone one that promotes good governance. So we're absolutely delighted that we now have for the first time in the UN's history the names of those standing for the job, an idea of their vision for the UN, and opportunities for all member states to engage with them. I think the President of the General Assembly deserves a great deal of praise for ensuring that the meetings that have been taking place this week are a webcast and that they include at least a few questions from the public. But we at UNAUK and 1 for 7 billion, well we're campaigners, and it's our job to keep pushing and pushing for the process to become more robust and open. That is why we're calling for the next Secretary General to have a single longer term of office. What is the point of selecting a great person to do a job and then start by the politics of seeking re-appointment? And that is why of course we're holding today's event. We want to give you, the public, the chance to really get to know these candidates. Thank you all so much for making the time to be here doing what must be such a busy and intense week, we really really appreciated. So when we started to plan this event many many months ago, I think I'd imagine something along the lines of the US primary debates. I'm not sure we still want to go down that route, so I have no fear candidates, no one will be asking you to comment on the size of your hands or anything like that. But I hope that we will nonetheless have, I hope that we will nonetheless have some very spirited exchanges on the issues that the UN needs to be addressing. The debate tonight will be based on questions that our 1 for 7 billion partners, Global Citizen and Avaz, have gathered through a survey involving nearly 25,000 people in 161 countries from Albania to Zimbabwe. We will also ask questions from NGOs within our network and questions that were solicited by the UN non-governmental liaison service, but that just missed out on being asked doing the sessions at the UN. And then we'll hand over to you for an open Q&A. Thanks to New America, we have this wonderful intimate setting and I think hopefully some of us also got a drink before we took our seats. So candidates, I hope that you will relax. This is not the UN, there's no speakers lists, there are no formulae question stroke statements from countries. Think of this a little bit like being your living room and think of us as your very nosy new neighbors who really just want to get to know you a little bit better. Ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming to the stage your moderator, the Guardian's Mark Rice Oxley and of course the distinguished candidates who are vying for the world's most impossible job. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, time is short so we should crack on but I think I should just formally introduce the panel, the candidates before us tonight. To my immediate right, Dr Vesna Pusic, the former Deputy Prime Minister of Croatia, to her right Natalia Kerman, another former Deputy Prime Minister of Moldova, we have Danilo Turk, the former President of Slovenia and on the end we have Igor Luksič, former or current I think, the real Deputy Prime Minister of Montenegro. Welcome to you all. I thought I'd throw you a nice and easy ball to start with and then make things a bit trickier later on. Perhaps Vesna, we could start with you. What do you think makes you the best candidate for this job? I told you it's going to be an easy question. Well, when we come all from the same region it's a little more complicated than when you have people from different regions. But I would say having seen the UN on the ground in my country, UN peacekeepers during the war, having gone from being at war to being let's say a relatively normal country, having gone from being somebody who's receiving development assistance to somebody who's providing development assistance, gave me some experience that at least curbs arrogance, I think to some extent, which I think will be very important for anybody, but especially for the next sector general in facing and dealing with countries and people that are facing hardships of this time, of this type now. Like wars, like, you know, wars are not only horrible, they're also extremely embarrassing. And everybody looks a little bit down on you. And to know what that feels like and to know that everybody who is in this situation actually is as surprised as you were and as incredulous I think helps. Also in my life I've done many different things since I've been around for a long time. So I taught the university, which is something that UN uses as experts, people from the academia. I've founded and led an NGO during the war that was directly dealing in human rights issues and reconciliation facilitated by the civil society rather than by elected politicians. And then finally in 2000 I became an elected politician and spent considerably more time in opposition than in parliament than in government, but also spent a term in government as a foreign minister. So I've seen many different sort of aspects of being active and trying to move things forward. So that might help. Okay. Natalia, if I could move to you, what's the thing you're most passionate about? What would be the defining feature of your tenure if you were Secretary General? I think that the most challenging task would be to reform the United Nations in the sense of bringing fresh ideas, fresh solutions, in some words, deconstruct the system and make it better purpose and result oriented. In other words, United Nations these days has to be stronger, more adaptable and deliver faster and more efficient on the common agenda, putting the people at the center and leaving no one behind. And this is a challenging task because we know bureaucracy is never reformed too willingly or too fast. And in the 70 years of the existence of the United Nations, there were attempts to reform and there were even some successes. But this time we simply don't have the luxury of the time and the nature of modern world where the traditional definitions of threats, challenges and conflicts do not apply. Well, we have to deal continuously with eradicating poverty in some areas. We see the emergence of new actors. We have to cope with the threat of international terrorism and deliver on the climate change agenda. We don't have this time. We have to do something fast and do something now and very well to make sure that we are fit for the job because our citizens are expecting nothing less than that from now. I think that will be the biggest challenge. Okay, thank you. And Danilo, if I could turn to you, what will we see in your first 100 days as Secretary General? What would be your overriding priority at the beginning of a term? Now, of course, in the political sphere, it will be a test on how much progress can we make to bring P5 closer together. And of course, this sounds fairly unrealistic, but it is also necessary. I think it's not entirely impossible. I don't say that this must succeed in the first 100 days, but this should be tried from start. And I believe the objective of the Secretary General would be to help building something that would call a global security understanding. I can describe it further if necessary. The other thing is to put the institutional arrangements that are being now designed for the sustainable development goals in the right order. That means high-level political forum will have to be sufficiently well-defined in terms of its agenda and servicing. I'm encouraged by the fact that the Statistical Commission of the United Nations has done a very good work on indicators to measure progress in sustainable development goals. And as we know, we cannot manage something that we cannot measure. And I think we can measure things to some extent and manage them better. Of course, later on, we'll need a more rich toolkit to deal with these things, and that can also be discussed. And on a short-term basis, I think we can do something in the Secretariat as well. I can perhaps, if I was Secretary General, I would convene a small group of key officials in the Secretariat and insist that we have to shorten the period of time needed for recruitment of new people. We will have needs for recruitment, especially with regard to Millennium Development Goals, Sustainable Development Goals. And we need to shorten that period. You are probably aware. I mean, it now lasts almost 200 days to recruit a person for a job in the United Nations. Of course, there are reasons to go through various vettings and background checkings and all these things. But this can be made shorter. I think the procedures have become long, and you're asking specific questions about 100 days. I would say this should be the first week. No, but you see, we have to strengthen, we have to change the process, and we can do it. 10 to 1. It's already progress, because the day before yesterday it was 21, 25 to 1. Well, first of all, good evening to all, and I'm really grateful to our hosts for convening us here tonight, because I think this is really another historical event. I agree with what has been said in the introductory remarks, because, I mean, yesterday, today, tomorrow, we are really doing something new, which has never been done before. And it is quite important. It will increase for sure the level of transparency, and I'm sure that Genie cannot be brought back into the bottle. I think that's quite important. And can you just imagine whatever we agree, whether it's one tenure in office lasting five or seven years, or two for 10 years, can you imagine next time you go to the hearing or informal dialogue, how complex it is going to be, that people will simply start asking, okay, you told us five or seven years ago, okay, this and that. Have you delivered? Why not? What was your problem? So I've decided to join this competition, because I really believe the UN needs something new. It needs some new, not only new faces, it needs new approaches. And what I've tried to do is, you know, along with giving my views how the world or UN World Organization handle peace and security, sustainable development, and human rights, we also should reinforce some aspects of our management. But the flavor I want to give it is, okay, what are youth, what do youth think of today's world? Because many research suggests that this is the best period in history a human being can be born. You know, IT, medical services, life expectancy grows and so on and so on. But are we really sure that the youth worldwide shares the sentiment? And don't forget, half of the world's population is younger than 25 years. So we need to give them something new. And I really agree with all those who contend that there's been some detachment between the UN and ordinary people. We need to bring back this attachment. We need to fight to make UN really relevant. We need to make every penny spent for UN Worldwide investment. Obviously, we should have the best person for the job and the selection process should focus on meritocracy, professionalism, relevant professional experience, and the quality of morality and integrity of the candidates themselves. But at the very same time, I think that we need to take into consideration the very important objective to strive for the gender balance while selecting top officials and senior management in the UN, in other international organizations, and indeed in our national systems back home. And another principle, the principle of equitable geographical representation, is something that is very much rooted actually into the United Nations system. And why not this time, for the very first time in 70 years of UN's existence, we might actually choose a good candidate from Eastern Europe to lead the organization, be it a woman or a man? Ask the two of us. Well, 70 years we didn't have an Eastern European. Well, I mean, I think that the discussion really is sometimes simplified to the principles that have governed the UN elections throughout history. Of course, UN has to have a sense of fairness. And how do we achieve fairness in the country, in an organization which represents all parts of the world without regional rotation? And I remember when the elections were held 10 years ago, and Asia said we need to have an Asian candidate and nobody there to object. 15 years earlier, when Africa said we need an African, no one there to object. Well, look, you should be careful with this sort of characterization. You're like we are in a less formal setting tonight. Yes, so maybe this is a common denominator. You mean to make UN great again? An outsider to what? An outsider to the United Nations or an outsider to politics? I don't think you can have an outsider to politics because outsiders to politics would not be interested in these topics, would know anything in these topics. And however much experience we might have in our countries, you're even questioning the right of our region to have qualified people, let alone our countries, which are all relatively small. So I think that if you want outsiders in that sense, you've got them. Certainly outsiders to the big system of the United Nations, not outsiders to the core topics of the United Nations. And I don't think you would want that. Actually, the core topics of the United Nations and the core values that the United Nations promote have been marginalized enough. And if anything, there was something Igor said earlier, you sort of need to reintroduce those values. And precisely because of that, I think it's important to shake up the system, not by denying the importance of any kind of political, inside political experience, political understanding. But yes, of some economic plastic attitudes towards set rules, even patterns of speech. I mean, half the time, nobody in his right mind can't understand what these people are saying, what they're talking about. And I was studying for days, abbreviations, and I decided that I was not going to do this, because this is ridiculous. This is an organization that is meant to serve the people, to serve some of the key objectives of and highest aspirations of humankind. And nobody can understand what people are saying. So this is an important thing. Correct, yes. The way that you make that pledge here... We didn't need to. We are implementing. We don't speak UN. Are you making the outside world your own world? Maybe we should be talking about independence. And there is a serious issue here. When you are Secretary General and you are a Quarantine key staff, lots of people around the world, and you have any other questions that have come in, have expressed concern that the key jobs always go to the big powers. And maybe there's a reason for that, because if you weren't Secretary General, you can't have to get on well with your tribe. So will you say that when you're Secretary General, will you still see a French heritage, or will you still see a Britain in one of these UN jobs, or will it be a bit fairer? Is there anything? Well, you know, talking about the senior management team, we talk about a lot of things that the Secretary General is supposed to try to change, given the current track record. And you know, just imagine Secretary General coming from Montenegro, it's not a key power. How can you say that? If Secretary General, and that's what I would plan to do, nominate Deputy Secretary General, I believe that because we come from Northern Hemisphere, that person should come from Southern Hemisphere. I also believe that that person should have its seat in Nairobi. And for sure, then we already can show our commitment to making it more regional equality, also more commitment to create UN system where everybody feels ownership. And that's what I believe it's important. My three principles I'm laying out are responsibility, inclusiveness, engagement. So we need to try to do things which will resonate, which will make people feel okay, we are really on track of becoming, on making it an inclusive and to everybody's ownership system. Plus, I mean, on the other hand, when you talk to different people, they raise argument and say, listen, it's all nice, but there's 17 countries that provide for 82% of the UN budget. So we want to have a say about how money is spent. It's a pretty fair argument you need to take into account. So Secretary General should have to be able to try to balance it, balance it out. Of course, has to try to also to pursue the principle of gender equality. So saying about or mentioning new faces, it also means let's open the floor for different people. Okay, if we are also talking about a big country, okay, give us some more names. Let's try to make it a more interactive, more transparent procedure. And that's why it is important that we are now entering the new age of appointing Secretary General and other people because it will inevitably to more transparency and more discussions about other places. Not yet. Feel very comfortable. No, look, people who think about these things are also very sophisticated and they would not come with this sort of pressure, I mean, very simply and very quickly. That may come later and may take different forms. But I'd like to explain my own experience. You see, I was invited by Kofi Annan to become his assistant for political affairs in the year 2000. And I know that at that time, there was a fair amount of competition from other countries, from larger countries, from countries which pay more dues to the United Nations. Nevertheless, Kofi Annan invited me and I felt very honored by that because I knew the kind of configuration which existed at the time. Now, it is doable, it is doable. But of course, the Secretary General has to be absolutely convinced that the person chosen is the right person for the job. And that of course helps resisting pressures. That helps him to say, look, I found the right person. And I think that that experience is a small part of the answer to this bigger question. You mentioned earlier more than 20,000 questions from around the world in our core app. I'm just going to go through them one by one. So we can start responding and wait until October until this whole process ends. I think one of the issues that came through most strongly in this core app was people were saying we have the equity well-being to sign up to the Sustainable Development Goals and poverty and climate change and suffer inequality. But what are you going to do to ensure that happens and it's not just empty promises that kind of flow away? The implementation for real hasn't really started yet. And this is going to be one of the big problems. How to develop the strategies to implement, first of all, because the Sustainable Development Goals are to some extent different from the Millennium Development Goals because they have some additional elements such as the rule of law and some elements of human rights. Also some goals that were part of the Millennium Goals that were not met such as position of women and women's rights. One thing that I think might help is to broaden the base of countries that get involved in development cooperation because the current model very much is the big donor countries that provide development assistance, the big organizations, and poor countries or poor countries that are recipient of development assistance. They also get told a lot. You cannot rely only on official development aids. You need to develop your own economies, investment climate, private investment, direct private investment. You have to attract all of that in order to improve your economies which, to some extent, is absolutely true at least for most countries. I think there are countries that are exception even in that sense that need special attention. But most of the countries are in between. Most of the countries are not necessarily the big rich countries but are also countries that don't need or don't receive development assistance and can but have absolutely no tradition of development cooperation and providing development assistance that will not be billions of dollars, that will not be huge projects but can be and if well coordinated even small projects that make a difference and let me just illustrate that with one project that we started in Afghanistan which is building small maternity hospital for training midwives. We started this as Croatia. It is going to train midwives in the community meaning people who will come there and train for six months and then go and help women in the villages. One such small hospital is not going to make any difference or certainly not the big difference in Afghanistan and we didn't have more money than for just this one hospital but bringing 10 countries of our size and economic capacity together bringing 20 countries together and building a network of these would actually make a big difference and I think that in order because sustainable development goals are not only about money they're also they are about money that's certainly the first prerogative but they're also about transferring experience knowledge know how people that can start something experience in institutions building in state building in post-conflict reconciliation all kinds of things that influence the economy but are not only the economy and I think by broadening this base and going for the countries that don't have now that tradition or that is not part of their culture their foreign policy culture and bring them in as countries initiating not to say providing development assistance of financial and non-financial kind I think would give the sustainable development goals a way better chance of implement being implemented if we come back to the SDGs do it so it's a pretty sketchy idea but you have a UN staff we'd rather than asking what would be the case of Anders Compass the whistleblower who will be able to what would be going on with a peace cable to keep this and what would you do to protect whistleblowers and prosecute these people because rather than build a way around it seems to be the UN approach so far well in Italy well look I know Anders Compass if I am elected secretary general I'll make sure that he's protected I know him for no no look I mean this is a very important case which shows many many problems that exist in the process in the United Nations and of course one of the key problems is why was this information hidden from the decision makers for so long what went wrong in the structure of the secretary that has to be thoroughly investigated and in order to have such an investigation one has to protect the person who has spoken first so Anders Compass would have that kind of protection would need that should happen but it's he's not the only one this has happened again and again the UN is terrible at investigating its own people and protecting the people who that was well look but you have to work on specific cases this is of course an exemplary case this is a case which defines the approach that will be taken in the future I mean that's why it is important that we know who the person is and we know that he's a credible person he has demonstrated this in a number of situations in the past in Colombia in Central America now in Central African Republic so he is a person who has the kind of credibility which gives a good case to the Secretary General to say okay here we have a whistleblower that we need to protect and we'll build our new approach around this new well this the solution that we will find another question we had again about the our idea of accountability within the UN from Austin Mackle in Ecuador what will you do is make the UN more democratic and accountable going forward by children and how you're going to look at what's going on I think that the Secretary General should first and foremost lead by example you really have to be absolutely sure in your own credentials of high standards of morality and integrity and then you have the right to demand the same attitude from the staff who is working in your team and the Secretariat and all around the United Nations system and then they should inspire and they should project this attitude in absolutely everything they do and they undertake and that should be the first criteria while hiring people for important positions in the United Nations Secretariat and also there is of course all kind of inner structures and the ethical office within the Department of Legal Affairs and when there are instances of breaching this very important law and practice they have to be thoroughly investigated and there is no place for corruption no place for fraud mismanagement or waste of resources when it goes about the performance of the United Nations Secretariat and I think that should lead the efforts of the Secretary-General In fact one last question from the crowd What more could you done for the active world growing with Pijito if you prefer the city legal because I mentioned in your in your session General Assembly you were full on the spot about this and you questioned what was the even in terms of what is the U.S. criticism of the U.J. in terms of deal with this correct Yeah it was actually my response to a question related to migration refugee crisis because it is really a case which shows that we should try to do things differently because you know there's a big problem going on and Montenegro is a neighborhood of some of the countries that were on this Western Balkans route and the problem is still not over I mean we see number of incidents going on still in the region and so on so there was much desire agreement and eventually reached after a lot of sleepless nights a lot of rounds of discussions and so on and the next day you have very prominent specialized agency of the United Nations saying well you see that it's controversial it might be illegal and so on so it's a bit embarrassing I think it shows that we should try to approach things differently there has to be more communication there has to be more work more cooperation when one of the meetings I had I mean in general what I'm trying to say is that this concrete example shows that there has to be more cooperation between UN and other regional arrangements regional organizations that's why we all talk about the need to improve this cooperation because UN cannot do everything on its own we have to that's why we talk I talk about extended partnerships that's why I talk about better coordination it cannot happen that some of the regional arrangements are more proactive and pushy than UN actually UN should be there because we are talking about early warning systems prevention mediation so on but what actually we do a field there's a lot more that can be done that's one aspect of the refugee migrants problem the other aspect is I guess even more complex because currently biggest number since the Second World War migrating involuntarily because you have millions of people who want to move and settle somewhere else because they just want to change the environment where they live interestingly enough but I've seen some research shows that actually it's there's 200 million people worldwide that wants want to change the way where they live and if they're allowed that may actually give boost to world GDP but the trouble is and that's why I like this story about Sustainable Development Goals is that it's not only about GDP growth there's a lot more than that but coming back to this I'm actually trying to to underscore that Sustainable Development Goals is it is also about migration International Migration Organization actually finds out that there is five or six goals where inside there are targets related to migration so it's a lot more complex and that's why the only way to try to find some solutions is through extended partnerships and cooperation well I'll be a little more allow me to differ a little on the evaluation of the the EU approach first of all I think that it's absolutely essential to cooperate with regional organizations because otherwise things are undoable and why EU was faced with having to deal with it's not the migration issue it's a refugee issue I mean I think we have to be very clear we were at the beginning there was about 70% of people who were coming through so to speak Eastern Europe and our countries 70% were Syria and Iraq who were acknowledged refugees and 30% were Afghanistan who were supposedly migrants but if you look and as time went on that ratio changed and became 50-50 but you look at the migrants from Afghanistan is I think a very questionable definition depending on where these people are coming from and what they're running away from so I think there also could be viewed as refugees to a large extent secondly the problem here was that none of them and this is where the UN jumped in maybe a little bit before they thought it is true that it was very difficult for Europe to deal with it everybody fought with everybody else not because there were that many refugees but because there were that many refugees in such a short period of time there was there were close to million people in less than six months but the fact was that none of them came directly from Afghanistan or directly from Syria or directly from Iraq they all came from Turkey and they've all spent between a few months to a few years in Turkey in which they were refugees Turkey I have to say was pointing this out and at least from what I heard personally from 2012 was saying people in front of the European Union in front of the entire world saying people we will not be able to deal with this there are too many people coming in that we have to to take care of help us they even mentioned the number they even said how much money they spent and for a long time everybody's betting them on the shoulder and not doing much and then at one point they opened the gates and people started coming in across the again in Jairan whatever you say in in in English but these people were refugees but these people were not coming from directly from countries where they were their lives were in danger they were coming from a country that just was not helped in time to provide them with assistance and in that context the EU deal is probably too little too late but makes much more sense than if it was returning them to people to a country where their lives were in danger I want to pause it there because we've got a fantastic audience