Ban Ki-moon

Ban Ki-moon (1944- ), South Korean diplomat, eighth Secretary-General of the United Nations from January 2007. Ban was born on June 13, 1944, in the city of Chungju, during the Japanese occupation of Korea. At the age of 18, Ban travelled to the United States on a visit sponsored by the Red Cross, during which he met the president, John F. Kennedy. Ban later stated that this experience set him on the path to a career in diplomacy. He studied at the Department of International Relations of Seoul National University, graduating in 1970. He later completed postgraduate studies at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, from where he graduated as a Master in Public Administration in 1985.

Ban has spent most of his diplomatic career in a variety of roles for the United Nations and the South Korean ministry for foreign affairs, or MOFA (reorganized as the ministry of foreign affairs and trade, or MOFAT, in 1998). He joined MOFA in 1970, served in South Korea’s mission to the United Nations between 1975 and 1980 (during which time South Korea had only observer status at the UN; the country became a full member in 1991), and was director of MOFA’s UN division until 1983. In January 1996, Ban became deputy minister of foreign affairs for political affairs. The following month he was appointed chief of protocol to the president, Kim Young-sam, becoming senior secretary for foreign policy and national security later the same year. In May 1998, Ban was appointed ambassador extraordinary and plenipotentiary to Austria and international organizations in Vienna (among which are the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, and the secretariat of the Wassenaar Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies). In January 1999 he became chairman of the preparatory commission for the comprehensive test-ban treaty (CTBTO; see Nuclear Testing), also based in Vienna.

Ban returned to South Korea in January 2000 to become vice-minister of foreign affairs and trade in MOFAT. In May 2001, he was appointed South Korea’s ambassador to the UN. In September of the same year South Korea took the presidency of the UN general assembly. Ban helped to oversee the first measure passed during South Korea’s presidency, a motion condemning the September 11 terrorist attacks against the United States. In September 2002, Ban became MOFAT’s ambassador-at-large, and in January 2004 was appointed minister of foreign affairs and trade. In this role he was closely involved with negotiations that sought to prevent North Korea from developing an arsenal of nuclear weapons (see Nuclear Warfare and Nuclear Proliferation).

Ban Ki-moon’s experience in this role, and South Korea’s status as both an important donor to the United Nations and as a contributor to peacekeeping forces, placed him as a leading contender to replace Kofi Annan as secretary-general of the UN in 2007. Winning the crucial support of both China and the United States, he was elected to the post unanimously in October 2006, and took office on January 1, 2007.