Quiet Ban turns into noisy rights champion

Born on Friday the 13th in an impoverished country at war, Ban Ki-moon could have been a poster child for all the troubles that keeps the United Nations in business.

The former South Korean foreign minister, set to be reelected Tuesday to a second term as UN secretary general, often recalls a tough childhood in a country brought to its knees by foreign occupation, World War II and then the fratricidal North-South conflict.

The success of South Korea in overcoming poverty, strife and dictatorship strongly inspired a new found bravado lecturing Arab strongmen to give their people greater liberty.

Critics, who say he has been too soft on some of the major powers who he depends on for his job, are counting on Ban, who was 67 on June 13, to be even more outspoken in his next five years running the global body.

Everyone has his "weaknesses", said Ban on the day that he announced that he was "humbly" putting himself forward for a second term.

One of six children, Ban was born at the tail end of World War II in 1944 to a middle class family which was forced to flee his home city of Chungju in Chungcheong province when the Korean War erupted in 1950.

Ban studied his way to a place at the elite Seoul National University which launched him onto a distinguished diplomatic career.

But a meeting with President John F. Kennedy while on a scholarship visit to Washington in 1962 and taking part in anti-dictatorship protests in Seoul emboldened his own lectures to the likes of Moamer Kadhafi of Libya, Bashar al-Assad of Syria and Ali Abdullah Saleh of Yemen.

"Of course, at that time students were arrested and beaten on the street, they were suspended from school," he said in a recent interview with AFP of his own protest experiences in the 1960s. "Sometimes I was just thrown, my hands and feet were taken by the soldiers."

Ban also spoke recently of his last telephone call with Syria's Assad. "Why do you keep calling me?" Assad said in their argument. He has since refused to take Ban's calls.

People sometimes find it hard to follow his English, but Ban's personal message has become clearer with each uprising in the Arab world.

He said he told Assad that as UN secretary general "I do not interfere with internal politics. But when it comes to fundamental human rights, when there is a clear violation of those rights, I will speak out."

His aggressive line on Libya and Syria and calling for an investigative panel in Sri Lanka have not always pleased China and Russia. But he has done nothing in his first five years to tempt the Security Council permanent five -- China, Russia, the United States, France and Britain -- to use their veto to stop his second term.

"He has ridden the diplomatic rapids with great skill," said one Security Council ambassador, speaking on condition of traditional anonymity.

Ban took over from Kofi Annan in 2007 calling himself a "harmonizer, balancer, mediator." In seeking his new term he said he aimed to be a "bridge builder".

But it is his insistence on "quiet diplomacy" that has got him into trouble, first with Myanmar and more recently with China. Some developing countries accuse him of being too pro-US.

Rights groups were particularly critical when he failed to raise the case of detained Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo in a meeting with China's President Hu Jintao in November.

The Arab Spring and the tough UN action in using force to make sure Alassane Ouattara became president of Ivory Coast this year have strengthened Ban's name however.

He has also charmed the feminist lobby with his action to boost women's rights. He has insisted that there must be at least one woman's name on the selection list for all top UN jobs and was given a pop star welcome at the launch of the new UN Women agency this year led by former Chilean president Michelle Bachelet.

Ban's consensus skills were honed partly in a diplomatic career that saw him serve stints in India and as deputy ambassador to the United States and ambassador to Austria, where he was chairman of the preparatory commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organisation.

As South Korea's foreign minister from 2004 until 2007 he played a leading role in six-nation talks on North Korea's nuclear ambitions. Asia then got behind him as the continent's candidate for the UN leadership.

Ban married his high school sweetheart, Yoo Soon-taek. The couple have a son and two daughters.

Published by By Tim Witcher - UNITED NATIONS

The Middle East Online, June 21, 2011

http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=46843