13 June 2008
World fuel and food price rises were on the agenda earlier when United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon held talks with Gordon Brown at No10.
Read the transcript
Prime Minister:
I am delighted to have hosted Secretary-General Ban in Downing Street today. I am grateful to him for the leadership he shows in all he does on behalf of the international community and I am pleased that today he will, with his wife, have an audience with Her Majesty The Queen later this morning.
We have had very useful discussions. We have discussed the reform of the international institutions and I welcome the leading role played by the United Nations in the global dialogue on how we can reform the international system. And in particular we have been looking forward to the Millennium Development Goals event that will take place in September in New York. And it is essential that the international community redoubles its efforts, particularly at a time when oil prices and food prices have been rising, to achieve for the poorest people of the world the Millennium Development Goals. And people all over the world are relying on us and the Secretary General’s leadership to do the right thing, and on 25 September I am pleased that I will play a part, with the Secretary-General, in this major summit.
We talked about the increases in oil prices that are hurting the world economy. As I said yesterday, I will attend the producer-consumer summit in Jedda on 22 June. It is clear that the oil price is unsustainably high, with damage to the global economy, and is affecting severely the lives of millions of people, particularly the poorest people round the world. And the way forward is clear, as I said yesterday, we need a far better dialogue leading to results between consumers and producers.
We agreed also that it was right that the UN, working with the World Bank and the IMF, provide a coordinated response to rising food prices which are hitting so many people.
I want to thank the Secretary-General for his leadership on aid for Burma, his continued engagement on the humanitarian track, and the use of his good offices has meant that many people in Burma who would otherwise not have had aid have received it. And we urge him to continue his work, not just in helping those people who have been afflicted by the damage done in Burma, but also for the release of Aung San Suu Kyi whose birthday next Thursday we will want to mark.
The United Nations is playing an essential role in Afghanistan and the conference in Paris is evidence of the international community’s continuing commitment to the government and people of Afghanistan. We have announced aid that we are able to make, and we want to help, as the Secretary-General has said yesterday, in the democratic process in Afghanistan.
I raised with the Secretary-General, and he raised with me, the situation that is deteriorating in Zimbabwe. We now know that 50 people have been killed in recent events, there have been more than 2,000 arrests, there have been 30,000 people displaced. Tendai Biti, the Number Two in the MDC party, has been arrested for treason. Food aid has been suspended for 4 million people who depend upon it because the NGOs are no longer able to work in the country. It is essential that the international community is united in demanding that the UN agencies and the NGOs are able to continue their work of mercy. It is also important that election observers are allowed to deploy and operate effectively and we must work to ensure that these elections that are to take place on 27 June are fair and free and that the level of violence in the country is diminished. We want more international observers to be invited in to make sure that the elections are free and fair and I will continue to discuss this with Ban Ki-moon and other people on the road to 27 June.
These are all great challenges facing the international community. We are better placed to tackle them because of the work of the Secretary-General, we will continue to support his efforts and we will continue to urge the international community to do the work of justice in areas where there are injustices that need to be addressed.
My welcome to you Secretary-General.
Mr Ban Ki-moon
Thank you very much Mr Prime Minister for your kind welcome and hospitality. It is a great pleasure for me to be back to London to engage in dialogue with you and other senior government leaders.
I have just had very good discussions over breakfast with the Prime Minister Gordon Brown on many issues of mutual concern and interest for the United Nations activities and for the benefit of the international community.
Among other things we discussed the high level event that I will convene, together with the President of the General Assembly, on 25 September to push forward in implementing the Millennium Development Goals. As you are already aware, we are now [indistinct] to meet the targets of the Millennium Development Goals by 2015 and I am sincerely grateful for the leadership role that Prime Minister Gordon Brown has taken, including the call to action. I have invited him to participate in that high level event on 25 September for the MDG to take an important leadership role, to galvanise the political role and mobilise the necessary resources to meet the targets of the MDG.
We also spoke about the climate change as part of my discussions with world leaders as we continue to explore ways to help the ongoing negotiations move forward so that we will be able to have an agreement, a globally acceptable agreement, by the end of December 2009 with creating the Kyoto Protocol. I have been impressed by the Prime Minister’s commitment to make substantial progress in dealing with this very serious concern affecting humanity.
And we both showed a commitment to do all we can to help ensure that rising food costs will not create a catastrophe to all those around the world who already find it hard to get enough to eat.
I am aware that a number of you are interested in the proposals that I sent to the Security Council yesterday on Kosovo. I also discussed this matter with Prime Minister Gordon Brown today, as well as with other key stakeholders while I was in Paris yesterday. I am aware that this package may not fully satisfy all sides, yet it is my honest belief, after a considerable time discussing this issue with all concerned parties, that what I have proposed will prove to be the least objectionable cause to all and can offer us a way forward. My aim has been to pursue a modus vivendi that is acceptable to the parties and would be supported by the key international stakeholders. I sincerely believe that this package achieves that goal.
In our discussions this morning the Prime Minister and I also talked about a number of issues around the world, from Zimbabwe, and Sudan, and Myanmar and the Middle East. Since the Prime Minister has explained about all what we have discussed I will not go into detail, but if I may say something more about Zimbabwe. When I had the meeting with President Mugabe last week in Rome I emphasised the importance of ensuring that there should be no further violence and that this forthcoming Presidential run-off election should be held in a most transparent, and fair, and consultative, and credible way and I urged him to take all necessary measures to ensure that. And I also urged him that humanitarian assistance should be allowed to be delivered to the many people who are suffering from this situation.
As always I am happy with the strong support the United Nations has been receiving, and will receive, from the Government of the United Kingdom and Prime Minister Gordon Brown particularly, and I am very much happy to have an opportunity of having very in-depth discussions with the Prime Minister this morning.
I am also very much honoured personally to have an opportunity to have an audience with Her Majesty The Queen today.
I will be pleased to take some questions.
Prime Minister:
Thank you very much. Can I congratulate the Secretary-General also on his birthday, which is today. And can I just repeat what he has said that it is time for an end to violence, an end to repression, the restoration of aid and for free and fair elections in Zimbabwe.
Question:
[Party political content]
Prime Minister:
[Party political content]
Question:
Can I ask you both about the energy crisis? On the Jedda summit we have been told not to expect any short term increase in production, so what can we actually expect, what measures can that conference take to ease the fuel crisis? And Prime Minister just on the domestic front, we are going into a fuel strike, when can British consumers expect some relief at the pumps?
Mr Ban Ki-moon
The rising oil price is a serious concern to the whole international community because it affects the whole spectrum of our life. As Prime Minister Gordon Brown has just said, I understand that the Saudi King is going to host a meeting, inviting oil producers and consumers. I hope they will have good discussions on this matter. As I am going to have a meeting with the King of Saudi Arabia tomorrow evening in Jedda I will also discuss this matter. This has impacted, particularly these rising food prices. We have discussed this issue last week in Rome, we need to address and manage properly the rising food prices as well as the rising petroleum prices because unless we properly manage this issue this may trigger the [indistinct] of all other challenges and crises affecting not only social and economic issues, but also even political and security issues. And therefore I would urge the leaders of the world, particularly consumers and oil producers, to address this issue properly and I count on the leadership of Prime Minister Gordon Brown when he attends this meeting.
Prime Minister:
Let me say about the British event, it is extremely disappointing that the talks between the employers and the unions have ended without resolution. I can say that we have been working very closely with the industry to put in place detailed contingency plans to reduce as far as possible and to minimise the disruption to the driving public. But we would strongly urge the parties to this dispute to return to the negotiating table as soon as possible.
The Secretary-General has mentioned that this is a global problem about oil prices that requires a global solution. We can of course take action in the United Kingdom, as we have done, by freezing petrol duty, by raising the winter allowance to help pensioners with their gas and electricity bills, but these are global price rises affecting every country that require a global solution. And that requires in the first instance a proper dialogue between the consumers of oil and the producers of oil, and that is why I will go to Jedda a week on Sunday and urge other consumers and other producers to look at how this dialogue could yield better results. We know that the demand for oil is exceeding the supply of oil, not just now but in the medium to long term future, but we know also we can take measures to both reduce demand - diversify demand for oil - and increase supply. Now these are the measures that I believe producers and consumers must discuss together and must do so at a global level.
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