New Zealander wants to be first woman U.N. leader
WELLINGTON, New Zealand — Helen Clark, the New Zealand leader who refused U.S. calls to send troops to Iraq, said she will run for secretary-general of the United Nations amid a global campaign to elect a woman to the world’s top diplomatic post.
Clark, 66, became the eighth candidate — and fourth woman — to be nominated to succeed Ban Ki-moon, who will finish his term later this year. The first female elected prime minister of New Zealand, Clark led t he country for nine years before becoming the first woman to helm the U.N. Development Program, which administers the global body’s poverty eradication program, in 2009.
“I know how to build consensus on issues,” Clark said late Monday at a news conference in New York, which ended with New Zealand diplomats serenading reporters in Maori. “The U.N. has many tools in its tool kit, and they all have to be utilized for a more peaceful and inclusive society.”
The secretary-general position has been an exclusively male bastion since the U.N. was created in the aftermath of World War II. The next leader will be decided under a new process aimed at introducing greater transparency. The applicants will for the first time hold informal meetings with the U.N.’s 193 nations before the 15-member Security Council recommends a candidate.
A core group of U.N. member states supports the bid for a woman to be nominated, said Jean Krasno, a lecturer at the City College of New York.
“Right now, this is time for a woman after eight men — let’s move on here,” said Krasno, who chairs the Campaign to Elect a Woman U.N. SecretaryGeneral. “The timing is right because women, who have become empowered over the last couple of decades, are finally working their way up to very, very prominent positions. So you can’t any longer hold the argument that there aren’t enough qualified women.”
The Security Council — which includes the permanent five members of China, France, Russia, the U.K. and the U.S. — will start discussions over candidates in July.
The new secretary-general’s “main challenge will be to reposition the U.N. as the main agency for tackling world problems,” said Ramesh Thakur, director of the Australian National University’s Centre for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament in Canberra.
“Helen Clark has an outside chance.”