UNITED NATIONS, Jan. 2 (UPI) -- Ban Ki-moon, former foreign minister of South Korea, has formally taken over as the eighth U.N. secretary-general replacing retiring Kofi Annan as the world's top diplomat.
His first order of business Tuesday was to honor those staff members who lost their lives on U.N. missions, briefly speak with reporters and hold a video conference, web cast meeting with staff.
The 62-year-old Ban, a career diplomat who has promised to be a bridge-builder, to restore trust and confidence in the 61-year old organization also vows continued reform as did Annan 10 years earlier.
During the two months Ban had to make the transition, he kept his appointment intentions closely guarded, only to hint his deputy could be another woman, as was the first deputy secretary-general, Louise Frechette, from Canada. But, he says, this time it would likely be a woman from a third world country.
On New Year's Eve, Ban announced his first appointments, Vijay Nambiar of India as Chef de Cabinet and Michelle Montas of Haiti as his spokeswoman. The deputy spokeswoman will remain Marie Okabe.
"I intend to make further appointments in the coming days," said Ban.
Montas said Tuesday the next appointments Ban planned to announce soon were for heads of the Department of Management and the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian affairs.
"Today's (Sunday's) appointments will serve as a solid basis for establishing my team and pursuing a program of reform of the (U.N.) Secretariat to provide continuity along with change."
He said Nambiar was chosen because he held "many important roles in and around the United Nations, including, among others, special advisor to ... Annan" and the ambassador of India to the United Nations.
Prior to joining the United Nations in March, Nambiar served as deputy national security advisor and head of the National Security Council Secretariat in India.
He previously served as India's ambassador to the U.N. World Headquarters in New York, from May 2002 to June 2004. Earlier, as Ambassador of India, he served in Pakistan, 2000-2001; China 1996-2000; Malaysia 1993-1996, and Afghanistan, 1990-1992. He was also Ambassador of India in Algeria from 1985 to 1988.
During his career in the Indian Foreign Service, Ban had served in numerous bilateral and multilateral appointments in Beijing, Belgrade and New York during the 1970s and 1980s.
"I have known Nambiar for a long time and we share deep confidence and respect for each other," added Ban.
Montas is an-award-winning journalist and was head of the French unit of U.N. Radio, the statement said. She served as spokeswoman for U.N. General Assembly President Julian Robert Hunte, the foreign minister of St. Lucia, in 2003.
Montas reported for Radio Haiti-Inter in the early 1970s, covering human rights abuses, political corruption and state-sponsored violence in Haiti along with her husband Jean Dominique.
Montas, during her first briefing to reporters, pointed out Ban is the new secretary-general's family name, pronounced as in autobahn, while his given name, Ki-moon, was pronounced as if with a hard "G," instead of a "K," as in Gee-moon
Other appointments were expected in the next few weeks, she said.
Most high-level U.N. contracts expire at the end of February. While appointments may be high on Ban's to-do list, his immediate diplomatic focus will be on the crises in Somalia, Sudan's western Darfur region and the Middle East in general, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Lebanon in particular.
As for the domestic part of Ban's new life, he is living out of a suite in the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in Midtown Manhattan, a short drive or a 15-minute walk to his office in East Midtown Manhattan's Turtle Bay neighborhood. He walked to work on his first day, wearing an overcoat with the temperature in the low 40s. He was escorted by U.N. security officers and Nambiar.
Ban and his wife may not fully unpack for home or office because they have been excluded, butaaa only temporarily, from the exclusive Sutton Place townhouse on the Upper East Side that is the official residence of the secretary-general and his U.N. office is destined to move in the relatively near future.
Ban will not be allowed to move into his new permanent living quarters until late autumn at the earliest because of $4.5 million in long-needed renovations to the neo-Georgian former home of Anne Morgan, daughter of J.P. Morgan.
The 50-year-old U.N. headquarters complex is due to go through a nearly $2 billion renovation but with the secretary-general's offices moving around the gutting and reconstruction of the 39-story Secretariat.
How bad is the residence? The New York City Department of Buildings website says the building has an "active" notice of a violation opened in 1989 for the single elevator in the residence. Annan had mentioned an out of repair elevator among the four-story building's many ills, including 85-year old electrical wiring, insufficient for 21st century communications technology.
