UN Secretary-General visiting Jamaica

UNITED Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will arrive in Jamaica this weekend to attend the Caricom heads of Government meeting, beginning in Montego Bay on Sunday.

Ki-Moon is to discuss regional efforts to achieve social and economic targets, better known as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which have a target of 2015.

He is expected to tell Caricom leaders that the international community must act as one in dealing with the impact of the global economic crisis, particularly its effects on the world’s most vulnerable.

They will also be told that Caribbean countries need to accelerate their progress in meeting the goals which necessitate, among other measures: poverty reduction, improving maternal health, fighting environmental degradation and boosting school attendance.

In September the UN chief is hosting a high-level event at UN Headquarters in New York that is aimed at charting the progress so far towards the MDGs and determining where attention and resources should be devoted between now and 2015.

He will also discuss UN support for Haiti following January’s catastrophic earthquake, which killed more than 200,000 people and left at least one million others homeless.

He will also have bilateral meetings with various Caricom leaders and representatives of regional organisations.