The Director-General Takes Part in the Budapest Water Summit

On 8 October, UNESCO Director-General, Irina Bokova, will take part in the opening session of the Budapest Water Summit, dedicated to “The Role of Water and Sanitation in the Global Sustainable Development Agenda”. The Budapest Water Summit, held from 8 to 11 October, is a milestone event of the 2013 International Year of Water Cooperation,led by UNESCO on behalf of UN-Water.

Several high level government representatives will take part in the opening ceremony -- including János Áder, the President of Hungary; Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, the President of the African Union; Prince Khaled bin Sultan bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia; Prince El Hassan bin Talal of Jordan; Baroness Catherine Ashton, the Vice-President of the European Commission, and High Representative for Foreign Affairs & Security Policy; Plodprasop Suraswadi, Deputy Prime Minister of Thailand;  and Jejomar Binay, Vice President of the Republic of the Philippines. The Secretary General of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon and several heads of UN agencies will also participate in the opening session of the Summit. 

The Director-General will highlight the importance of water cooperation for sustainable human development and water management. In her view, sustainable water is essential to reaching all of the Millennium Development Goals by 2015, and it must lie at the heart of the new global sustainable development agenda to follow.

On the margins of the Summit, the Director-General is expected to hold bilateral meetings with the President of Hungary, Minister for Human Resources, Zoltán Balog and with the President of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, József Pálinkás.