The Special Representative of the UN Secretary General for Disaster Risk Reduction, Margareta Wahlström, arrives on a three-day visit to Pakistan tomorrow (October 6) during which she will meet with President Asif Ali Zadari, Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani, the National Disaster Management Authority, Meteorological Department officials and aid donors, to discuss future risk reduction measures as the country tries to cope with floods which have displaced an estimated 5.4 million people.

国連国際防災戦略事務局（UNISDR）のトップである、マルガレータ・ワルストロム国連事務総長特別代表（防災担当）が9月8～11日にかけて、日本を公式訪問しました。9月9日、日本記者クラブで記者会見が行われました。 Margareta Wahlström, Margareta Wahlström, the Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General (SRSG) for Disaster Risk Reduction and Chief of UNISDR, visited Japan from 8 – 11 September. A press conference was held at Japan National Press Club on 9 September.

The head of the United Nation’s disaster risk reduction office, UNISDR, Margareta Wahlström, today strongly backed the NGO initiative “Never Again: A Charter to End Extreme Hunger.”

UNインタビュー・シリーズ国連の幅広い活動をより多くの日本の皆様に知っていただくために、UNインタビュー・シリーズでは、国連諸機関の親善大使やサポーターをはじめ、国連を通して国際貢献されている方々にお話を伺っていきます。

Six months after the Great East Japan Earthquake, Margareta Wahlström, the United Nations Disaster Risk Reduction Chief, has met with Mayor Jin Sato of Minami-Sanriku town which lost 558 people in the tragedy. The total population of the town was 17,300 before the disaster and 343 are still unaccounted for.

Seismic risk has taken on a different meaning this week with the trial opening in Italy of six scientists charged with failing to predict the L’Aquila earthquake that killed 309 people in 2009 and left 70,000 people homeless. The scientists and one official are charged with manslaughter.

The UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, today drew attention to the “data-collection gap” which is preventing governments from effectively determining risk levels with his launch of the Fourth report of the MDG Gap Task Force in New York.

At a time when over one billion dollars has been mobilized to provide humanitarian aid to 13 million people in the drought-stricken Horn of Africa, leaders have issued a strong call to “reform the system of emergency humanitarian response in the region, aiming to enhance resilience and promote long-term solutions.”