Oral history interview with Javier Pérez de Cuéllar, 2002.

Biographical Note

UN Secretary General

Scope and Contents

Early years: 1920 born in Lima, Peru; international law at Catholic University; Career: 1940 Foreign Ministry clerk; 1944 appointment in Paris; 1946 participant in first General Assembly meeting (London); 1964 Switzerland ambassador; 1966 vice-minister of foreign affairs in Foreign Ministry; 1969 Moscow ambassador; 1971 Peru's permanent UN ambassador; 1975 Executive Director of UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and Under-Secretary-General for special political affairs; 1981-1991 UN Secretary General; 2000-2001 Prime-Minister of Peru; Peruvian representative to UNESCO; author of The Manual of Diplomatic Law and Pilgrimage for Peace: A Secretary-General's Memoir; Themes: bilateral diplomacy; third-world solidarity; necessity of US financial involvement in Latin America; opposition to The New International Economic Order (NIEO); lack of realism in developing countries; Group of 77 member; successes as Secretary General: independence of Nambia, Cuban withdrawal from Angola, end of Iraq-Iran war, solution of El Salvador problem, active in Yugoslovian crisis; necessity of dividing ECOSOC into social and economic commissions; UN resolutions lack follow-up mechanism; UN groundbreaking in policies on nuclear proliferation, environmental protection, population planning, and sustainable development; progress by UN conventions on rights of women and children; importance of Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Charter of the United Nations; necessity of reducing state sovereignty

Subjects

• Ambassadors--Peru--Interviews.
• Developing countries--Economic conditions.
• Developing countries--Foreign economic relations.
• Economic development--Environmental aspects.
• Economic development.
• Group of 77.
• Human rights.
• International cooperation.
• International economic relations.
• Interviews.
• Nuclear disarmament.
• Oral histories (literary works)
• Pérez de Cuéllar, Javier, 1920---Interviews.
• United Nations--History.
• United Nations--Officials and employees--Interviews.
• United Nations. General Assembly.--Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
• United Nations. Secretary-General.
• United States--Foreign economic relations--Latin America.
• Weiss, Thomas G. (Thomas George), 1946- interviewer.--http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/relators/ivr
• World politics--1975-1985.
• World politics--1985-1995.

Access Conditions

Copyright by the Ralph Bunche Institute for International Studies, The Graduate Center, The City University of New York, 2003