UN Secretary-General to open high-level conference on preventing violent extremism

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and Federal Councillor Didier Burkhalter, head of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA), will open a high-level meeting of the Geneva Conference on Preventing Violent Extremism – The Way Forward, which begins tomorrow in Geneva.

The conference is co-hosted by the Government of Switzerland and the United Nations at the UN office in Geneva.

Building upon the Secretary-General’s Plan of Action to Prevent Violent Extremism and the formal debate of the General Assembly on 12 and 16 February 2016, the Geneva Conference will provide an opportunity for the international community to share experiences and good practices in addressing the drivers of violent extremism and to build support for the Plan of Action.

The first of the conference day will be dedicated to a meeting of senior experts on key issues related to the prevention of violent extremism. The second day will be the high-level segment of the Conference including interventions at the ministerial level. Heads of international and regional organisations and heads of UN agencies will also participate in the discussions on action at the national, regional and global level during the day.