To understand my feelings — and my conception of the role of Secretary General — the nature of my religious and cultural background must first be understood. I should therefore like to outline not only my beliefs but also my conception of human institutions and of the human situation itself.

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As a Buddhist, I was trained to be tolerant of everything except intolerance

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The world will not Change and find peace if there is not a new education.

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Understanding, love and tolerance are the highest forms of interest on out small and interdependent planet.

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The single most important impediment to global institutions is the concept of "my country, right or wrong".

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Governments, systems, ideologies come and go, but it is humanity which remains.

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The concept of peaceful coexistence has been criticized by many who do not see the need to make the world safe for diversity. I wonder if they have ever paused to ask themselves the question: What is the alternative to coexistence?

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Every human being, of whatever origin, of whatever station, deserves respect. We must each respect others even as we respect ourselves.

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In modern war there is no such thing as victor and vanquished... There is only a loser, and the loser is mankind.

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As we watch the sun go down, evening after evening, through the smog across the poisoned waters of our native earth, we must ask ourselves seriously whether we really wish some future universal historian on another planet to say about us: "With all their genius and with all their skill, they ran out of foresight and air and food and water and ideas," or, They went on playing politics until their world collapsed around them.

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