Millennium Summit - The Summit

The Summit

The President of Finland Tarja Halonen and the President of Namibia Sam Nujoma co-chaired the Millennium Summit. This was due to the Presidency over the General Assembly of Theo-Ben Gurirab in the fifty-fourth session and that of Harri Holkeri in the fifty-fifth session. Therefore, the heads of state of Finland and Namibia were chosen to preside over the summit.

On Wednesday, 6 September 2000, the Millennium Summit was opened by Kofi Annan, the Secretary-General of the United Nations. Before moving into the summit, Annan called for a minute's silence for four United Nations workers who were killed in West Timor by pro-Indonesian militiamen. U.S. President Bill Clinton and Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered a plea for world peace. Sixty-three other speakers spoke for five minutes each. In the duration of the summit, Bill Clinton held separate meetings with Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian leader Yaser Arafat, calling on them to reach a peace agreement among the two nations, although no actual progress was made in doing so. Both sides were still committed to reaching such an agreement, however.

On Thursday, 7 September 2000, various heads of state discussed peacekeeping issues. They discussed these issues at a round-table meeting of the United Nations Security Council. Seventy speakers were scheduled for this day during the summit, including Chinese President Jiang Zemin, South African President Thabo Mbeki, Sri Lankan President Chandrika Kumaratunga, Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori and President of Sierra Leone Ahmad Kabbah.

The final day of the Millennium Summit, Friday, 8 September 2000, ended after 60 world leaders said their speeches for five minutes each. The speakers included Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid, Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo, and Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee.