UN chief says he'd like a woman to be next secretary-general

Sitting onstage in Los Angeles last Wednesday with U.S. Rep. Ed Royce, a California Republican who chairs the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Ban stressed that women comprise half the world's population and should be empowered and "given equal opportunities."

"[...] that's my humble suggestion, but that's up to member states," Ban said in the AP interview last Thursday during a visit to the home of 99-year-old Libba Patterson in Novato where he spent his first days in the United States as an 18-year-old student from South Korea.

The three other women candidates are New Zealand's former prime minister Helen Clark, who heads the U.N. Development Program; Christiana Figueres of Costa Rica, the U.N. official who played a key role in shaping last December's historic agreement to fight climate change; and former Moldovan Foreign Minister Natalia Gherman,

There is no deadline for nominations and two women mentioned as long-shot late entries are German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Kristalina Georgieva, another Bulgarian who is the European Commission's budget chief and a former top World Bank official.

The prospective secretary-general should have "a clear vision for the world of the future" and "strong integrity and commitment" to make progress toward peace and promote development and human rights, he said, and the ability to tackle seemingly intractable issues through inclusive dialogue and with flexibility.