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PACE President ends New York visit with an appeal for the election of a woman to the UN’s top job

13/03/2026 President

PACE President meets the UN Secretary General in New York

PACE President Petra Bayr has concluded a visit to the UN in New York by expressing strong support for the election of a woman as the next Secretary General of the UN.

The President was participating in the 70th session of the Commission for the Status of Women (CSW70), dedicated this year to the access of women to justice, and headed a PACE delegation attending the event.

In a series of high-level meetings with top UN officials — including with UN Secretary General António Guterres and the President of the UN General Assembly Analena Baerbock — she underlined the need to preserve recent progress on gender equality and to address the “backlash” against women’s rights. She also spoke at a side-event organised by PACE on this topic.

Europe needed to play a leading role in that process through “positive and inspiring examples”, the President underlined.

She also took part in a number of other side-events taking place at the global body organised by Unicef, UN Women, the IPU, OSCE-ODIHR and other organisations.

PACE President meets the UN Secretary General in New York
PACE President ends New York visit with an appeal for the election of a woman to the UN’s top job
PACE President ends New York visit with an appeal for the election of a woman to the UN’s top job
PACE President ends New York visit with an appeal for the election of a woman to the UN’s top job
PACE President ends New York visit with an appeal for the election of a woman to the UN’s top job
PACE President ends New York visit with an appeal for the election of a woman to the UN’s top job
PACE President ends New York visit with an appeal for the election of a woman to the UN’s top job
PACE President ends New York visit with an appeal for the election of a woman to the UN’s top job
PACE President Petra Bayr at the UN in New York: ‘The backlash against women's rights is real, but it is not inevitable’