UN Secretary Generals | Famous Books for UPSC Exam (Summary & Tests) PDF Download

The current Secretary-General of the United Nations is António Guterres, who assumed office on 1 January 2017, making him the ninth person to hold this position. Here is a list of the previous Secretaries-General and the dates of their terms:

• Trygve Lie, from Norway, served from 1946 to 1952.
• Dag Hammarskjöld, from Sweden, served from 1953 to 1961.
• U Thant, from Burma (now Myanmar), served from 1961 to 1971.
• Kurt Waldheim, from Austria, served from 1972 to 1981.
• Javier Perez de Cuellar, from Peru, served from 1982 to 1991.
• Boutros Boutros-Ghali, from Egypt, served from 1992 to 1996.
• Kofi A. Annan, from Ghana, served from 1997 to 2006.
• Ban Ki-moon, from the Republic of Korea, served from 2007 to 2016.

Before assuming his role, António Guterres served as Acting Secretary-General from Portugal and has been in office since 2017. It's worth mentioning that Gladwyn Jebb from the United Kingdom served as Acting Secretary-General from 24 October 1945 to 1 February 1946.

In late December 1950 and early 1951, Secretary-General Trygve Lie traveled to Europe for the holidays with his family. During his absence, Mr. David K. Owen, who was then the Assistant Secretary-General for the Department of Economic and Social Affairs, was appointed as Acting Secretary-General in New York. Trygve Lie visited Geneva, Paris, and London to find a suitable venue for the 6th regular session of the General Assembly, which was eventually held in Paris. More details about these appointments and additional resources for each Secretary-General can be found in the Research Guide on the Secretariat, which provides links to relevant information held by the Library.