Guterres Attends World Bank, IMF Spring Meetings in Washington
Summary
UN Secretary-General António Guterres traveled to Washington, D.C. on 15 April 2026 to participate in the Spring Meetings of the World Bank and the IMF. He joined World Bank President Ajay Banga at the closing of the Water Forward Initiative, delivering remarks on access to water as a basic human right. He subsequently helped launch the Borrowers Platform, a new forum for borrowing countries to share experience, build technical capacity, and speak collectively on debt architecture reform. The Secretary-General also met separately with Barbados Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley and Pakistan Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb.
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This press release documents UN Secretary-General António Guterres's participation in the World Bank and IMF Spring Meetings in Washington, D.C. on 15 April 2026. He attended the closing of the World Bank's Water Forward Initiative, where he called access to water a basic human right and urged governments to pursue dialogue to prevent water crises from becoming conflict drivers. He also helped launch the Borrowers Platform, describing it as a historic breakthrough to address inequities in the global financial and debt architecture, with UNCTAD serving as its secretariat. The Secretary-General met with Barbados Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley and Pakistan Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb. For compliance professionals, this document carries no binding obligations, penalties, or reporting requirements — it is an informational account of diplomatic engagement with multilateral development institutions.
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Apr 22, 2026GovPing captured this document from the original source. If the source has since changed or been removed, this is the text as it existed at that time.
Press Release
- Secretary-General
- Travel
SG/T/3461
21 April 2026
Activities of Secretary-General in Washington, D.C., 15 April
On the morning of Wednesday, 15 April, UN Secretary-General António Guterres arrived in Washington, D.C., to participate in the Spring Meetings of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
The Secretary-General joined World Bank President Ajay Banga at the closing of the Bank’s Water Forward Initiative. He told participants that the United Nations fully supports the Bank’s initiative and added that no strategy for development is sustainable if water is not an essential part of that strategy. It is totally unacceptable, he said, that access to water is not considered a basic human right.
Mr. Guterres called on Governments to show the political will to engage in bilateral or multilateral dialogue to manage water crises, which can, all too often, be drivers of conflict.
The Secretary-General then helped launch the Borrowers Platform. In remarks, he called the Borrowers Platform a historic breakthrough to address deep inequities in the global financial and debt architecture. He said borrower countries have long lacked a space comparable to creditor coordination forums.
The Platform will allow borrowing countries to sit together, share experience, build technical capacity and speak with a collective voice. The Secretary-General stressed that changing power relations is essential to achieving a fairer, more inclusive international financial system, noting the central role of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) as its secretariat.
While in Washington, D.C., the Secretary-General met with the Prime Minister of Barbados, Mia Amor Mottley, and with the Finance Minister of Pakistan, Muhammad Aurangzeb. The Secretary-General and the Finance Minister discussed the recently launched Platform. The Secretary-General took the opportunity to once again thank Pakistan for its effort in helping to resolve the current conflict in the Middle East.
The Secretary-General left Washington, D.C., in the early evening of Wednesday, 15 April.
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