Stressing on the need for fundamental reforms in the United Nations to meet new multiple challenges, including terrorism, poverty, disease and climate change, Secretary General Kofi Annan has appealed to lawmakers around the world to press their governments to advance the interests of the entire planet.

"The time has long since arrived to look hard at the institutions of the United Nations -- and, if necessary, to make radical reforms," Annan told the 109th Inter-Parliamentary Union Assembly in Geneva in a message delivered by Sergei Ordzhonikidze, Director-General of the UN Office there.

The decisions for change rest with member states, Annan said, pledging to do everything possible to help them make the UN a better instrument in the service of the peoples of the world. "Indeed, I appeal for your help. If the reform agenda is to succeed, it will require states to promote their national interest by advancing the global interest," he said.

"You as parliamentarians can do much to mobilise public opinion and encourage governments to do just that. The IPU itself, recently granted observer status in the General Assembly, can also make vital contributions to deliberations on these issues in the United Nations," he said.

Annan noted that some people feel uniquely endangered by terrorism and weapons of mass destruction while others see
civil wars and other armed conflicts in which conventional weapons and small arms cause terrible destruction as the main threat.

Yet others confront so-called 'soft threats' such as extreme poverty, infectious diseases, climatic change and environmental degradation and are worried their concerns do not receive sufficient priority.

"All these threats -- new and old, hard and soft -- are real and must be addressed. And they are, of course, inter-related," he said, adding that the UN is not always as effective as it could be in meeting all these challenges.

"This is hardly surprising, given that the principal organs of the United Nations have not altered in their fundamentals since 1945, while the world they are intended to manage has changed almost beyond recognition," he said.