Sheikha Moza bint Nasser yesterday joined UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon at the launch of his new initiative to make education a top global priority and boost progress towards the Millennium Development Goals on education. Speaking at the Education First initiative held on the sidelines of the 67th Session of the UN General Assembly, HH Sheikha Moza said: “The world is coming together to put education back in its rightful place on the agenda – first. Yes we will need funds, yes we will need resources, but most of all we need real understanding, genuine resolve, and action.” The initiative aims to tackle the global challenge of 61mn children receiving no education at all. Almost half of these live in conflict zones or fragile states. HH Sheikha Moza will take an advisory role to Ban Ki-moon on the Steering Committee of Education First, drawing on her experience as a Unesco special envoy for basic and higher education and as her role as Millennium Development Goals Advocate for education. “The loss of an education is a real and life-threatening tragedy to the victims whose voices right now are simply not being heard. It can mean the loss of a future,” Sheikha Moza said. “It is the most vicious of circles. No education means no job, no job means no income, and no income means no education. Destroying education in a conflict zone destroys a society’s chances of recovery. We know that children deprived of an education in conflict zones are far more likely to be drafted into armies or militias of one type or another. This is the logic of violence at its simplest, at its most brutal.” Sheikha Moza said she would announce in November her own “significant new initiative that will be a practical and powerful step towards getting those 61mn children into school.”