As we reported Aishwarya Rai Bachchan was recently in New York City attending the UN Peace Bell ceremony on September 21st. Aishwarya then had a very busy week and we have an exclusive report and pictures from the events Mrs. Rai-Bachchan attended including her appointment as the International Goodwill Ambassador for UNAIDS (United Nations programme on HIV/AIDS) on September 24th. Calling it an honor, she said at the event, “By coming on board, I hope to give further impetus to the work that UNAIDS has done and further contribute to the help spread the message. UNAIDS’ passion is infectious and I would like to contribute to it. This is shared responsibility and we can achieve it and make it possible.”
Also on September 24th Aishwarya attended the Women’s Leaders Forum at the Yale Club of New York. The subject of the meeting was “ensuring digital health and education for every woman and every child”. She spoke about a cause she says close to her heart and advocated for PMCTCT efforts worldwide along with Naomi Watts, Michel Sidibe (Executive Director, UNAIDS). Also attending this was the honourable Joyce Banda, President of MALAWI.
After this she also went to the Indian Mission where Indian kids were dressed up and welcomed her with flowers. The actress interacted with the staff, kids and the wives who were there to welcome her.
On the 25th she attended a dinner hosted by the Secretary General at MOMA (Museum of Modern Art), and high profile attendees included various heads of states as well as sports and entertainment stars including Shaquille O Neil, Deepak Chopra, and Christy Turlington to name a few.
September 26th brought another prestigious event with Aishwarya attending the Shared Responsibility and Global Solidarity event at the United Nations 67th General Assembly. At the event she met Gordon Brown, Special Envoy of the Secretary General for Global Education (Gordon Brown is a British Labour Party politician who was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Labour Party from 2007 until 2010). She also met with Hillary Clinton briefly as well.
About her appointment to the post, Michael Sidibe said, “Aishwarya is respected and admired by millions of people around the world. I am convinced that through her global outreach, Aishwarya can help UNAIDS reach its goal of eliminating new HIV infections among children by 2015. We look forward to working with her to reach our collective goals.”
