Kofi Annan, secretary-general of the United Nations, will deliver a lecture at 4:30 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 13, in Science Center C. The talk is open to the public.

President Neil L. Rudenstine will introduce Annan. The talk marks the opening of the Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies Tenth Anniversary Conference, "Conflict or Convergence: Global Perspective on War, Peace, and International Order."

Annan, a national of Ghana, is the first secretary-general to emerge from the ranks of the international civil service, having served in Addis Ababa, Cairo, Geneva, Egypt, and at the U.N. headquarters in New York.

The Harvard Academy, founded in 1987, was established to identify and support younger scholars whose work combines disciplinary excellence in the social sciences with an in-depth grounding in particular countries or regions. The nearly 50 scholars who have received support from the Academy occupy faculty positions at nearly every major research university in the United States.