NEW YORK : UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has appointed Oscar-winning actress Charlize Theron as a United Nations messenger of peace, with a special focus on ending violence against women.

She will be formally inducted on Monday at the United Nations headquarters in New York.

Messengers of peace are celebrities mainly from the fields of film, music, literature and sport who are charged with promoting UN activities and ideals through public appearances and media contacts.

Other messengers of peace include Israeli conductor Daniel Barenboim, American actors George Clooney and Michael Douglas, Nobel Peace Prize winner for literature Elie Wiesel, Chinese-American cellist Yo-Yo Ma, British primatologist Jane Goodall, Princess Haya Bint Al Hussein of Jordan, Brazilian writer Paulo Coelho and Japanese violinist Midori Goto.

Theron has been involved in charitable causes in rural areas of her native South Africa. She founded the Charlize Theron Africa Outreach Project with the goal of promoting HIV/AIDS education for impoverished children and their families in South Africa.

She also had her own experience of domestic violence at the age of 15 when her mother fatally shot her alcoholic father as he threatened the family in a drunken rage.

- CNA/il