Former prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, whose assassination 20 years ago is being marked this month, was "a heroic man of peace," UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said Wednesday.br Ban lamented that "terrorism, expanding settlements and halting progress in implementing Israeli-Palestinian agreements have repeatedly shattered hopes.br Offering his "deepest sympathies to the citizens of the State of Israel as they commemorate the life of a heroic man of peace," the secretary general urged Israelis to reclaim what he said was Rabin's initiative.br Rabin, a former IDF chief of staff, was assassinated on November 4, 1995, by Yigal Amir, a Jewish opponent of the Oslo peace process.