Abstract A water-soluble sulfonato-Cu (salen) complex catalyzed procedure for the N- arylation of simple aliphatic amines, amino alcohols and amino acids in pure water have been developed. A variety of substituted aryl iodides, bromides and electron-deficient chlorides were found to be applicable, and 1, 2-disubstituted benzimidazoles could be prepared easily by a cascade amination/condensation process in this catalytic system.