MAJOR-GENERAL FRANCISZEK GAGOR OF POLAND APPOINTED FORCE COMMANDER IN UNITED NATIONS IRAQ-KUWAIT OBSERVATION MISSION

MAJOR-GENERAL FRANCISZEK GĄGOR OF POLAND APPOINTED FORCE COMMANDER

IN UNITED NATIONS IRAQ-KUWAIT OBSERVATION MISSION

Secretary-General Kofi Annan announced today the appointment of Major-General Franciszek Gągor of Poland as Force Commander of the United Nations Iraq-Kuwait Observation Mission (UNIKOM) with effect from 17 January 2003.

Major-General Gągor has served in the Polish Armed Forces for 34 years.  He has held several command and staff appointments and is presently Chief of the General Directorate Operations General Staff.  From 1996 to 1999, he served as  the Director, Military Foreign Affairs Department, and from 1991 to1995, as Deputy Director and Director of the Bureau of Arms Control and Peacekeeping Missions of that Department.  In 1991, he was Head of the Peacekeeping Operations Division General Staff.

Major-General Gągor has served as a senior interpreter in the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF) II (1976-1977), as Chief Operations Officer of the Polish Battalion in the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force (UNDOF) (1980 and 1985), as Deputy Chief Logistics Officer in UNDOF (1989-1990), and as Deputy Sector Commander in UNIKOM in 1992. 

Major-General Gągor graduated from the Higher Military School of Mechanized Infantry, Warsaw, in 1973 and holds a master’s degree (1983) from the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań and a PhD (1998) from the Polish Academy of National Defence in Warsaw.

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