Biographical Note

NEW PERMANENT OBSERVER OF UNIVERSITY FOR PEACE PRESENTS APPOINTMENT LETTER

(Based on information provided by the Protocol and Liaison Service.)

The new Permanent Observer of the University for Peace (UNPEACE) to the United Nations, Narinder Kakar, presented his letter of appointment to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today.

Prior to his new appointment, Mr. Kakar was most recently the Director of the University’s United Nations Liaison Office in New York, where he served concurrently as the Permanent Observer of the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN).

Prior to joining UNPEACE, Mr. Kakar spent 30 years with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), holding diverse posts with progressively increasing responsibility in Yemen, Guyana, Turkey and China.  He most recently served as the Country Coordinator in the Maldives.  Among his other UNDP posts, he was Deputy Director and subsequently Director of the Division for Resource Mobilization in New York.

During his long career with the United Nations, Mr. Kakar served on a number of bodies, including the United Nations Joint Staff Pension Fund from 1989 to 1995.  He also chaired the Joint Appeals Board during the 1990s and was the first member of the United Nations Federal Credit Union Board of Directors, chairing it from 1991 to 1995.

A citizen of India, Mr. Kakar received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Delhi Polytecnic, where he also earned a diploma in journalism.  He obtained a Master’s degree from Haceteppe University in Turkey and, in 1995, was a social development Research Associate at Harvard University.

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