Biographical Note

Secretary-General Appoints Izumi Nakamitsu of Japan as Assistant Administrator,

 

Director, United Nations Development Programme’s Crisis Response Unit

 

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon announced today the appointment of Izumi Nakamitsu of Japan as Assistant Administrator and Director of the Crisis Response Unit, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

Ms. Nakamitsu has many years of distinguished service within and outside the United Nations system, most recently as Director, Asia and the Middle East Division of the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations.  Between 2008 and 2012, she was Director, Division of Policy, Evaluation and Training, Department of Peacekeeping Operations.  Between 2005 and 2008, she was in her native Japan as Professor of International Relations at Hitotsubashi University, Tokyo, and during the same period, she also served as a member of the Foreign Exchange Council to the Japanese Foreign Minister, and as a visiting senior advisor on peacebuilding at Japan International Cooperation Agency.

Prior to this, she was Chef de Cabinet and Director of Planning and Coordination at the Stockholm-based intergovernmental organization, the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA) between 1998 and 2004.  Earlier in her career, she held a number of positions in the United Nations system, both at Headquarters and in the field, including in the United Nations Reform Team of former Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Assistant High Commissioner for Policy and Operations Sergio Vieira de Mello, and in UNHCR field operations in the former Yugoslavia, Turkey and northern Iraq.

Ms. Nakamitsu holds a Master of Science in Foreign Service from Georgetown University, Washington, D.C., and a Bachelor of Law from Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan.

Born in 1963, she is married with two children.

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