Dr. Kerstin Leitner served with UNDP for 28 years. Among other functions, she was Resident Coordinator in Malawi and China. After her UNDP service, she was for 2 years Assistant Director-General at WHO, Geneva, in charge of Health and Environment. She retired from this post in 2005 and now lives in Berlin, Germany.
Book review by Kerstin Leitner We are currently experiencing a series of gruesome wars, and an increasing number of violent attacks on civilians both in war and in non-war situations. It seems a contagious toxin is spreading, and we don’t know how to contain and eliminate it. Now a book was published with the title…
Many changes have occurred over the decades since the UN was founded. We need to name these changes, some of which are systemic. For one, many new states were formed through the decolonization process and the collapse of the Soviet Union. They joined the UN, but did they truly subscribe to the spirit of the…
H.E. The President of the GA* Ambassador Dennis Francis UN New York Your Excellency, As a former UN staff member I participate in an informal Peacemaking Reflection Group (PRG), which follows from our respective locations and situations the work of the UN. Members of the Group welcome and would like to thank you for…
The war in Ukraine threw into stark relief the new patterns of geopolitics: On the one hand, there is the revived West, led by the USA, which began to wind down foreign military actions around 2010. On the other, there is certainly China, still without a strong international following, but making common cause with a…