New Zealand Institute of International Affairs
Speeches
Transcripts of speeches that have been made to the NZIIA or one of it's branches throughout New Zealand.
Born in 1950, Angel Gurría came to the OECD following a distinguished career in Mexico’s public service, including two ministerial posts. As Mexico’s Minister of Foreign Affairs from December 1994 to January 1998, he made dialogue and consensus-building one of the hallmarks of his approach to global issues. From January 1998 to December 2000, he was Mexico’s Minister of Finance and Public Credit in a period of significant and economical change.
As OECD Secretary-General, since June 2006, he has reinforced the OECD's role as a ‘hub” for global dialogue and debate on economic policy issues while pursuing internal modernization and reform. Under his leadership, OECD has opened membership talks with a number of countries including major emerging economies, such as Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Russia and South Africa.
Mr. Gurría is an active participant in various international not-for-profit bodies. He holds a B.A. degree in Economics from UNAM (Mexico), and a M.A. degree in Economics from Leeds University (United Kingdom). He speaks Spanish, French, English, Portuguese, Italian and some German. He is married to Dr. Lulu Quintana, a distinguished ophthalmologist, and they have three adult children.
Ambassador Julien joined the European Commission in 1980. He assumed his present role in 2005. In the early part of his career, his specialist areas were in agriculture, agribusiness, and rural development; fields in which he has tertiary qualifications. A previous European Commission posting was in Washington (1983-87). After that assignment he had responsibility in Brussels as Commission Spokesperson on a diverse range of topics. Between 1995 and 2005 Ambassador Julien's principal Commission responsibilities were to do with environmental and conservation issues. These are increasingly significant aspects of the EU-New Zealand relationship, alongside trade and economic matters, education and science, and joint political/security interests.
Meg Munn was elected Member of Parliament in June 2001 after a career in social work. She was appointed Minister for Womens Equality in May 2005 and subsequently carried responsibilities for Communities and Local Government. She took up her present role as Parliamentary Under-Secretary at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in July 2007 and has Ministerial responsibility for New Zealand and the Pacific.
Ms Karen Koning AbuZayd, Commissioner General for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) Karen AbuZayad has been Commissioner-General of UNRWA since June 2005. She had been Deputy Commissioner-General for the previous five years.
Prior to joining UNRWA, Karen AbuZayad worked for 19 years with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, mainly directing humanitarian relief efforts in Africa: Chad, Ethiopia, Kenya, Namibia, Sierra Leone, Somalia and Uganda. She spent two years1995-96, in Sarajevo during the Bosnian conflict.
In her present role as UNRWA Commissioner-General Karen has responsibility for a budget of $US340 million that provides education, health, social services and small-enterprise programmes for 4 million Palestinian refugees. UNRWA's head offices are in Gaza and Amman. The agency employs 25,000 staff. Karen has degrees from DePauw University Indiana and McGill University Montreal. She lectured in Uganda and Sudan before entering the challenging field of international humanitarian relief.
Dr Hans Blix was born in 1928 in Uppsala, Sweden. He studied at the University of Uppsala; at Columbia University, where he was also a research graduate; and at Cambridge University, where he received his Ph.D.
In 1959, he became Doctor of Laws at the Stockholm University, and in 1960, was appointed Associate Professor in International Law.
He has an Honorary Doctorate from Moscow State University (1987) and is a recipient of the Henry de Wolf Smyth Award (Washington, DC, 1988).
From 1963 to 1976, Dr Blix was Head of Department at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and served as Legal Adviser on International Law. In 1976, he became Under-Secretary of State at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, in charge of international development cooperation. He was appointed Minister for Foreign Affairs in October 1978.
From 1961 until 1981, he was a member of Sweden’s delegation to the United Nations General Assembly; and from 1962 to 1978, a member of the Swedish delegation to the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva.
He served as Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency from 1981 to 1997.
He has written several books on subjects associated with international and constitutional law and was a leader of the Liberal Campaign Committee in favour of retention of the Swedish nuclear energy programme in the referendum in 1980.
Dr Blix was appointed to his present position by the UN Secretary-General in January 2000 and took up his duties on 1 March 2000.
- an update on reform and renewal efforts since the 2005 Summit,
- with a focus on New Zealand interests and priorities as we look to the future - 16 August 2007
Dr Han was President of the 56th Session of the United Nations General Assembly during 2001-2002, and had a leading role in managing the crisis facing the world organisation after the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.
Before entering politics Dr Han was Professor of Economics at Seoul University (1977-88). In 2004 he received an honorary knighthood (KBE).
New Zealand Institute of International Affairs,
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New Zealand.
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