The UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon Monday evening announced the appointment of Deputy Executive Director of UNICEF, Rima Salah of Jordan along with two other women to the High-level Independent Panel on Peace Operations.
The UN panel is a mechanism that aims at improving peacekeeping missions works in several countries.
The announcement expands the original 14 member Panel to 17 members, including diplomats, military and scholars, who will assess the missions, their needs and challenges, as well as the nature of the conflict.
In addition to Salah ,the Panel now includes former lecturer and human rights activist Dr. Marie-Louise Baricakon and former Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women. Ms. Radhika Coomaraswamy.
The United Nations has 16 peacekeeping missions deployed across Africa and Asia .
Salah has worked at the UN for 20 years in increasingly senior positions in the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF). She served as UNICEF Deputy Executive Director in New York. Prior to this appointment, she worked as UNICEF Regional Director for West and Central Africa in Dakar, Senegal, where, among other achievements. She was also responsible for the establishment of the United Nations office in Abéché, in eastern Chad. Earlier in her career, she served with UNICEF in Vietnam, Burkina Faso, and Pakistan.
Salah holds a doctorate in cultural anthropology from the State University of New York and is fluent in English, French and Arabic.