Secretary-General Kofi Annan today announced the appointment of Swedish Ambassador Inga Björk-Klevby as Deputy Executive Director of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT) in Nairobi, Kenya. Ms. Björk-Klevby, an economist, is ambassador to Côte d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, after having been in charge of Sweden's international development cooperation policies, programmes and budget for years and having worked for more than two decades in international finance at the Central Bank of Sweden, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and the African Development Bank. The main task of the Deputy Executive Director of UN-HABITAT is to revitalize and oversee the management of the Habitat and Human Settlements Foundation so that it can contribute effectively to the water and sanitation goals and the slum upgrading targets of the Millennium Declaration, as requested in last month's World Summit Outcome document. Prior to her current assignment, Ms. Björk-Klevby served as the Ambassador of Sweden to Kenya, Rwanda, Seychelles and the Comoros and as Permanent Representative to the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the UN Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT). During this period, she was involved in restructuring the UN Centre for Human Settlements, leading to its current upgraded status as a Programme. She holds a master's degree from the Stockholm School of Economics and is married with two children. Biographical Note Mrs. Björk-Klevby, an economist by training and currently Ambassador of Sweden to Côte d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, has an outstanding international career in diplomacy, international finance and development cooperation. She worked for over 20 years in international finance in various advisory and senior management capacities with the Central Bank of Sweden, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, culminating with the post of Executive Director for the African Development Bank where she represented Nordic countries, Switzerland and India. During the period she served on the Board of the African Development Bank, she also chaired its Committee on Development Effectiveness to improve the Bank's evaluation and strategic planning functions. She also served for several years as the Assistant Undersecretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Sweden in charge of international development cooperation policies, programmes and budget. Prior to her current assignment, Mrs. Björk-Klevby served as the Ambassador of Sweden to Kenya, Rwanda, Seychelles and the Comoros and as Permanent Representative to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and UN-HABITAT. During this period, Mrs. Björk-Klevby was involved in the restructuring of the United Nations Centre of Human Settlements leading to its current status as a Programme. Mrs. Björk-Klevby's long-standing experience with development policies and financing, fund-raising, fund management and disbursement, budget preparations, debt relief and capital-increase negotiations are ideally suited to this post and the post of Deputy Administrator of the Foundation and its Slum Upgrading Facility. In her capacity as board member of several multilateral institutions, Mrs. Björk-Klevby also brings with her a complement of timely experience in institutional management and reform. * *** * |
