Swedish diplomat turns down top U.N. job in Kabul
Over at FP‘s newest blog Turtle Bay, Column Lynch reports that Steffan di Mistura has turned down the job of U.N. mission chief in Afghanistan. The Cable first reported that di Mistura had been offered the job, based on an interview with Richard Holbrooke. From Lynch’s post: The decision by Staffan di Mistura, a veteran ...
Over at FP's newest blog Turtle Bay, Column Lynch reports that Steffan di Mistura has turned down the job of U.N. mission chief in Afghanistan. The Cable first reported that di Mistura had been offered the job, based on an interview with Richard Holbrooke.
Over at FP‘s newest blog Turtle Bay, Column Lynch reports that Steffan di Mistura has turned down the job of U.N. mission chief in Afghanistan. The Cable first reported that di Mistura had been offered the job, based on an interview with Richard Holbrooke.
From Lynch’s post:
The decision by Staffan di Mistura, a veteran U.N. envoy who headed the U.N. mission in Baghdad, complicates the U.N.’s effort to ensure a smooth leadership transition when Kai Eide, the U.N.’s current chief in Kabul, steps down in March.
Eide said that he had informed Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon of his decision to step down months before his scheduled departure to avoid a leadership vacuum.
U.N. diplomats said that the U.N. has reopened its consideration of a short list of potential candidates, including Jean-Marie Guehénno, the former U.N. peacekeeping chief, Knut Vollebaek, Norway’s foreign minister, and Atonio Gutteres of Portugal, the head of the office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees. Jan Koubis, the director of the U.N. Economic Commission for Europe, is also under consideration.
Josh Rogin covers national security and foreign policy and writes the daily Web column The Cable. His column appears bi-weekly in the print edition of The Washington Post. He can be reached for comments or tips at josh.rogin@foreignpolicy.com.
Previously, Josh covered defense and foreign policy as a staff writer for Congressional Quarterly, writing extensively on Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay, U.S.-Asia relations, defense budgeting and appropriations, and the defense lobbying and contracting industries. Prior to that, he covered military modernization, cyber warfare, space, and missile defense for Federal Computer Week Magazine. He has also served as Pentagon Staff Reporter for the Asahi Shimbun, Japan's leading daily newspaper, in its Washington, D.C., bureau, where he reported on U.S.-Japan relations, Chinese military modernization, the North Korean nuclear crisis, and more.
A graduate of George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs, Josh lived in Yokohama, Japan, and studied at Tokyo's Sophia University. He speaks conversational Japanese and has reported from the region. He has also worked at the House International Relations Committee, the Embassy of Japan, and the Brookings Institution.
Josh's reporting has been featured on CNN, MSNBC, C-Span, CBS, ABC, NPR, WTOP, and several other outlets. He was a 2008-2009 National Press Foundation's Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellow, 2009 military reporting fellow with the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism and the 2011 recipient of the InterAction Award for Excellence in International Reporting. He hails from Philadelphia and lives in Washington, D.C. Twitter: @joshrogin
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