CHINA: Senior United Nations official Siddharth Chatterjee has formally taken over as the UN Resident Coordinator in China. He will be overseeing the work of 27 agencies, funds, and programs of the global organization in the world’s most populous country. Chatterjee will be UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’s senior-most UN Representative in China as the UN Resident Coordinator.
Resident Coordinators are the UN Secretary-General’s representatives for development at the country level. They are responsible for leading UN teams in different countries to recover better from the COVID-19 pandemic through the SDGs.
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In a statement, Chatterjee said, “Over the past four decades, the world has witnessed the profound economic and social transformations that have taken place in China, lifting hundreds of millions out of poverty.”
“As the UN Resident Coordinator to China, I look forward to leading the UN Country Team to work with the government to preserve this hard-won progress China has made as well as share China’s vast experience to solve global development challenges and accelerate the drive to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),” he added.
Over a period of 24 years in the UN, Chatterjee has served in a wide range of positions and organizations.
In December last year, UN Secretary-General Guterres appointed Chatterjee as the Resident Coordinator in China with the host government’s approval.
An advocate of gender equality and youth empowerment, Mr Chatterjee has also served in Switzerland, Denmark, Iraq, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan (Darfur), Indonesia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Iraqi Kurdistan.
He has served in UN Peacekeeping, United Nations Development Programme, United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF), the UN Population Fund, the Red Cross movement, United Nations Office for Project Services and UN Security.