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Secretary-General appoints deputy executive director of UN-HABITAT

Secretary-General appoints deputy executive director of UN-HABITAT

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.

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.