Minister for Africa, Asia and the UN

Mark Malloch-Brown was appointed the Minister for Africa, Asia and the UN in June 2007 and attends meetings of the Cabinet.

He served as Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations from April to December 2006. Before this, from January 2005, he had been the Secretary-General’s Chef de Cabinet. From July 1999 until August 2005 he was Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme. After stepping down from the UN, he briefly took up the role of Vice Chairman of Soros Fund Management.

Before the UN, he worked at the World Bank, joining in 1994 as Director of External Affairs and subsequently serving as Vice-President for External Affairs and Vice-President for United Nations Affairs from 1996 to 1999.

He was the lead international partner from 1986 to 1994 in a strategic communications management firm, the Sawyer-Miller Group, where he worked with corporations and governments.

He founded the Economist Development Report and served as its editor from 1983 to 1986. Previously - from 1977 to 1979 - he was the political correspondent of The Economist.

From 1979 to 1983, he worked for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and was stationed in Thailand from 1979 to 1981, in charge of field operations for Cambodian refugees.

He received a first class honours degree in History from Magdalene College, Cambridge University, and a Master's Degree in Political Science from the University of Michigan, and is the recipient of a number of honorary degrees and awards. At the end of 2006, he became a Distinguished Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Globalisation at Yale University. Aged 53, he is married with four children.

Responsibilities

• Africa
• Asia (Afghanistan, Sub-Continent and Far East)
• United Nations
• Commonwealth
• Human rights
• Global and economic issues
• FCO Services
• FCO business in the House of Lords