Thomas Gass of Switzerland was appointed by the United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon as Assistant Secretary-General for Policy Coordination and Inter-Agency Affairs in the Department of Economic and Social Affairs.

Mr. Gass, who will take up his position on 3 September, brings with him wide-ranging experience in bilateral and multilateral development cooperation.  Since August 2009, he has served as Head of the Mission of Switzerland to Nepal (Ambassador and Country Director of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation).
Before his posting to Nepal, Mr. Gass was Head of the Economic and Development Section at the Permanent Mission of Switzerland to the United Nations in New York.  He also served as Policy and Programme Officer for the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, as Deputy Resident Representative of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Guyana, and as Regional Director for Europe with the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute in Rome.
Born in 1963, Mr. Gass holds a PhD in natural sciences from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich and an MSc and engineering diploma in agricultural sciences from the same Institute. He is married and father of three adult children.

The following staff members were promoted in August:

Haitian Lu, Principal Programme Officer, Office of the Under-Secretary-General

Huanyu Liu, Economic Affairs Officer, Office for ECOSOC Support and Coordination