Assistant Secretary-General
Jomo Kwame Sundaram
Jomo Kwame Sundaram has been Assistant Secretary-General for Economic Development at DESA since January 2005.
Mr. Jomo has an extensive background in the field of economic development. He has taught at Harvard, Yale, Science University of Malaysia, National University of Malaysia, University of Malaya and Cornell. He has also been a Visiting Fellow at Cambridge University and a Senior Research Fellow at the Asia Research Institute in the National University of Singapore.
He was the Founder-Director of the Institute of Social Analysis (INSAN), Founder-Chair of IDEAs (International Development Economics Associates) and has served on the Board of the United Nations Research Institute on Social Development (UNRISD), Geneva.
Mr. Jomo has also served as the (Honorary) Research Coordinator for the G-24 Intergovernmental Group on International Monetary Affairs and Development since December 2006.
Over the years, Mr. Jomo has authored more than 40 monographs, edited more than 60 books and translated 12 volumes, in addition to writing numerous academic papers and articles for the media.
He studied at both Yale and Harvard. In 2007, he was awarded the Wassily Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought.
Thomas Stelzer
Thomas Stelzer has been Assistant Secretary-General for Policy Coordination and Inter-Agency Affairs at DESA since March 2008.
Previous to this appointment, Mr. Stelzer served as Permanent Representative of Austria to the United Nations Office in Vienna, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) and the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) Preparatory Commission.
Earlier in his career, Mr. Stelzer held a number of diplomatic and international posts, including Special Assistant to the Executive Secretary of the CTBTO Preparatory Commission, Deputy Director of the Austrian Cultural Institute in New York and Minister-Counsellor at the Permanent Mission of Austria to the United Nations Headquarters in New York.
He was the Austrian Delegate to the Committee for Disarmament and International Security (First Committee) of the General Assembly and Representative to the governing bodies of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).
Mr. Stelzer was President of the UNIDO Industrial Development Board from 2005-2006, Chair of the CTBTO Preparatory Commission in 2003 and Facilitator and Chair of the Vienna Terrorism Symposiums in both 2002 and 2007.
Most recently, he served as a Vice-Chair of the Second Conference of States Parties of the United Nations Convention against Corruption, which he had also co-negotiated.
His academic pursuits have included services as a lecturer on multilateralism at the Department of Political Science at Vienna University.
Since 1999, Mr. Stelzer has been serving as President of Klangforum Wien, a leading ensemble for contemporary classical music.
Mr. Stelzer obtained his doctorate in law from Vienna University, a Master of Arts in Latin American Studies from Stanford University and a diploma in International Relations from the John Hopkins University, School of Advanced International Studies, Bologna Center.
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