Nationality Hungarian, Swiss | ||
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Occupation Senior Adviser to the Secretary-General on Climate Change, United Nations | ||
János Pásztor (born 1955) is a Hungarian diplomat, the Senior Adviser to the Secretary-General on Climate Change. He joined his current role in January 2016 at the request of United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Prior to his current role he was Assistant Secretary-General on Climate Change in the Executive Office of the Secretary-General of the United Nations in New York City. He was appointed Assistant Secretary-General in January 2015 after taking leave of absence from the World Wide Fund for Nature International where he was Policy and Science Director and acting Director for Conservation.
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Career in the UN
Pásztor has extensive experience of working in the United Nations with previous roles including (2010-2012) Executive Secretary of the UN Secretary-General’s High-level Panel on Global Sustainability (GSP); (2008-2010) Director of UN Secretary-General’s Climate Change Support Team; (2007) Director, UN Environment Management Group (EMG), United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP); (1993-2006) Various positions at the secretariat of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), initially in Geneva, and later in Bonn. The last position was Coordinator, Project-based Mechanisms Programme; (1990-1992) Senior Programme Officer, Atmosphere and Energy, Secretariat of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED, or the “Earth Summit ‘92”); and (1986-1989) Energy Programme Officer, United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
Career outside of the UN
From 2012-2015 he was Policy and Science Director, and from May 2015 Acting Executive Director for Conservation at WWF International; (1989-1990) he was a Research Associate, Stockholm Environment Institute; (1985-1986) Senior Programme Officer, Energy at the World Commission on Environment and Development (the “Brundtland Commission”); (1984) Research Associate, The Beijer Institute; (1979 – 1983) Director, Energy for my Neighbour Programme, World Council of Churches (WCC).
Education and personal life
A national of Hungary (and later also of Switzerland), he holds a B.Sc. and M.Sc. in Nuclear Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He is married and has two children.