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Rudolphus Franciscus Marie Lubbers or Ruud Lubbers (* May 7, 1939) is since 2001 the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.
Life and career
Ruud Lubbers was prime minister of the Netherlands from 1982 until 1994, coming from the Christian CDA party. A strong political conservative, during his time in office, Lubbers was regarded by many as a heir to Margaret Thatcher; one of his campaign slogans was: "meer markt, minder overheid" (more market, less government).
Lubbers was born in Rotterdam. He studied economics at the Erasmus University Rotterdam and was a student of the first Nobel Prize Laureate in economics Jan Tinbergen. As suggested by the title of his 1962 thesis - "The influence of differing productivity trends in various countries on the current account of the balance of payments" - his main interest was in monetary affairs. He originally planned an academic career, but was compelled by family circumstances to join the management of Lubbers' Construction Workshops and Machinery Fabricators Hollandia B.V.
From 11 May 1973 to 19 December 1977 he was Minister of Economic Affairs in the Den Uyl-government and a member of the Catholic People's Party (KVP). He was an effective, if sometimes somewhat bad-tempered minister. He chose to return to Parliament on the formation of the Van Agt-government in 1977, becoming Senior Deputy Parliamentary Leader of the Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), the alliance between the KVP and the other two main denominational parties.. His career got an unexpected boost when the leader of the parliamentary faction of the CDA, Willem Aantjes, had to resign in 1978 on accusations that he served in the Germanic-SS during the Second World War. Lubbers took over the position of Aantjes and suddenly found himself in a powerful political position.
In 1982 after the general election won by Prime Minister Dries van Agt, a similar thing happened when Van Agt suddenly announced he would not be available for a third term. Lubbers took over the post, a position he held until 1994, making him the longest serving prime minister in the history of The Netherlands.
Major aspects of his time in office:
- Extensive cutbacks in public spending
- The launch of far-reaching deregulation and privatization programs
- A massive demonstration in The Hague (1983) against the planned installation in the Netherlands of nuclear-armed US cruise missiles (which was cancelled after all due to arms reduction talks between the US and the Soviet Union)
After leaving office, was put forward as a candidate for the head of NATO, but the US vetoed his appointment.
Ruud Lubbers (left) and Romano Prodi From 1995 to 2000 he taught Globalization Studies at Tilburg University in the Netherlands and at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University in the United States. He was also vice-chairman of the Independent World Commission on the Oceans and chair of Globus, the Institute for Globalization and Development based in Tilburg.
On January 1, 2001 he became the ninth United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. He succeeded Mrs. Sadako Ogata of Japan. In October 2003, his three year term was extended for another two years, to December 31, 2005. He annually donates some $300,000 to the refugee agency since he assumed his post in 2001, an amount roughly equivalent to his salary and expenses.
Sexual harassment allegation
In May 2004 the UN Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS) has launched an investigation into an allegation by a 51-year-old American female administrator in the human resources department of the refugee organisation, that Lubbers has harassed her sexually while she left a meeting in December 2003. The OIOS expanded the investigation and questioned many UN personnel to determine if there was "a broader context." Lubbers claims that he just made a friendly gesture and that it was a misunderstanding, possibly caused by a colleague who jokingly gave the gesture a sexual connotation. The woman waited more than four months before filing a formal complaint.
On July 15 2004 Lubbers was declared innocent by Secretary General Kofi Annan thus resolving the situation, though Annan was critical about the way Lubbers handled the situation: he wrote a letter asking the woman to withdraw the allegation, and promised that in that case the matter would have no negative consequences for her. Some argue that this could be construed as a threat in the case that she would refuse.
John Danforth, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, has asked Annan for clarification on declaring Lubbers innocent.
The woman appealed, but later withdrew the appeal.
Honorary doctorate
On 6 September 2004 Ruud Lubbers received an honorary doctorate from the Radboud University Nijmegen.
External Links
- The High Commissioner Ruud Lubbers (http://www.unhcr.ch/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/admin/+LwwFqAvxxvWW9WWwxFqAvxxvWW9WWwhFqhT0NuItFqhwmMoDzFqhEyTfNAFqwDzmwwwwwwww1FqhEyTfN) - UNHCR website
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