Speakers

Speakers for the TEIMUN conference 2012 will be announced soon! 

Speakers 2011

Jaap de Hoop Scheffer

Jaap de Hoop Scheffer was born in Amsterdam on 3 April 1948. After completing his secondary education, he studied law at Leiden University, graduating in 1974. From 1976 to 1986, he was employed in the Foreign Service of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He started in the spokesmen’s service (1976). From 1976 to 1978, he served at the Embassy in Accra (Ghana). He then worked at the Permanent Delegation to NATO in Brussels until 1980, where he was responsible for issues relating to defence planning. Mr De Hoop Scheffer was elected to the House of Representatives of the States General for the Christian Democratic Alliance (CDA) in June 1986. He became the party’s spokesperson on foreign policy (as well as asylum and refugee policy and European justice matters) in the House and served on the Permanent Committees on Justice, European Affairs and Defence. From 1989 to 1994 he chaired the Permanent Committee on Development Cooperation. From 1986 to 1994 he was also a member of the Parliamentary Assemblies of the Council of Europe and the Western European Union (WEU). In 1990, during the Gulf crisis, he served as WEU rapporteur on the consequences of the invasion of Kuwait and continuing operations in the Gulf region.

From 1994 to1997, he was a member of the North Atlantic Assembly. In October 2001, he resigned as leader of the parliamentary party and as the political leader of the CDA. From November 2001 to 15 May 2002, he chaired the House Permanent Committee on Foreign Affairs. On 22 July 2002, he was appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs in the first Balkenende government. He was appointed to the same post in the second Balkenende government on 27 May 2003 (until 3 December 2003). 

He served as the 11th Secretary General of NATO from January 5, 2004 until August 1, 2009.

On 1 September 2009 De Hoop Scheffer was appointed to the Pieter Kooimans Chair for Peace, Law and Security at Leiden University. The appointment is part-time, and the holder of this chair is appointed for a maximum of three years. De Hoop Scheffer will focus on issues in the area of peace, law and security and will also lecture in the field of international politics and the practice of diplomacy.Jaap de Hoop Scheffer is the first holder of the Kooijmans chair for Peace, Law and Security at Campus The Hague.

Uri Rosenthal

Uri Rosenthal began his professional academic career in 1970 as a lecturer at the University of Amsterdam. From 1973 to 1979 he lectured at Erasmus University, where, in 1980, he became professor of political science. Since 1987 he has been professor of public administration at Leiden University. Besides his academic duties, Professor Rosenthal was, until his appointment as foreign minister, also chairman of the Institute for Safety, Security and Crisis Management. From 1997 to 2002 he was deputy chair of the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO).

Uri Rosenthal has represented the People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) in the Senate of the States General since June 1999. In 2005 he became leader of the VVD in the Senate. In that capacity he was active in international organisations including the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and the Euro-Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly.

On 14 October 2010 Professor Rosenthal was appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Rutte-Verhagen government. 

Sigrid Kaag

Sigrid Kaag (1961) is the Assistant Secretary-General and Assistant Administrator and Director of the Partnerships Bureau of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). From 2007 to 2010 Ms. Kaag has served as the Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa with the United Nationals Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in Amman, Jordan. Prior to this, she served as the Chief of Staff of the Executive Director and as Deputy Director of Programmes of UNICEF in New York. Ms. Kaag also served with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in the Middle East and Vienna, in Sudan as senior UN adviser to the United Nations/World Bank Joint Assessment Mission in the office of the Deputy Special Representative of the Secretary-General and as Deputy Director of Programmes, Chief Donor Relations, at the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Geneva . In her career before joining the UN system in 1994, Ms. Kaag worked for the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and for Shell International in London.