NEW PERMANENT REPRESENTATIVE OF COLOMBIA PRESENTS CREDENTIALS TO DIRECTOR-GENERAL OF UNOG

Angelino Garzón, the new Permanent Representative of Colombia to the United Nations Office at Geneva, today presented his credentials to Sergei Ordzhonikidze, the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva.

Mr. Garzón is a Colombian journalist and politician and former union leader. Mostly notably, from January 2004 to December 2007, he was the Governor of the Valle del Cauca Department of Colombia. From December 2007 to the present Mr. Garzón worked as a consultant for a number of international and national concerns and, since October 2007, remains a member of the Carter Group to Improve Bilateral Relations Between Colombia and Ecuador.

During the Government of President Andres Pastrana, Mr. Garzón was appointed as Minister for Labour from 2000 until 2002. Since 2000, he has also been an active member of the Bi-national Commission Colombia-Venezuela.

Mr. Garzón has also been involved in labour issues as a union leader for many different labour unions, and served as General Secretary of the Central Union of Workers between 1981 and 1990. He later ran for congressman and was elected to become part of the Constituent Assembly of Colombia that created the Colombian Constitution of 1991. He also served as Vice President of the Patriotic Union Party and the member of the 19th of April Movement.

Mr. Garzón was born in Buga, Valle del Cauca, in 1950.


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