Pretoria - South Africa has received credentials from Zhuldyz Akisheva, the newly-appointed Regional Representative for Southern Africa’s United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).
The credentials were received on Tuesday by the Deputy Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, Nomaindiya Mfeketo, who was accompanied by the Deputy Ministers of Correctional Services Thabang Makwetla and Health Joe Phaahla.
Akisheva, a national of Kazakhstan, succeeds Senegal’s Mandiyaye Niang, who in September 2013 was appointed as permanent judge of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.
The UNODC Regional Office for Southern Africa (ROSA) was formed in 1997 and covers 11 countries in the region including Angola, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
The mandate and functions of the UNODC-ROSA include, among others, addressing issues related to international drugs, the combatting of transnational organised crime, as well as international terrorism.
Although the UNODC receives its funding from the regular budget of the United Nations, the sheer scale of its mandate and operational activities are such that most of its funding comes from extra-budgetary resources provided in the main by the donor community.
Akisheva previously held a number of key positions within the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, including Head of the UNODC Programme Office in Kyrgyzstan and Deputy Regional Representative at the UNODC Regional Office for Central Asia. – SAnews.gov.za
