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SPEAKER: SOREN JESSEN-PETERSEN
Soren Jessen-Petersen currently serves as Chairman of the Stability Pact Steering Committee on Migration, Asylum and Regional Return matters in the Western Balkans. In this capacity, he is responsible for the elaboration of a strategy and the development of a Program of Action to manage and stabilize population movements in South Eastern Europe. Formerly, Mr. Jessen-Petersen served as Assistant High Commissioner at UNHCR headquarters in Geneva from January 1998 to December 2001 where he headed UNHCR global operations, directly supervising the Bureau that covers all regions of the world. The AHC undertook some 80 missions to Africa, Asia, the Americas and Europe, aimed at developing operational strategies as well as mobilizing governmental support for UNHCR activities.

Additionally, Mr. Jessen-Petersen has served as Director of the UNHCR Liaison Office at the United Nations Headquarters in New York as well as the High Commissioner’s Special Envoy to the former Yugoslavia from December 1995 to September 1996, in Sarajevo. As Special Envoy, he was responsible for developing the strategy and overseeing the implementation of Annex VII of the Dayton Peace Agreement and directed a US $350 million humanitarian operation for approximately 4 million refugees, displaced persons, returnees and other victims, and managing more than 500 UNHCR staff.

A citizen of Denmark, lawyer and journalist by training, and prolific writer, Mr. Jessen-Petersen has had a long career with the UNHCR.

MODERATOR: JOANNE VAN SELM
Joanne van Selm is a Senior Policy Analyst at the Migration Policy Institute, focusing on refugee protection, international humanitarian response, and migration management. She is also a Senior Researcher at the University of Amsterdam’s Institute of Ethnic and Migration Studies and She is the Co-Editor of the Journal of Refugee Studies. Furthermore, Dr. van Selm is a member of the Executive Board of the International Association for the Study of Forced Migration, for which she developed and chaired the Program of the 7th bi-annual Conference in January 2001. During 2000-2001, she co-directed a project on Security and Refugees for the United Nations University, and served as a member of the Executive Committee of the International Studies Association’s section on Ethnicity, Nationalism, and Migration. She has also published widely on temporary protection, European asylum policy, and other refugee and migration related topics.