Kamal Amakrane

Kamal Amakrane currently serves as Special Adviser for Strategic Partnerships supporting United Nations’ efforts to develop and deploy technological innovations to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. He is also working on advancing a people-centered approach to climate action and is supporting efforts on addressing climate forced migration (2019-). In 2018, Kamal served as Senior Adviser at Columbia University’s Global Policy Initiative, where he directed the Migration Consensus Initiative. During the intergovernmental negotiations leading to the adoption of the groundbreaking Global Compact for Migration, he led a coalition of countries, non-governmental organizations and other civil society stakeholders that successfully secured unprecedented global agreement on protections for those forced to leave their countries due to climate change, as well as commitments on real action to address such climate-forced migration. Before this, Kamal served as Political Director to the President of the UN General Assembly in two successive Cabinets. He is credited as one of the architects behind the processes resulting in the New York Declaration for Refugees & Migrants and the Global Compact for Migration (2015-2017). Prior to his work for the Presidents of the General Assembly, Kamal had an accomplished career as a senior UN official. He served as Chief of Staff of the UN Peacekeeping Mission in Cote d’Ivoire (2013-15), Chief of the Office of the UN-AU Joint Special Representative for Darfur (2011-13), and Head of the Office of the UN Envoy to Myanmar (2008-2011). Previously, Kamal had spent many years supporting the UN’s engagement towards the stabilization of Iraq and tasked with organizing the country’s first elections (2004-08). His international career began in the Office of UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan (2002), after which he joined the Office of Arab League’s Secretary-General Amr Moussa, advising on Iraq issues (2003). Prior to focusing on international affairs, Kamal was working on sustainable development and urban planning issues in Morocco (1998-2001). Kamal has been a member of the Board of Directors of the Tällberg Foundation since 2018. He was also elected to the Executive Board of Sciences Po Paris in 2002 & 2003, and was appointed a Yale World Fellow in 2012. He is an Architect and a graduate of Sciences Po Paris and Columbia’s SIPA. He speaks fluent Spanish, English, French, Arabic and Amazigh.