UN General Assembly President-elect (PGA) Abdulla Shahid has appointed India’s deputy Permanent Representative at the UN, Ambassador Nagaraj Naidu to officiate as his Chef de Cabinet, in effect his Chief of Staff. India’s diplomat and Thilmeeza Hussain, the Maldives’ Permanent Representative to the UN and Ambassador to the United States, who has been appointed as the PGA’s Special Envoy “will be instrumental in delivering my vision for the ‘Presidency Of Hope’,” Shahid announced. Both appointees have started their functions, attending a meet with the outgoing PGA Volkan Bozkir. India supported and canvassed for the Maldivian Foreign Minister as President of the 76th General Assembly. He won this week with 143 votes, nearly three fourths of the 191 countries that voted in the annual election, while his rival, former Afghanistan Foreign Minister Zalmai Rassoul got 48 votes.
