Mark Malloch Brown, Baron Malloch-Brown

The Right Honourable
The Lord Malloch-Brown
KCMG PC
Minister of State for Africa, Asia and the United Nations
In office
28 June 2007 – 24 July 2009
Prime Minister Gordon Brown
Preceded by Position established
Succeeded by The Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead (Africa and the United Nations)
Chris Bryant (Undersecretary of State for Europe and Asia)
2nd Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations
In office
1 April 2006 – 31 December 2006
Secretary-General Kofi Annan
Preceded by Louise Fréchette
Succeeded by Asha-Rose Migiro
Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme
In office
1 July 1999 – 15 August 2005
Secretary-General Kofi Annan
Preceded by James Speth
Succeeded by Kemal Derviş
Member of the House of Lords
In office
9 July 2007 – 7 September 2015
on Leave of Absence
Personal details
Born (1953-09-16) 16 September 1953
Political party Crossbench
Labour (fmr.)
Alma mater Magdalene College, Cambridge
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

George Mark Malloch Brown, Baron Malloch-Brown KCMG PC (born 16 September 1953) is a former UK government minister (2007 - 2009) and United Nations Deputy Secretary-General (2006), as well as development specialist at the World Bank and United Nations (1994 - 2005), and a communications consultant and journalist. He was Minister of State in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office of the British government with responsibility for Africa, Asia and the United Nations (June 2007 - July 2009). Following his appointment to government, Malloch Brown was created a life peer on 9 July 2007 as Baron Malloch-Brown, of St Leonard's Forest in the County of West Sussex[1] (his title is hyphenated but his surname is not). Malloch Brown was previously at the World Bank (1994–1999), the Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme (1999 to 2005) and briefly United Nations Deputy Secretary-General (April to December 2006). He had previously worked at the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (1979–1983). He is also a former journalist for The Economist, development specialist, and communications consultant. He has served as Chair of the Royal African Society,[2] among other non-governmental and private sector roles, such as membership of the Executive Committee of the International Crisis Group.

Early life and education

Malloch Brown was born in England in 1953[3][4] to a South African diplomat who had been exiled.[5] He was educated at Marlborough College,[6] and earned a First Class Honours Degree in History from Magdalene College, Cambridge and a master's degree in Political Science from the University of Michigan.[7] He is an only child, but has four children with his wife.

Early career

He was the political correspondent at The Economist between 1977 and 1979.[8] Following this he worked for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees from 1979 to 1983, where he worked for Kofi Annan, and was stationed in Thailand (1979 to 1981)[8] where he was in charge of field operations for Cambodian refugees and supervised the construction of camps at Sa Kaeo and Khao-I-Dang.[9] In this period the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees was awarded the 1981 Nobel Peace Prize, the second time it had been awarded the prize.[10]

Malloch Brown contemplated running for the SDP in the 1983 UK General election but was not selected as a candidate.[11]

In 1983 Malloch Brown returned to The Economist as the founding editor of the Economist Development Report, a position he retained until 1986.[8][10]

Sawyer-Miller (1986–1994)

Malloch Brown was the lead international partner at the US-based Sawyer-Miller Group communications consultancy from 1986 to 1994;[8] he ultimately co-owned the Group with three other partners.[10] The Group was among the first communication consultants to use US-style election campaign methods for foreign governments, companies, and public policy debates.[11]

His international assignments included work in Chile, where he advised the opposition in its successful challenge to former dictator Augusto Pinochet, and in the Philippines, where he worked with Corazon Aquino in the campaign against the Ferdinand Marcos dictatorship. He also worked in Peru (where he assisted Mario Vargas Llosa with his 1990 presidential campaign), Colombia (where he advised the government on how to shed "its image as the political wing of the Medellin cartel"[12]), Venezuela and Bolivia.[8][12][13] In 1989 Malloch Brown advised Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada's presidential campaign in Bolivia.[14]

He also "worked extensively on privatisation and other economic reform issues with leaders in Eastern Europe and Russia."[10]

World Bank and United Nations (1994–2006)

In 1994 Malloch Brown joined the World Bank as Vice-President for External Affairs, which included responsibility for relations with the United Nations. Malloch Brown used his experience to good effect at the bank, helping to transform its reputation: "under his guidance, the bank blitzed opinion-makers with full-page newspaper advertisements and a television campaign to change perceptions of it as an arrogant institution unwilling to heed outsiders. To his credit, the institution gradually gained a reputation as a 'listening bank', unlike its more aloof sister institution, the International Monetary Fund."[12]

In July 1999 he moved back to the United Nations as Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), remaining in this position until August 2005.[6] In this role Malloch Brown co-ordinated the UN's response to the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami.[6] Internally at UNDP, which was facing increased competition from the World Bank in its areas of responsibility such as capacity building, governance and emergency recovery, he tried to re orient UNDP's activities (sometimes controversially), because of competition with other UN agencies who were also adapting to the demands of a globalising world. Compared with his predecessor, he improved resource mobilisation from donor countries. He led the UN's creation of the Millennium Development Goals which were adopted at the UN Millennium Summit in December 2000,[10] later recounting that the draft had gone to the printers without an environmental goal when Malloch Brown passed the head of the UN environment programme in a corridor, leading to the rapid addition of MDG number 7.[15]

In January 2005 he was appointed Chef de Cabinet to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, whilst retaining his position as Administrator of UNDP for much of 2005.[10][16]

Deputy Secretary-General (2006)

Malloch Brown succeeded Louise Fréchette as United Nations Deputy Secretary-General on 1 April 2006, retaining the position until December 2006.[6]

Oil for food

Malloch Brown publicly defended handling of the Oil-for-Food Programme by the UN in general, and Kofi Annan in particular. While he countered critics that "Not a penny was lost from the organization,"[17] an internal UN audit of the Oil-for-Food programme revealed that there had been overcompensation amounting to $557 million.[18] A separate audit of UN peacekeeping procurement concluded that at least $310 million from a budget of $1.6 billion could not be accounted for.[17]

Malloch Brown, briefing the Security Council, argued that, while the situation uncovered by the audit was "alarming", and that nearly $300 million out of a $1.6 billion budget was involved, it showed more that there was significant waste with only narrow instances of fraud. He noted that the UN Secretariat, based on the reservations expressed by the department being audited, did not entirely accept the auditor's conclusions.[19]

Criticisms of the George W. Bush administration

On 6 June 2006, while addressing a conference in New York City, he criticised the United States administration for allowing "too much unchecked UN-bashing and stereotyping". He stated that much of the political dialogue in the US about the UN had been abdicated to its most strident critics, such as conservative talk-show host Rush Limbaugh and the Fox News cable channel and, as a result of this, the true role and value of the UN has become "a mystery in Middle America".[20] These remarks resulted in a backlash from the White House and some US conservative commentators, culminating in a call for an apology by the US envoy to the United Nations John Bolton. Bolton added to reporters, "I spoke to the secretary-general this morning, I said "I've known you since 1989 and I'm telling you this is the worst mistake by a senior U.N. official that I have seen in that entire time."[21]

John Podesta and Richard C. Leone wrote that Bolton's comment "distorted Mr. Malloch Brown's remarks by calling them an attack on 'the American people', and ... by conflating Rush Limbaugh and Fox News with the American people. ... Mr. Malloch Brown had to break with the niceties of diplomatic tradition to plead for such leadership. ... Mr. Malloch Brown is surely correct: the people of the United States deserve better leadership and diplomacy to represent their interests in the world’s most important international body."[22] Malloch Brown himself rejected the need to apologise, and received the support of Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who said that his deputy's comments "should be read in the right spirit".[23]

In July 2006, during the Israel-Hezbollah crisis in Lebanon, Malloch Brown said America should allow others to "share the lead" in solving the Lebanon crisis, and also advised that Britain adopt a lower profile in solving the crisis, lest the international community see the negotiations as being led by the same team that instigated the invasion of Iraq. These comments again drew criticism from some American officials, including the US State Department, a spokesman from which stated "We are seeing a troubling pattern of a high official of the UN who seems to be making it his business to criticize member states and, frankly, with misplaced and misguided criticisms."[24]

Malloch Brown responded in an interview with PBS:

"I don't think the US has anything to object to in the comments. I was really in fact in the interview calling for the US to reach out to France and others to make sure it was demonstrating a broad multilateral coalition and within a single news cycle of my calling for that, it was doing it." He added "I may be prophetic but I wasn't critical".[25]

When Bolton later announced his own resignation in early December, Malloch Brown made his delight clear, telling reporters "No comment – and you can say he said it with a smile".[26]

UK Minister (2007–2009)

On 27 June 2007 it was announced that Malloch Brown was joining the Government of incoming Prime Minister Gordon Brown as Minister of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) with responsibility for Africa, Asia and the United Nations.[12] It was also announced that Malloch Brown would receive a peerage to enable him to sit in the House of Lords; he was also appointed to the Privy Council. Plans for his appointment and peerage had been leaked to The Observer's Pendennis column in November 2006.[27] At the time the Daily Telegraph said that he "While the aid agencies and liberals were still toasting the arrival of 'Saint Mark' to Whitehall, the neo-cons on both sides of the Atlantic were throwing darts at photographs of their devil. [He] divides opinion between those who see him as the great hope for Africa and a principled opponent of the war in Iraq, and those who believe that he is an anti-American egotist who defended Kofi Annan over the oil-for-food scandal."[28]

Following the decision by the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) to refer the case of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi back for a second appeal against conviction, Dr Hans Köchler, UN-appointed international observer at the Lockerbie trial, wrote on 4 July 2007 to Malloch Brown reiterating his call for a "full and independent public inquiry of the Lockerbie case".[29] Köchler addressed the letter also to First Minister of Scotland, Alex Salmond, Foreign Secretary, David Miliband and Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith.[30]

In November 2007, the conservative British magazine The Spectator drew some attention with its criticism of the Malloch Brown family's occupancy of a government-owned, so-called "grace and favour" apartment in London, previously used by the former Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott.[31] On 18 November 2007 The Sunday Times fuelled the controversy by reporting that "some see the hand of Miliband behind the savaging of Malloch Brown in The Spectator".[32]

On 7 July 2009, Lord Malloch Brown announced he was stepping down from his position as Minister of State for Africa, Asia and the United Nations at the end of July 2009, citing personal and family reasons.[33][34]

Post-ministerial career

Malloch Brown was appointed chairman of global affairs for FTI Consulting in September 2010.[35] Consultancy appointments to oil companies Vitol and SouthWest Energy Ltd (both approved by the relevant parliamentary committee) were reported in 2010.[36]

Malloch Brown became chairman of the board of directors of SGO Corporation Limited, a holding company whose primary asset is the election technology and voting machine manufacturer Smartmatic, in 2014.[37][38]

Other

Malloch Brown was listed 7th in the Leaders & Revolutionaries Section of the Time 100 in 2005.[8][39]

On 15 December 2006, he was named a visiting fellow at the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization and announced plans to focus on writing a book on changing leadership in a globalised world while in residence during the spring semester.[40]

Malloch Brown was appointed a Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George (KCMG) in the British New Year Honours 2007.

His book The Unfinished Global Revolution[41] came out early 2011 on Penguin Press.[42]

Association with George Soros

Malloch Brown has been closely associated with billionaire speculator George Soros. Working for Refugees International, he was part of the Soros Advisory Committee on Bosnia in 1993–94, formed by George Soros. He has since kept cordial relations with Soros, and rented an apartment owned by Soros while working in New York on UN assignments.[43] In May 2007, Soros' Quantum Fund announced the appointment of Sir Mark as vice-president.[44] In September 2007, The Observer reported that he had resigned this position on becoming a government minister in the UK.[45] Also in May 2007, Malloch Brown was named vice-chairman of Soros Fund Management and the Open Society Institute, two other important Soros organisations.[46]

Malloch Brown is a member of the Executive Committee of the International Crisis Group,[47] and played a key role in its foundation in 1993-5.

Styles and honours

References

  1. ↑ The London Gazette: no. 58391. p. 10139. 13 July 2007.
  2. ↑ Royal African Society, Council
  3. ↑ The Independent, 15 September 2008, Lord Malloch-Brown: You Ask The Questions
  4. ↑ Mehdi Hasan, New Statesman, 31 March 2011, The NS Interview: Mark Malloch Brown, former UN deputy secretary general
  5. ↑ tfstevenson.com, 20 October 2012, An Interview with Lord Malloch-Brown
  6. 1 2 3 4 BBC, 28 June 2007, Profile: Mark Malloch Brown
  7. ↑ BusinessWeek, Mark Malloch-Brown
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 6 United Nations, Mark Malloch Brown at the Wayback Machine (archived 26 April 2007)
  9. ↑ Thompson, Larry Clinton. Refugee Workers in the Indochina Exodus, 1975-1982. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2010.
  10. 1 2 3 4 5 6 http://www.ycsg.yale.edu, Mark Malloch Brown at the Wayback Machine (archived 23 July 2008)
  11. 1 2 Randeep Ramesh in The Guardian, "Meet Kofi Annan's right hand man", 12 January 2005
  12. 1 2 3 4 Mark Tran, The Guardian, 28 June 2007, Profile: Lord Malloch Brown
  13. ↑ Barry Siegel, Los Angeles Times, 24 November 1991, Spin Doctors To The World : The Sawyer Miller Group Uses The Tricks Of Political Campaigns To Change The Way You Think About Foreign Governments, Big Business And Any Client In Need Of An Image Lift
  14. ↑ Michael Barker, zmag.org, 26 November 2007, The United Nations and Polyarchy at the Wayback Machine (archived 28 August 2008)
  15. ↑ Mark Tran, The Guardian, 16 November 2012, Mark Malloch-Brown: developing the MDGs was a bit like nuclear fusion
  16. ↑ The Guardian, "UN appoints Briton as new chief of staff" 4 January 2005
  17. 1 2 Wall Street Journal, "Axis of Soros", 9 May 2007
  18. ↑ United Nations Office of Internal Oversight, "Findings Resulting From Oversight Activities of the Oil-for-Food Programme", 2004 Archived 24 September 2006 at the Wayback Machine.
  19. ↑ UN Security Council, "SC/8645 UN Security Council Minutes 5376 Meeting (AM)", 22 February 2006
  20. ↑ Alec Russell in The Telegraph, "US failing to aid the UN, says Annan's deputy", 8 June 2006
  21. ↑ Fox News, "Speech by U.N. Leader Draws Angry Response From U.S.", 7 June 2006
  22. ↑ John Podesta and Richard C. Leone in the The Century Foundation, "Time for U.S. Leadership, Not Bullying at the United Nations", 16 June 2006
  23. ↑ James Bone and Richard Beeston in The Times, "Apologise or we'll cut your funding, US envoy tells UN", 9 June 2006
  24. ↑ Reuters, 2 August 2006
  25. ↑ PBS NewsHour, "Talks for International Force in Lebanon Stall in U.N.", 2 August 2006
  26. ↑ Edith M. Lederer 5 December 2006; "Bush Agenda Came 1st for Bolton at U.N."; The Associated Press. Retrieved on 3 December 2007
  27. ↑ Oliver Marre, The Observer, 12 November 2006, Pendennis: Brown's found a new friend ... called Brown
  28. ↑ Rachel Sylvester and Alice Thomson, Daily Telegraph, 14 July 2007, Mark Malloch Brown: 'Let's not rely just on US'
  29. ↑ UN observer calls for fresh Lockerbie probe
  30. ↑ Köchler calls for independent inquiry into Lockerbie
  31. ↑ The Spectator, 7 November 2007, The taxpayer is being stung so this Lord can live in Admiralty House
  32. ↑ Profile: Lord Malloch-Brown
  33. ↑ BBC UK News, 8 July 2009, Foreign Office minister resigns
  34. ↑ Mary Riddell, Daily Telegraph, 22 July 2009, Lord Malloch-Brown interview: 'This dangerous gridlock that taints our politics'
  35. ↑ FTI Consulting (2010). FTI Consulting Appoints Lord Malloch-Brown as Chairman, Global Affairs at the Wayback Machine (archived 24 November 2010). Retrieved 13 July 2011.
  36. ↑ The Guardian, 30 July 2010, Former Africa minister Malloch-Brown advises oil firm on African expansion
  37. ↑ "Lord Mark Malloch-Brown to chair election technology group SGO". Finalcial Times. 24 November 2014.
  38. ↑ "About Us". SGO. Retrieved 7 October 2015.
  39. ↑ http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/completelist/0,29569,1972656,00.html
  40. ↑ AP in The International Herald Tribune, "U.N. official named fellow at Yale", 15 December 2006
  41. ↑ Carnegiecouncil.org, The Unfinished Global Revolution: discussion at the Wayback Machine (archived 10 March 2011), 23 February 2011
  42. ↑ Robert Weiner, Review, ID: International Dialogue, A Multidisciplinary Journal of World Affairs 1 2011
  43. ↑ "An Annan Deputy Is a Soros Tenant". The New York Sun. 15 June 2005. Retrieved 13 July 2007.
  44. ↑ Benny Avni in The New York Sun, "Ex-Deputy U.N. Chief Joins With Soros", 7 May 2007
  45. ↑ Och, look. A new rich friend for Mr Brown The Observer, 16 September 2007
  46. ↑ "Mark Malloch Brown appointed Vice-Chairman of Soros Fund Management, Open Society Institute". Global Public Policy Institute. 21 May 2007.
  47. ↑ ICG, Crisis Group's Board of Trustees

External links

Wikisource has original works written by or about:
Mark Malloch Brown
Diplomatic posts
Preceded by
James Speth		 Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme
1999–2005 		Succeeded by
Kemal Derviş
Preceded by
Louise Fréchette		 Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations
2006 		Succeeded by
Asha-Rose Migiro
Political offices
New office Minister of State for Africa, Asia and the United Nations
2007–2009 		Succeeded by
Glenys Kinnock
as Minister of State for Africa and the United Nations
Succeeded by
Chris Bryant
as Undersecretary of State for Europe and Asia
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