Tanzanian ambassador to the U.N. to speak on millennium goals, April 5

Augustine Philip Mahiga, the Tanzanian Ambassador to the United Nations, will deliver a talk titled "Africa and the Millennium Goals: Challenges and Prospects," Tuesday, April 5, at 6:30 p.m., in the Biotechnology Building Conference Room on campus. The lecture is free and open to the public and will be followed by a reception.

Mahiga will discuss ongoing efforts to reach the U.N.'s Millennium Development Goals in Africa, an ambitious humanitarian agenda that includes: the eradication of hunger; universal primary education; gender equality; the reduction of child mortality; improved maternal health; containing and eradicating the spread of HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases; environmental sustainability; and the creation of a global partnership for development.

Mahiga has served as the U.N. High Commissioner's Office for Refugees' (UNHCR) representative to Italy, the Republic of Malta, the Vatican and Republic of San Marino, where he coordinated and managed refugee and migration issues. As the UNHCR's chief of mission to India, he initiated national legislation to assist the office's largest urban refugee caseload.

Mahiga also served as refugee emergency operation director and coordinator for the Great Lakes Region of Africa, assisting more than 1.5 million refugees, the largest refugee emergency and post-emergency operation in Africa.

From 1992 to 1994, he was the first UNHCR chief of mission in Liberia, where he was responsible for the protection of and assistance to 90,000 refugees and 10,000 internally displaced persons.

Mahiga's talk is sponsored by the Institute for African Development (IAD) at Cornell. For information, call 255-6849 or go online at: http://www.einaudi.cornell.edu/africa/news/index.asp?id=871.