Sigrid Kaag


Sigrid Agnes Maria Kaag is a Dutch diplomat and politician. A member of the Democrats 66 party, she has been Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation in the Third Rutte cabinet since 26 October 2017.
A diplomat by occupation, Kaag worked as a civil servant for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 1990 until 1993 when she became a United Nations official for the UNRWA in Jerusalem from 1994 until 1997. Kaag worked as a administrator at the International Organization for Migration in Geneva from 1998 until 2004 when she became a senior advisor of the United Nations for Khartoum and Nairobi until 2005 when she became a senior official at UNICEF. Kaag served as Regional Director for Middle East and North Africa for UNICEF in Amman from 2007 until May 2010 when she was appointed Assistant Secretary-General and Director of the Bureau of External Relations of the UNDP in New York. She oversaw UNDP’s strategic external engagement, organization-wide communication and advocacy, as well as resource mobilization.
From January 2015 until October 2017 she served as the United Nations Special Coordinator for Lebanon. Prior to that she served as Under Secretary-General and Special Coordinator of the United Nations – Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons Joint Mission to eliminate the declared chemical weapons programme of the Syrian Arab Republic between October 2013 and September 2014. Until her mission in Syria she was employed as Assistant Secretary-General and Assistant Administrator and Director of the Bureau of External Relations and Advocacy of the United Nations Development Programme.

Early life and education

Kaag was born in Rijswijk as the daughter of a classical pianist. She grew up in Zeist and initially studied Arabic at Utrecht University, but later switched to The American University in Cairo where she obtained a B.A. degree in Middle East Studies in 1985. She subsequently obtained an M.Phil. degree in International Relations from St Antony's College in 1987, and an M.A. degree in Middle East Studies from the University of Exeter in 1988. She also received foreign relations training at the Clingendael Institute in The Hague, and studied at the French École nationale d'administration.

Career

Early career

After her studies, Kaag worked as analyst for Royal Dutch Shell in London, United Kingdom. Later, she worked for the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs as Deputy Head of the UN Political Affairs Department. During her time in the diplomatic service, she lived and worked in Beirut, Vienna, and Khartoum.

1994–2013: Career at the United Nations

Kaag started working for the United Nations in 1994 and first served as Senior United Nations Adviser in the Office of the Deputy Special Representative of the Secretary-General in Khartoum, Sudan. From 1998 to 2004 she was Chief of Donor Relations for the International Organization for Migration, and Senior Programme Manager with the External Relations Office of UNRWA in Jerusalem. Working in the Middle East she was responsible for areas as the occupied Palestinian territories, Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria.
From 2007 to May 2010, Kaag was Regional Director for Middle East and North Africa for UNICEF in Amman. In May 2010 she was appointed Assistant Secretary-General and Assistant Administrator and Director of the Bureau of External Relations and Advocacy of the United Nations Development Programme in New York. In this capacity, she was the deputy to Helen Clark and oversaw UNDP’s strategic external engagement, organization-wide communication and advocacy, as well as resource mobilization.

2013–2014: Head of the OPCW-UN Joint Mission in Syria

On 13 October 2013, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon nominated Kaag to lead the OPCW-UN Joint Mission for the destruction of Syria's chemical weapons. The United Nations Security Council was set to vote on her nomination three days later, on 16 October. She was then officially confirmed for the position. Kaag led a team of one hundred experts who were responsible for ensuring the elimination of Syria's chemical weapon stockpiles before 30 June 2014.

2014–2017: United Nations Special Coordinator for Lebanon

By the end of her term in September 2014, news media reported that Kaag was rumored to succeed Lakhdar Brahimi as UN Special Envoy to Syria. On 1 December 2014, the UN Secretary General Ban announced that Kaag would become the United Nations Special Coordinator for Lebanon, succeeding Sir Derek Plumbly.
In early 2017, Kaag was considered by international media to be one of the candidates to succeed Helen Clark as Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme and head of the United Nations Development Group; the post eventually went to Achim Steiner.

2017–present: Minister and D66 leadership candidate

Since 26 October 2017, Kaag has been serving as the Dutch Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation in the third government of Prime Minister Mark Rutte. After the resignation of Foreign Affairs Minister Halbe Zijlstra on 13 February 2018, she was nominated ad interim to succeed him while conserving her other cabinet position. Sigrid Kaag was consequently the first female Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands.
Since 2018, Kaag has been serving on the joint World Bank/WHO Global Preparedness Monitoring Board, co-chaired by Elhadj As Sy and Gro Harlem Brundtland. In 2019, she joined the World Economic Forum High-Level Group on Humanitarian Investing, co-chaired by Børge Brende, Kristalina Georgieva and Peter Maurer.
On 21 June 2020, Kaag announced her candidacy for lijsttrekkerschap of the Democrats 66 party for the 2021 Dutch general election, with the ambition of becoming the Netherlands' first female Prime Minister. If elected lijsttrekker, she will become the second female party leader of D66 after Els Borst in 1998.

Honours and awards

International organizations

Kaag is married and has four children. Her husband, Anis al-Qaq, is Palestinian, a deputy minister under Yasser Arafat in the 1990s, and used to be the Palestinian representative to Switzerland. Kaag is a noted polyglot and speaks six languages: Dutch, English, French, Spanish, German and Arabic. She was the first Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General featured in the Vogue fashion and lifestyle magazine.