Mr Kassym-Jomart Tokayev of Kazakhstan has been Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva and Personal Representative of the United Nations Secretary-General to the Conference on Disarmament since 2 May 2011.

Mr Tokayev brings to the position a wealth of experience at senior levels of Government. A career diplomat, he served from 1992 as Deputy Minister and later as First Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan. He then served as Minister for Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan from 1994 to 1999, when he was also appointed Deputy Prime Minister and later the same year Prime Minister of Kazakhstan. He served as Prime Minister from 1999 until 2002, when he was appointed State Secretary for Foreign Affairs before becoming Minister for Foreign Affairs in 2003.

Prior to taking up his functions as Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva, Mr Tokayev was Chairman of the Senate of the Parliament of Kazakhstan, having been unanimously elected in January 2007.
Born in 1953, Mr Tokayev is a graduate of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations, the Beijing Institute of the Chinese Language and the Diplomatic Academy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation. He has a PhD in Political Science and has written several books on international affairs.

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