Current heads of Multilateral Institutions

World Trade Organization

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala is the seventh Director-General of the WTO. She took office on 1 March 2021, becoming the first woman and the first African to serve as Director-General. Her term of office will expire on 31 August 2025. Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala is a global finance expert, an economist and international development professional with over 30 years of experience working in Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America and North America. Dr Okonjo-Iweala was formerly Chair of the Board of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. Previously, Dr. Okonjo-Iweala twice served as Nigeria’s Finance Minister (2003-2006 and 2011-2015) and briefly acted as Foreign Minister in 2006, the first woman to hold both positions.

World Bank

David R. Malpass was selected as 13th President of the World Bank Group by its Board of Executive Directors on April 5, 2019.  His five-year term began on April 9.Mr. Malpass previously served as Under Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs for the United States.  Mr. Malpass represented the United States in international settings, including the G-7 and G-20 Deputy Finance Ministerial, World Bank–IMF Spring and Annual Meetings, and meetings of the Financial Stability Board, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation.

International Monetary Fund

Ms. Kristalina Georgieva, from Bulgaria, is Managing Director and Chairman of the Executive Board from October 1, 2019. Madame Christine Lagarde, from France, was Managing Director and Chairman of the Executive Board from July 5, 2011 to September 12, 2019. Indian-American economist Gita Gopinath, who previously served as Chief Economist, was appointed as First Deputy Managing Director, effective January 21, 2022.

United Nations

• António Guterres, the ninth Secretary-General of the United Nations, took office on 1st January 2017. António Manuel de Oliveira Guterres GCC GCL is a Portuguese politician and diplomat. UN General Assembly appointed Antonio Guterres as the UN Secretary General for a second term beginning January 1, 2022, days after the powerful Security Council had unanimously recommended his name to the 193-member body for re-election. President of the 75th session of the UN General Assembly Volkan Bozkir announced that Guterres has been appointed by acclamation Secretary General of the United Nations for the second term of office beginning on January 1, 2022 and ending on December 31, 2026.
• The secretary-general of the United Nations (UNSG or SG) is the chief administrative officer of the United Nations and head of the United Nations Secretariat, one of the six principal organs of the United Nations. The secretary-general is appointed by the General Assembly upon the recommendation of the Security Council.
• As the recommendation must come from the Security Council, any of the five permanent members of the council can veto a nomination. Most secretaries-general are compromise candidates from middle powers and have little prior fame.
• The length of the term is discretionary, but all secretaries-general since 1971 have been appointed to five-year terms.
• Every secretary-general since 1961 has been re-selected for a second term, with the exception of Boutros Boutros-Ghali, who was vetoed by the United States in the 1996 selection.

President of United Nations

The president of the United Nations General Assembly is a position voted for by representatives in the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on a yearly basis. The president is the chair and presiding officer of the General Assembly. Abdulla Shahid is the current president since 14 September 2021. On 7 June 2021, he was elected as the 76th president of the United Nations General Assembly with an overwhelming three-fourth majority, with 143 in favour, 48 against and no abstentions and no invalid votes. Shahid is the first Maldivian politician to become the President of the General Assembly of the United Nations. He is a Maldivian politician who has served as the Minister of Foreign Affairs for Maldives since 2018.

Group of 20 (G20)

The current chair of G-20 is held by Italy. The 2021 summit is planned to be held in Italy. The 2022, 2023 and 2024 summits will be hosted by Indonesia, India and Brazil respectively. Group of 20 (G20) is an international body created in 1999 that provides a forum for strategic economic communication between industrialized and developing countries. The G20 originated as a response to the economic crises of the late 1990s; it expanded on the work of the Group of Seven (G7; known as the Group of Eight [G8] in its political incarnation) by including countries that previously.

The members of the G20 are: Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Republic of Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States, and the European Union.

Group of Seven or G-7

• The Group of Seven (G7) is an inter-governmental political forum consisting of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States. In addition, the European Union is a ‘non-enumerated member’.
• Its members are the world’s largest IMF advanced economies and wealthiest liberal democracies; the group is officially organized around shared values of pluralism and representative government.
• Members are great powers in global affairs and maintain mutually close political, economic, social, legal, environmental, military, religious, cultural, and diplomatic relations. From 2022, Germany has taken over the rotating presidency of the G7, following the presidency of the United Kingdom.
• As of 2020, the collective group accounts for over 50 percent of global net wealth (which is $418 trillion), 32 to 46 percent of global gross domestic product, and approximately 770 million people or 10 percent of the world’s population.

Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank

• The bank was proposed by China in 2013 and the initiative was launched at a ceremony in Beijing in October 2014. It received the highest credit ratings from the three biggest rating agencies in the world, and is seen as a potential rival to the World Bank and IMF.
• On 25 December 2015, the Articles of Agreement entered into force. On 16 January 2016, the board of governors of the bank convened its inaugural meeting in Beijing and declared the bank open for business. Jin Liqunwas elected as the bank’s president for a five-year term.
• India is a founding member of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) with the second highest voting share after China. It is headed by former Chinese vice minister for finance Jin Liqun. AIIB’s Board of Directors has appointed Dr Urjit Patel to the position of Vice President for Investment Operations Region 1 – South Asia, the Pacific Islands and South East Asia in January 2022. Patel, 58, was the 24th governor of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), succeeding Raghuram Rajan on September 5, 2016. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is on the board of governors of the bank. Below the President are five vice presidents — one being the position that Pandian held and is now being given to Patel.
• Indian is one of the founding members of the AIIB. On 24 October 2014, twenty-one countries signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) regarding the AIIB in Beijing, China: Bangladesh, Brunei, Cambodia, India, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Mongolia, Nepal, Oman, Pakistan, Philippines, Qatar, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Uzbekistan and Vietnam.
• China had the highest subscription of $ 29.7 billion, followed by India $8.3 billion and Russia $6.5 billion. Accordingly China has the largest voting power, followed by India and Russia.
• The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) is a multilateral development bank that aims to improve economic and social outcomes in Asia. The bank currently has 105 members, including 16 prospective members from around the world.
• The bank started operation after the agreement entered into force on 25 December 2015, after ratifications were received from 10 member states holding a total number of 50% of the initial subscriptions of the Authorized Capital Stock.
• Several other European states – including Germany, France and Italy – followed the UK’s decision to join the AIIB in March. Other European countries who joined the AIIB include Georgia, Finland, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Serbia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.
• While Canada, Australia and New Zealand are members of the AIIB, the United States is not.

The New Development Bank

• Marcos Troyjo is President of the New Development Bank (NDB). He was unanimously elected to lead the multilateral development bank for a five-year mandate (2020-2025) by the NDB’s Board of Governors on May 27, 2020.
• Prior to his current position, Troyjo served as Brazil’s Deputy Minister of the Economy, in charge of Foreign Trade & International Affairs. He was Chairman of the Board of Directors of the NDB, where he also served as Director for Brazil. He was Brazil’s Alternate Governor at the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB), a member of the World Bank’s Development Committee and a representative at board level in many other multilateral development institutions.
• V. Kamath, from India, was the first elected president of the NDB in 2015. Kundapur Vaman Kamath, the former chief of the New Development Bank of BRICS countries, previously served as the Chairman of Infosys Limited, the second-largest Indian IT services company, and as the Non-Executive Chairman of ICICI Bank, India’s largest private bank.
• The New Development Bank (NDB), formerly referred to as the BRICS Development Bank, is a multilateral development bank established by the BRICS states (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa).
• The New Development Bank (NDB) was established in 2015 by BRICS countries – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. The Bank’s membership is open to members of the United Nations. NDB commenced the admission of its first new member countries in the second half of 2021.Apart from BRICS the other members of the New Development Bank include Bangladesh, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Uruguay.
• At the fourth BRICS Summit in New Delhi (2012), the leaders of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa considered the possibility of setting up a new Development Bank to mobilize resources for infrastructure and sustainable development projects in BRICS and other emerging economies, as well as in developing countries.
• Following the report from the Finance Ministers at the fifth BRICS summit in Durban (2013), the leaders agreed on the feasibility of establishing the New Development Bank and made the decision to do so. During the sixth BRICS Summit in Fortaleza (2014), the leaders signed the Agreement establishing the New Development Bank (NDB).
• In the Fortaleza Declaration, the leaders stressed that the NDB will strengthen cooperation among BRICS and will supplement the efforts of multilateral and regional financial institutions for global development, thus contributing to collective commitments for achieving the goal of strong, sustainable and balanced growth.
• At the signing of the Headquarters Agreement with the government of the People’s Republic of China and the Memorandum of Understanding with the Shanghai Municipal People’s Government on 27 February 2016, the NDB became fully operational.
• According to Fortaleza Declaration ,“the Bank shall have an initial authorized capital of US$ 100 billion. The initial subscribed capital shall be US$ 50 billion, equally shared among founding members. The first chair of the Board of Governors shall be from Russia. The first chair of the Board of Directors shall be from Brazil. The first President of the Bank shall be from India. The headquarters of the Bank shall be located in Shanghai. The New Development Bank Africa Regional Center shall be established in South Africa concurrently with the headquarters.” (Fortaleza Declaration)

President of European Commission

The President of European Commission is Ursula von der Leyen, née Ursula Albrecht, a Belgian-born German politician who was the first woman to serve as Germany’s minister of defense (2013–19). In July 2019 she became the first woman to be elected president of the European Commission. The president of the European Commission is the head of the European Commission, the executive branch of the European Union. The President of the Commission leads a Cabinet of Commissioners, referred to as the College, collectively accountable to the European Parliament.

New President of European Parliament

Roberta Metsola is a Maltese politician serving as President of the European Parliament since January 2022. President of Maltese conservative politician Roberta Metsola is the new president of the European Parliament. The Maltese politician is only the third woman at the head of the European Parliament, following in the footsteps of her French predecessors Simone Veil and Nicole Fontaine. The European Parliament is the EU’s lawmaking body, representing the bloc’s 450 million citizens. It is directly elected by EU voters every five years. Metsola was first elected to as a Member of the European Parliament in 2013, and became the First Vice-President of the European Parliament in November 2020.

NATO Secretary General

• The secretary general of NATO is the chief civil servant of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The officeholder is an international diplomat responsible for coordinating the workings of the alliance, leading NATO’s international staff, chairing the meetings of the North Atlantic Council and most major committees of the alliance, with the notable exception of the NATO Military Committee, as well as acting as NATO’s spokesperson.
• The secretary general does not have a military command role; political, military and strategic decisions ultimately rest with the member states. Together with the chairman of the NATO Military Committee and the supreme allied commander, the officeholder is one of the foremost officials of NATO.
• The current secretary general is former Norwegian Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg, who took office on 1 October 2014. Stoltenberg’s mission as secretary general was extended for another four-year term, meaning that he was to lead NATO until September 30, 2022. However, due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, his term was extended further by another year.
• General Tod D. Wolters assumed duties as NATO’s 19th Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR) on May 3, 2019. As SACEUR, he is one of NATO’s two strategic commanders and commands Allied Command Operations (ACO), which is responsible for the planning and execution of all Alliance operations. Tod Daniel Wolters (born 13 October 1960) is a United States Air Force four-star general.