Engage Your World Speaker Series: Why the United Nations Matters More Than Ever - A Talk by Brenden Varma
This message has been approved by Cynthia Green, director of the Center for Global Engagement, for distribution to students, faculty and staff.
FSU’s Center for Global Engagement Engage Your World Speaker Series presents Brenden Varma, Deputy Director of the United Nations Information Center in Washington, DC, who will talk about why, in a world of growing global threats and challenges, the United Nations matters more than ever. He’ll also touch on how the United Nations engages with the Government and people of the United States.
Brenden Varma has served as a United Nations spokesperson and political affairs officer for over 20 years in New York, Baghdad, Jerusalem, Mogadishu and Pristina. He currently serves as the Deputy Director of the UN Information Center in Washington, DC. Prior to that, he worked in the Outreach Division of the Department of Global Communications at UN Headquarters in New York, where he managed programs related to anti-racism and youth engagement. He has served twice as the Director of Communications and Spokesperson for the President of the General Assembly. He has also worked in the Department of Political Affairs as a Political Affairs Officer, covering the Americas, the Middle East, the Horn of Africa and Southern Africa. In addition, he served as an Associate Spokesperson for former Secretaries-General Ban Ki-moon and Kofi Annan.
Prior to joining the UN, he worked for ABC News in New York and the Organization of American States in Washington, DC. He holds an M.A. in International Relations from the University of Kent at Canterbury in the United Kingdom and a B.S. in Languages from Georgetown University in Washington, DC. He also completed coursework at the Universidad de Buenos Aires and Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales in Argentina. He is a United States national of Indian origin.