{"id":2523,"date":"2014-10-16T12:25:02","date_gmt":"2014-10-16T12:25:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.internationaldiplomat.com\/?p=2523"},"modified":"2014-10-16T12:25:02","modified_gmt":"2014-10-16T12:25:02","slug":"former-prisoner-conscience-elected-new-ipu-president","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/12h71.com\/?p=2523","title":{"rendered":"Former \u201cprisoner of conscience\u201d elected as new IPU president"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 style=\"color: #424242 !important;\">Geneva,\u00a0<span class=\"aBn\" tabindex=\"0\" data-term=\"goog_660976079\"><span class=\"aQJ\">16 October 2014<\/span><\/span><br \/>\nBangladesh MP and former Amnesty International \u201cprisoner of conscience\u201d Saber Chowdhury was today elected as the new President of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU).<br \/>\nHe defeated three other candidates \u2013 Speaker of Australia\u2019s House of Representatives Bronwyn Bishop, Indonesian MP Nurhayati Ali Assegaf and former Speaker of the Maldives Parliament Abdulla Shahid \u00a0&#8211; \u00a0in an election on the concluding day of the 131<sup>st<\/sup>\u00a0IPU Assembly. He becomes the 28<sup>th<\/sup>\u00a0president of the Organization in its 125-year history.<br \/>\nPresident Chowdhury is the third IPU president from South Asia after Najma Heptulla (1999-2002) and Gurdial Singh Dhillon (1973-1976).<br \/>\nHe takes over from former Moroccan Speaker of Parliament Abdelwahad Radi, who ends his three-year mandate today.<br \/>\nA former businessman with an education in law, politics and economics in the UK, President Chowdhury first became an MP in 1996 at the age of 35. He was also the youngest member of the government when he held two deputy ministerial posts in succession between 1999 and 2001.<br \/>\nA political prisoner in the early 2000\u2019s, he is a firm believer in the rule of law and human rights. He was involved in ground-breaking legislation to criminalize custodial torture in Bangladesh and to address domestic violence.<br \/>\nAn active national politician who has also pioneered community initiatives on a range of social and economic issues targeting women and youth in particular, President Chowdhury has similarly been active on the international stage for a number of years.<br \/>\nClimate change, disaster-risk reduction, sustainable development and nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament have been the focus of much of his international political work. Within IPU and as a former president of IPU\u2019s Committee on Peace and International Security, he has played an important role on issues relating to a key objective of the Organization.<br \/>\n\u201cPolitics and public service is about helping people to solve their problems, to live their dreams. My belief is to always improve upon what you find and leave a better, more peaceful world. I will be an active president, accessible and leading from the front,\u201d he said.<\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Geneva,\u00a016 October 2014 Bangladesh MP and former Amnesty International \u201cprisoner of conscience\u201d Saber Chowdhury was today elected as the new President of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU). He defeated three other candidates \u2013 Speaker of Australia\u2019s House of Representatives Bronwyn Bishop, Indonesian MP Nurhayati Ali Assegaf and former Speaker of the Maldives Parliament Abdulla Shahid \u00a0&#8211;<br \/><a class=\"moretag\" href=\"https:\/\/12h71.com\/?p=2523\">+ Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[539,2078,548],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2523","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english","category-geneva-international","category-international-diplomat"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/12h71.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/12h71.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/12h71.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/12h71.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/12h71.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/12h71.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2523\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/12h71.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/12h71.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/12h71.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}