The International Crisis Group (ICG), one of the best sources out there for information and reports on conflicts around the world, has a new president. And ICG’s board (which includes Thomas Pickering, one of Mark’s frequent Bloggingheads interlocutors) made a great decision in Louise Arbour, a Canadian judge who served four highly distinguished years as the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
As High Commissioner, Arbour fulfilled a difficult job by using the most salient of the tools at her disposal — the podium — to great effect. At ICG, she will be able to leverage another powerful voice for advocacy, and we congratulate and wish her the best success at her new post.
The only downside for ICG is that it is losing a terrific president in Gareth Evans, who will be co-chairing a new initiative called the International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament. Based on his prior success co-chairing International Commissions (on State Sovereignty and Intervention, which produced the landmark “Responsibility to Protect” doctrine), though, he should do just fine.