An interview with Her Excellency Permanent Representative of the State of Qatar to the United Nations, Sheikha Alya Ahmed bin Saif Al-Thani

Marking the 80th anniversary of the United Nations, H.E. Sheikha Alya Al-Thani (MA International Studies and Diplomacy 2006) speaks with Professor Leslie Vinjamuri about her time at SOAS, her diplomatic career and the future of the UN.

To mark the 80th Anniversary of the United Nations, SOAS World had the honour of hosting a conversation between Her Excellency Permanent Representative of the State of Qatar to the United Nations, Sheikha Alya Ahmed bin Saif Al-Thani (MA International Studies and Diplomacy 2006) and Professor Leslie Vinjamuri, Professor of International Relations at SOAS and Director of the US and the Americas Programme at Chatham House. We are also pleased to announce that we are launching a SOAS UN Alumni Network.

Professor Vinjamuri

It's an honour to be able to speak with you. As a leader in your country, as a leader at the United Nations, and as one of the world's great female diplomats, you are a tremendous source of inspiration for us. It carries great meaning, not only for our community and for your country, but for aspiring diplomats across the world, to see you forging a path for women in international affairs.

Can you describe your time at SOAS and why you chose that specific course?

It had always been my aspiration to join the Foreign Ministry. I worked for seven years at the Council for Family Affairs working closely with the Foreign Ministry and being involved in many issues like the Beijing +5  Conference on women, and conferences on children and issues relating to the social groups; major UN conferences that  laid the groundwork for the social component of the UN agenda.

I decided to move to the path of diplomacy because I'm the daughter of a diplomat. My late father was Qatar’s first Ambassador to the United Kingdom immediately after independence in 1971. He also covered a number of countries in Europe for around seven years and was appointed Minister of State for Foreign Affairs for 11 years.

Through all this time my interest built up, especially when he came to the UN and addressed the UN General Assembly as the Minister. That Image really stayed with me and I felt that this is what I wanted to be. When I consulted my father, he said “You have to have a passion. You have to be driven to be a diplomat.”

I took his advice, which is why when I started my career at the Council for Family Affairs in 1999, I worked on building my passion, then moved to the Foreign Ministry after joining SOAS.

I enrolled in the MA International Studies and Diplomacy in 2006. SOAS was an incredible experience for me. I gained so much: negotiation skills, building and deepening my understanding of international law and really building an angle, which is why my thesis was around human rights. I focused on that to build knowledge and to get the skills I needed to embark on the world of diplomacy, especially multilateral diplomacy.

My passion was always the United Nations and SOAS was an incredible opportunity. Two diplomats who worked as part of my diplomatic team joined SOAS, one chose to do the LLM in International Law.

Did SOAS change your perspective, and did it influence how you did your job when you started?

The skills SOAS builds in you stay with you. The early experiences, the vibrant community you meet - it’s basically a United Nations you have so many nationalities, backgrounds and cultures. Tolerance and acceptance are really high; it’s basically a very ideal community. Then you move on and encounter the real world, where differences are deepened because of misunderstandings.

I'm a Muslim and wear the Hijab, SOAS accepted that. It looked beyond appearances or how you’re dressed, but when you go out into the world you are faced with misunderstanding and misconception. I give credit to SOAS for building tolerance and understanding that things need time.  We need to understand each other; we need to be patient and then we can move forward and work together.

There were many people who I studied with who were already in the UN system and I’m still in touch with many of those even if we went on to different roles. There are some who I got to know later and surprisingly, we think alike, even those who studied at different times. We have the same built-in knowledge and patience when it comes to dealing in a multilateral forum.

How did you manage to continue this tolerance and foster an open environment through a time when the world hasn't been especially tolerant?

After SOAS, I was posted to New York and served for four years as a Minister Counsellor. Qatar was on the Security Council and I joined in the second year of our council term. I stayed for four years and was then appointed as Ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva. I served in Geneva for two years and His Highness the Amir of the State of Qatar decided that I would be appointed as ambassador to the UN in New York.

The Security Council experience was incredible. A period where I have encountered multilateral diplomacy especially  on the topics relating to the situation in the Middle East, in Lebanon, in the Palestinian occupied territories and the war in Gaza in 2008. Also the global issues relating to the climate agenda and the moments when the world coming together around the Sustainable Development Goals in 2015.

A lot happened in this time, but in the Middle East, and in particular the Middle East peace process unfortunately, when it comes to deliverables, we haven't seen a lot. We can see the situation in Gaza today. It's a build-up of 70 years of occupation, of the continuation of Israeli settlements in the Palestinian occupied territories, the continuation of the siege in Gaza.

There are areas where we haven't seen much improvement, but there is a lot that has been accomplished. Even though we have deep differences of views, we have managed to come together on the development side.

Does being a woman at the UN and in a leadership role carry special meaning for you?

It carries meaning for me all the time. When I joined the Foreign Ministry in 2007, I was the first female diplomat to be appointed and posted abroad. We started late, but the government encourages women to join the Foreign Ministry.

Being privileged to do it, being encouraged to do it, and being provided with the opportunity immediately after my Master's degree at SOAS by joining the Security Council team in New York, I carried it with me and felt the responsibility. If I succeed, more women will join, but if I fail, people will be reluctant. I took it on myself that I had to succeed and I had to encourage others to join.

Today in New York there are around 48 female ambassadors. It might sound low out of 193 countries, but it’s an incredible journey moving from six ambassadors during the time of US Ambassador Madeleine Albright [in the 1990s]. We also see vibrant deputy ambassadors and gender parity within UN management.

In Qatar, the way has been open for women since I joined and we now have over 35 percent of our diplomatic corps and a number of ambassadorial or consulate appointments who are women. The door is open and the pressure has eased but it's always with me because anything can change and we still need more women everywhere in the diplomatic world.

Students on the MA International Studies and Diplomacy travel to Geneva each year for meetings with international diplomats across the UN, NGOs, and other expert communities. You have spent time as Qatar’s representative in Geneva and New York. How do these two posts compare?

Geneva is a different world to New York. Geneva is the kitchen; everything is cooked there. There are 16 agencies doing a lot of work and you move from human rights to labour to health and other issues. It's really enriching and enlightening in terms of technicality and depth of the discussions.

There’s a sort of competition between New York and Geneva. New York is the spotlight, the diplomatic part where the world comes together on political issues, but Geneva is the heart of the United Nations when it comes to the technicality of the work.

When I served as ambassador in Geneva, we were on the Human Rights Council. It was the height of the Arab Spring with debates on Libya and Syria and we were also serving on the executive board of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Labour Organization (ILO).

The human rights component is huge. You are involved in negotiations and technical discussions when it comes to assistance for member states and looking at country specific areas to build capacity for human rights. You address country-specific issues in depth when it comes to accountability and dealing with atrocities. Syria took a lot of our attention because of the atrocities committed by the former [Assad] regime.

On the positive side, we looked at those countries who have transformed and who are offered support by the UN for this transition.

You’ve come into a position of leadership alongside the transformation of Qatar on the global stage. Has your role and the sense of possibility changed?

I've been privileged to work in an environment that wants to embrace working with the United Nations closely, building bridges, mediating conflicts, supporting development in countries when it comes to humanitarian assistance, supporting countries transitioning when it comes to human rights and focusing on education in time of conflict. Qatar is focused on strengthening education systems because we believe this is a building block to sustaining situations so countries do not flip to war again.

His Highness the Amir continues the legacy of his father since assuming in 2013, embracing the United Nations, making sure they are present at leadership level during high-level week in September. The most important statement that the population of Qatar expects every year is His Highness’ statement at the General Assembly where we set the tone on where we stand on issues.

It is a difficult time; the world is fracturing and the US has commitment to the UN is precarious. There are grave challenge in the Middle East, and Qatar has had a unique role. What is your experience of this at the UN?

It is an incredible time where everyone is anxiously considering whether multilateralism will stand and whether the UN will continue to get the support it needs to survive to serve the people of the world.

The Secretary General has initiated UN at its 80th and the next general assembly will be the 80th anniversary of the establishment of the United Nations. The impact of the reduction in Official Development Assistance (ODA) to countries is felt in the UN. The initiative is about how we can reform the system, how we can restructure and consolidate to ensure that people and real needs are not impacted on the ground.

We are based in the US and we understand the shifts in interests. We are expecting the new US Ambassador to the UN and we are very eager to engage with him and to make sure he stands with us in terms of finding solutions. We're very hopeful.

On the Middle East, there is hope that the UN will convene the two-State conference on 19 June. Initiated by Saudi Arabia and France, the idea of the conference is to push further for the process. We are very hopeful that this is gaining ground and getting support.

Qatar has been intensively engaged with the US and Egypt today to reach a ceasefire in Gaza. It is not only about ending the war in Gaza, but dealing with the root causes. We need to find the path for Palestinian statehood and a future for Gaza that takes them out of the siege that they have been under for the last two decades. I am positive about the long term. We are very much unified today in the Arab region, but not only in the region, the whole world today is backing solutions as creative places where people can think and offer solutions.