Maleeha Lodhi

Maleeha Lodhi has served as Pakistan’s Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York, the first woman to represent Pakistan at the UN. She twice served as Pakistan’s Ambassador to the US (1993 – 1996, 1999 – 2002) and as High Commissioner to Britain (2003 – 2008). She also served as a member of the UN Secretary General’s Advisory Board on Disarmament Affairs from 2001 to 2005. She was the first woman in all of Asia to become the editor of a national daily newspaper. In 1994 Time magazine nominated her as one of a hundred people in the world who will help shape the 21st century, the only one from Pakistan. Dr Lodhi was a Public Policy Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars in Washington in 2010 and a Fellow at Harvard University’s Kennedy School in 2008. She is the recipient of the President’s award of Hilal-e-Imtiaz for Public Service in Pakistan. She is the author of two books: ‘Pakistan’s Encounter with Democracy’ (1994) and ‘Pakistan: Internal and External Challenges’ (2004). She also edited a volume titled ‘Pakistan: Beyond the ‘Crisis State,’ published by OUP.