On 19 June, Rania Al-Mashat took the oath of office before United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres at the UN Headquarters in New York, formally assuming her role as Executive Secretary of ESCWA.
Expressing her gratitude to the Secretary-General and ESCWA member States for their trust, she reaffirmed her commitment to serving the Arab region at a time of profound political, security, and development challenges. She emphasized the importance of regional cooperation in addressing shared challenges and advancing human dignity, human security, and inclusive development, while underscoring the role of ESCWA as a responsive, impactful, and solutions-oriented platform for its member States.
On 16 June, Al-Mashat also participated in a high-level panel at the 2026 Annual World Bank Conference on Development Economics (ABCDE), where she stressed that economic policy, from AI and infrastructure to investment, must ultimately serve people, and called for stronger regional cooperation to create jobs and opportunities for future generations.
