A Late Entry With Seven Rivals

The United Arab Emirates has put forward Lana Nusseibeh, its former UN envoy, to be the next UN Secretary-General, according to the state-owned Emirates News Agency. Nusseibeh is minister of state in the UAE's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and was her country's first female ambassador to the UN. Her nomination was submitted by UAE President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan as part of the selection process.

She enters the race late and joins six other candidates vying to become the UN's next top diplomat. Born in 1978, Nusseibeh served as the UAE's UN ambassador from 2013 to 2024, making her a well-known name in international circles despite her late entry.

• •She has taken a leave of absence from her government position to focus on her candidacy.
• •Teneo, a New York-based PR firm working for the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs, confirmed the nomination to FRANCE 24 and PassBlue.
• •The office of the General Assembly president would not confirm whether nomination documentation had been received, saying Khalilur Rahman, who presides over the session, is travelling.

What the Emirates President and the Candidate Said

In submitting the nomination, the UAE president cited "Nusseibeh's deep experience of the United Nations, her judgement in addressing the ongoing international challenges, and her record of constructive work".

Jan Hromadko, Teneo's managing director, announced the candidacy by email, writing "I'm reaching out following today's announcement of HE Lana Nusseibeh's candidacy for UN Secretary-General," and enclosing her vision statement.

In that statement, Nusseibeh set out her view of the office: "The Charter gives the Secretary-General no army and no vote. But the position, held well, entails a different kind of power". She also pledged there will be "no exemptions for friends and no grudges against critics".

Rights Groups Raise Sudan and UAE Records

The nomination has drawn scrutiny from rights advocates. Human Rights Watch's 2026 report on the UAE describes severe restrictions on expression, association and assembly in the country.

Sudan is a particular flashpoint. UN independent panels of experts have accused the UAE of arming and funding the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, which are fighting the Sudanese Armed Forces. Amnesty International reported in May 2025 that Chinese-guided bombs and howitzers used by the RSF were re-exported by the Emirates, breaching the arms embargo on Darfur.

The Emirati government rejected the findings and denied supplying weapons or military support to either side in Sudan. The International Court of Justice dismissed Sudan's case against the Emirates for lack of jurisdiction but did not resolve the underlying allegations.

Nathaniel Raymond, executive director of the Humanitarian Research Lab at the Yale School of Public Health, said a Nusseibeh appointment could be a "catastrophe" for the UN's work in Sudan, Yemen and elsewhere in the Mideast and North Africa.

He said Nusseibeh has "a dual loyalty, conflict of interest" between the UN and a state credibly accused by the UN of aiding the El Fasher massacre, which the UN determined has the "hallmarks of genocide". Raymond noted that next week marks the one-year anniversary of El Fasher, and said the UN should not celebrate it by making a government official of the country that made the massacre militarily possible the Secretary-General.

The Math of the Security Council Vote

Current Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, a former Portuguese prime minister, ends his term on December 31, 2026, so member states must decide on a successor by then. The selection process began officially about a year ago, and the Council recommends a candidate to the General Assembly for final approval. All candidates so far have gone through public hearings by the 193-member General Assembly and informal Security Council straw polls.

The hurdles for any candidate are steep:

• •A candidate needs at least nine votes from the 15-member Security Council and must not be vetoed by a permanent, or "P5", member.
• •Nusseibeh will need to win over the four other veto-wielding permanent members: Britain, China, France and Russia.
• •In six straw polls, no candidate has drawn consensus; in the October 16 poll, the top three - Rebeca Grynspan of Costa Rica, Carolyn Rodrigues Birkett of Guyana and Rafael Mariano Grossi of Argentina - each drew two "discourage" votes from P5 members.

A former diplomat from the global South said Nusseibeh would not have jumped into the race at this point if she did not think the P5 were agreeable to her nomination. Richard Gowan of the International Crisis Group said: "Her rollout has been pretty slick, and UN insiders assume that she will have squared away the veto powers before going public. It feels like it may be a coronation".

The field remains fluid. Michelle Bachelet, Chile's two-time former president, dropped out in late September after US criticism of her advocacy for women's rights. Macky Sall of Senegal also recently dropped out, and the candidacies of Nusseibeh and Olara Otunnu of Uganda have thrown off the expectation that the Latin America-Caribbean region would claim the post.

Rodrigues Birkett, in second place, is defending her government's position that Israel has been defying international law in Gaza while assuring the Council it would not influence her decisions. Nusseibeh's entry adds a fourth woman to the race; the UN has never had a woman secretary-general, an 81-year gap a General Assembly resolution said this contest was supposed to rectify.

A straw poll expected on Friday, October 23, was postponed, possibly to the next week, to give the UAE time to submit Nusseibeh's nomination, sources told FRANCE 24 and PassBlue. Diplomats expect Nusseibeh to take part in a General Assembly interactive dialogue before the Council holds its next straw poll.

Melissa Summers, spokesperson for General Assembly President Rahman, said in an October 21 email that "any new candidate who may emerge will be introduced to the wider UN membership", in line with the relevant revitalisation resolutions.