DHARAMSHALA: Mr Matteo Mecacci, a leading human rights advocate and former member of Italian Parliament, has been appointed as the new President of the US-based International Campaign for Tibet (ICT), the world’s largest advocacy organisation for the Tibetan people.

In a statement, Mr Richard Gere, Chairman of the ICT Board, said: “We are thrilled to wlecome Matteo at an important and exciting moment for ICT and the Tibet movement worldwide. I’ve known and worked with Matteo for many years and know him to be an energetic, compassionate and creative leader with a solid track record in working with evolving democracies all over the world. Matteo has a deep connection to His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Tibet, an awareness of the political, cultural and social dynamics within China, and brings to ICT considerable experience in diplomacy, democracy and advocacy.”

“Mr Mecacci will lead implementation of a five-year strategic plan that will help ICT build on its successes of 25 years of advocacy and deepen the impact of its work for the Tibetan people,” the ICT said in its statement on 12 December.

Mr Matteo Mecacci served as a member of the Italian Chamber of Deputies and Chairperson of the Italian Parliamentary Intergroup for Tibet. In November 2009, he organised the 5th World Parliamentarians Convention on Tibet in Rome, which hosted His Holiness the Dalai Lama and established an International Network of Parliamentarians on Tibet (INPaT). In 2010, he became Co-Chair of INPaT with Mr Thomas Mann, a Member of the European Parliament. He has played an active role in promoting Tibetan democracy in exile as he was a member of the Tibetan Election Observation Mission during the Tibetan parliamentary and Kalon Tripa elections in March 2011.

Mr Matteo, who studied international law at the University of Firenze in Italy, played leading roles in various campaigns to foster democracy and protect human rights at the international level. He was part of a coalition of international NGOs advocating the reform of the United Nations. He played an important role in the international campaign in 2007 which led to the adoption of the first UN resolution calling for a world moratorium on capital executions and the abolition of the death penalty. As a member of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Parliamentary Assembly, he supervised the presidential elections in Georgia and took part in numerous electoral missions, including Moldavia, Britain, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Armenia, US, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Macedonia, Turkey, Tunisia, Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Serbia.

Founded in 1988, the International Campaign for Tibet has been proactively promoting the human rights and democratic freedoms of the Tibetan people. It has offices in Washington, DC, Amsterdam, Berlin and Brussels.