Shazia Z. Rafi

Shazia Z. Rafi was Secretary-General of Parliamentarians for Global Action from 1996-2013 and the first woman on the ballot and runner-up finalist for the Inter-Parliamentary Union Secretary-General election. She is the president of a nonprofit group helping national legislatures to improve air quality in Asia: www.airqualityasia.org.

Born in Lahore, Pakistan, she graduated from Bryn Mawr College and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. Rafi is a Women's Media Center SheSource expert on international security, international law, women's rights and the environment. She lives in New York City and her website is www.shaziarafi.com (http://shaziarafi.com).

WORLDVIEWS

Six Reasons We Will Always Have the Paris Agreement

Shazia Z. Rafi

• June 3, 2017

President Trump announced recently to a baffled world that the United States would withdraw from the Paris Agreement. Or in his own inimitable words, “we are leaving, . . . we will renegotiate a better deal . . . #AmericaFirst.” The reactions from other world leaders were fast and furious, with the strongest words …

Climate and Environment, US Foreign Relations, WORLDVIEWS

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The UN General Assembly Grows More Assertive Under a Dane

Shazia Z. Rafi

• February 18, 2016

Corridor diplomacy — private nonmeetings, informal discussions — has been the norm at the United Nations since its founding 70 years ago. It is the preferred method of its most powerful organ, the Security Council, particularly now, as the election of the UN’s next secretary-general for the 2017-2022 term is underway. In this election …

General Assembly, Secretary-General

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Desperate Escape: Why Syrian and Other Refugees Are Rushing to Europe

Shazia Z. Rafi

• September 18, 2015

As a relentless remake of the Middle East and North Africa has been taking place, mass displacements of populations have also been occurring. And more chaos is ahead, says the United States Defense Intelligence chief, Lt. Gen. Vincent Stewart, in his assessment that Iraq and Syria may have been permanently torn asunder by war …

Middle East, Migration, Refugees, UN Agencies

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Can New UN Goals Put an End to Filthy Air in Beijing and Delhi?

Shazia Z. Rafi

• August 17, 2015

Remarkably after a yearlong effort by environmental health advocates, air quality has been embedded in the new set of universal development goals for a sustainable future. Since an estimated 60 percent of the global population will live in cities by 2030, which is the deadline of the new goals, outdoor urban air quality is …

Asia, Climate and Environment, Health and Population, Sustainable Development Goals

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World Health Assembly Backs Calls to Strengthen Clean Air SDGs

Shazia Z. Rafi

• May 28, 2015

Negotiations are entering the last stages of formulating the Sustainable Development Goals. For over a year, governments, the United Nations system, nongovernment organizations and parliamentarians have been engaged in negotiations on the next set of development goals, called SDGs, to succeed the eight Millennium Development Goals, which expire at the end of this year. …