Switzerland - IOM’s 107th Council – the first since the agency entered the United Nations – will open Monday, 5 December, at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, Switzerland. It will run through 8 December.

The Council will mark the 65th anniversary of IOM’s founding on 5 December 1951. It will feature keynote addresses by President of Malta Marie-Louise Coleiro Preca and President of the United Nations General Assembly Peter Thomson.

The session will consider an application for IOM membership from the Kingdom of Tonga. Eighteen applications for the observer status will also be considered. Major topics of discussion will include IOM–UN relations and the 2018 Global Compact on Migration.

The Council will also feature three high level panels: “Global compact for safe, orderly and regular migration – from process to substance”, whose distinguished panelists will include former president of Ireland and former UN Human Rights Commissioner Mary Robinson, “Opportunities for Policy Development to Address Climate Migration and Cross-Border Disaster Displacement”, and “The Grand Bargain on humanitarian financing”.

Other speakers will include: Ambassador Beatriz Londoño Soto, Permanent Representative of Colombia to the UN in Geneva; Gregory Maniatis, Senior Adviser to the UN SRSG for International Migration; Raúl Heredia, Deputy Permanent Representative of Mexico to the UN in Geneva; Ambassador Hans-Joachim Daerr, Permanent Representative of the Federal Republic of Germany to the UN in Geneva; Prof. Walter Kaelin, Adviser to the Chair of the Platform on Disaster Displacement; Prof. Tord Kjellstrom, Professor and Expert in Environmental and Occupational Health; Androulla Kaminara, Director for Africa, Asia, Latin America, Caribbean and Pacific, DG ECHO; Jemilah Mahmood, USG, Partnerships, IFRC; Nathalie Lintvelt, Head, Migration and Development Group, Stabilization and Humanitarian Aid Department, MFA, Netherlands; Maryam Teschke-Panah, Deputy Head, Conflict, Humanitarian and Security Department, DFID, UK; Ahmad Faizal, President, Mercy Malaysia; Professor Yasushi Iguchi, Kwansei Gakuin University, Japan.

Edited highlights will be shared throughout the four days via IOM’s YouTube Channel and social media channels (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat – search UN Migration).

The Council will also host a presentation of a McKinsey Global Institute report: People on the move: Migration’s impact on individuals and economies and a “Migrants Voices” session, featuring among others, Luis Salinas, producer of the film “The Golden Dream” (Mexico 2013).

The film will be screened as part of IOM’s Global Migration Film Festival at 18.30 on 6 December in the Auditorium Ivan Pictet, Maison de la Paix, Chemin Eugène-Rigot 2, Genève.

The Global Migration Film Festival will take place 5 to 18 December with over 75 screenings all over the world.

For further information please contact IOM HQ. Azzouz Samri, Tel: +41 22 717 94 68, Email: asamri@iom.int or Leonard Doyle, Tel: + 41 79 285 71 23, Email: ldoyle@iom.int