Kathmandu, April 4:

The UN has appointed a senior official for its mission in Nepal, a press statement issued by the UN said.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has appointed Aracelly Santana his deputy special representative for Nepal and deputy head of the UNMIN, headed by Ian Martin.

The 62-year-old Santana, currently UNMIN chief of staff, replaces Tamrat Samuel and will assume her new post on April 21.

Santana, a UN veteran, served with the Centre against Apartheid, where she organised two missions of the Secretary-General to South Africa in the lead-up to the negotiations that ended apartheid.

Since the 1990s, her functions focused on electoral matters and she served as officer-in-charge and deputy director of the Electoral Assistance Division until September 2007. She has undertaken several political postings in the Balkans. The UNMIN’s tenure in Nepal ends in June.