Kevin Rudd out of running for top UN job
July 29, 2016
The hopes of ex-premier Kevin Rudd to be the next United Nations Secretary General were dashed on Friday when the Australian government refused to nominate him.
Candidates for the top UN job must be nominated by their governments and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said that he made the decision not to put Rudd forward after consulting with his cabinet.
Turnbull: 'Rudd isn't qualified'
"This is not a partisan issue, this is a considered judgment," Turnbull, who is from the rival Liberal Party, told reporters in Sydney. "This is a judgment about Mr. Rudd's suitability for that particular role."
Rudd served two stints as Australian prime minister. He was in office from 2007 to 2010 before losing the Labor leadership and therefore the prime mininster's post to internal party rival Julia Gillard. In 2013, he won the role back via the same process, only to lose by a landslide to the Liberal Party in a general election the same year.
Labor had argued it was in the national interest to have an Australian in the role and said that Rudd, a Mandarin-speaking former diplomat, would fit the bill. But reports said there was little enthusiasm for him within the ruling Liberal government.
Among the dozen contenders to succeed Moon when his term expires at the end of the year are Argentina's Foreign Minister Susana Malcorra, Slovenia's ex-President Danilo Turk, New Zealand's former Prime Minister Helen Clark and Antonio Guterres, who served as Portugal's prime minister before heading the UN refugee agency.
jar/msh (AFP, dpa)