Sunday, October 05, 2008

Farouk Hosni: Candidate for UNESCO Director General

Farouk Hosny -- 2001 -- Acrylic on Canvas - 105x205 cm
Zamalek Art Galary

Farouk Hosni, having served for two decades as Egyptian Minister of Culture, has been nominated by his government to be the next Director General of UNESCO, and is considered to be a leading candidate. He is also know internationally as an abstract artist. One of his paintings is reproduced above. The second term of office of the current Director General, Koïchiro Matsuura, ends in October 2009.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Disgusting!!! Farouk Hosni is a notorious hatemonger, the exact opposite of the kind of person we need to lead UNESCO. He has called for the burning of any Israeli books found in Egyptian libraries, and that is nowhere near the worst of his racist hatemongering statements! Shame on us, shame on the United Nations, shame on the world if this person becomes head of UNESCO.

And shame on this website if it censors this comment!

John Daly said...

There is an excellent article by Yojana Sharma on SciDev.Net describing the various candidates for the post of Director General.

I don't know who Frank is, but I have accepted his challenge to publish his comment even though I would prefer more temperate and analytical comments.

It does indicate how controversial Farouk Hosni's candidacy has become.