Danilo Turk President of Slovenia Date of Birth: 19.02.1952 Country: Slovenia

1. Biography of Danilo Türk
2. Education and Academic Career
3. Work in the United Nations
4. Assistant to the Secretary-General of the United Nations
5. Presidency of Slovenia

Biography of Danilo Türk

Danilo Türk is a Slovenian lawyer, specialist in international law, and diplomat. He was born on February 19, 1952, in Maribor, Slovenia.

Education and Academic Career

Türk completed his law degree at the Faculty of Law, University of Ljubljana, in 1975. He went on to defend his doctoral dissertation in the field of international law in 1982. Türk is the author of the book "The Principle of Non-Intervention in International Relations and International Law" (Ljubljana, 1984), as well as approximately 100 articles on human rights, minority rights, the use of force by states, GATT, and other topics. He has lectured at universities in Europe and the United States.

Work in the United Nations

From 1984, Türk worked within the United Nations system. He served as a member of the Subcommission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, and in 1990, he held the position of its chairman. He was a special rapporteur of the Subcommission on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights from 1988 to 1992, and on the right to freedom of opinion and expression from 1989 to 1992. After Slovenia's independence in 1992, Türk served as its permanent representative to the United Nations until 2000. During this period, he participated in numerous consultative meetings organized by the High Commissioner on National Minorities. From 1994 to 1997, he simultaneously chaired the working group of the Third Committee of the United Nations General Assembly on the reform of United Nations mechanisms in the field of human rights. In 1997-1998, he was also a member of the Human Rights Committee established by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In 1998-1999, Türk represented Slovenia in the United Nations Security Council and chaired the Committee on the implementation of Security Council resolution 748 of 1992 (sanctions against Libya).

Assistant to the Secretary-General of the United Nations

From 2000 to 2005, Türk served as Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs under Secretary-General Kofi Annan. In this role, he was responsible for advising the Secretary-General on political matters and coordinating political activities of the United Nations Secretariat.

Presidency of Slovenia

In June 2007, Türk's candidacy for the presidency of Slovenia was nominated by a block of left-centrist parties, with the Social Democratic Party playing a major role. In the first round of the presidential elections held on October 21, 2007, Türk came in second place with 24.54% of the votes, trailing behind the candidate from the right-centrist government bloc, Lojze Peterle, who received 28.5% of the votes. However, in the second round held on November 11, 2007, Türk won the presidency with 70.8% of the votes. This result was attributed to Türk's ability to attract supporters of other opposition candidates, particularly Miti Gašpari, the former governor of the Central Bank, who narrowly missed advancing to the second round, falling behind Türk by less than 1% of the votes.