Doumbia-Henry announced as World Maritime University president

Dual Swiss and Dominican national Doumbia-Henry is currently director of the International Labour Standards Department, of the International Labour Office of the International Labour Organization (ILO), and will bring many years of experience at the UN, and expertise on international labour law, international trade law, maritime law, and the law of the sea.

Doumbia-Henry's work at ILO has involved collaboration with the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) a number of times, with extensive work on MLC 2006, the Joint IMO/ILO Ad Hoc Expert Working Groups on Fair Treatment of Seafarers and on Liability and Compensation regarding Claims for Death, Personal Injury and Abandonment of Seafarers.

“[Doumbia-Henry] has had a long standing commitment to the maritime sector and to education, beginning with her doctoral research on IMO Conventions. In addition, she has an excellent knowledge of the needs of developing countries and the difficulties which they may encounter in implementing and enforcing the provisions of maritime transport related multilateral treaties.” commented IMO secretary general and chancellor of WMU, Koji Sekimizu said.

The seventh WMU president, Doumbia-Henry will be the first female and first person from a developing country to take up the position.

Since it was founded in 1983 by the IMO, 3,293 students from 165 countries have graduated from WMU through its headquarters in Malmo, Sweden and MSc programmes in Changhai and Dalian.