Søren Jessen-Petersen joined Independent Diplomat as Head of the Washington Office in January 2008. He is also a lecturer at the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. He has since November 2006 been a Guest Scholar at the United States Institute of Peace (USIP) where he has been writing a book on the interplay between politics and humanitarian consequences.

Søren served as Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General in Kosovo and head of UNMIK from August 2004 to July 2006 at the level of Under Secretary-General. He was the European Union Special Representative in Skopje, Macedonia from February to June 2004.

Prior to this he served as the Chairman of the European Union Stability Pact's Migration, Asylum, Refugees Regional Initiative (MARRI), as Assistant High Commissioner at UNHCR headquarters in Geneva, and as Director of the UNHCR Liaison Office at the United Nations Headquarters in New York. 

Søren Jessen-Petersen is available for press interviews and background briefings, in English, French, German or the Scandinavian languages, on a variety of matters, in particular Europe, the Balkans (especially Kosovo), the Great Lakes region of Africa and West Africa (as well as Western Sahara), Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, South East Asia and Columbia as well as UN matters and humanitarian issues.  Contact him directly at +1 202 429 3881.