Qureshi connects with thought leaders through 'FMConnect' to address pandemic

ISLAMABAD: Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said on Friday he is connecting with some of the world’s most compelling and diverse thought leaders through a digital platform to address the coronavirus pandemic.

“In cognizance of the global nature of the #Covid_19 pandemic & the need for a multi stakeholder/int’l perspective to address it, I am connecting with some of the world’s most compelling & diverse thought leaders through the #FMConnect platform across digital roundtables,” he tweeted.

In cognizance of the global nature of the #Covid_19 pandemic & the need for a multi stakeholder/int’l perspective to address it, I am connecting with some of the world’s most compelling & diverse thought leaders through the #FMConnect platform across digital roundtables.

— Shah Mahmood Qureshi (@SMQureshiPTI) May 8, 2020

Separately, the Foreign Office in a statement said Foreign Minister Qureshi introduced FM Connect Digital: The Thought Leaders series. The FM Connect Thought Leader platform will see the Foreign Minister hosting a diversity of round table digital discussions with intellectuals, writers, academics, thinkers and researchers across the globe, it said.

For the inaugural FM Connect digital session, Qureshi invited four global thought leaders for a discussion premised on Post Covid-19 realities on the global geo-political and socio economic landscape.

These thought leaders included:

Dr William Ury, co-founder of Harvard University’s Program on Negotiation and one of the world’s leading experts on negotiation. He is currently a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Harvard Negotiation Project and a bestselling, award winning author.

Professor Kishore Mahbubani, a Singaporean Diplomat and an Academic, former president of the United Nations Security Council and is a Distinguished Fellow at the Asia Research Institute (ARI), National University of Singapore (NUS).

Dr Kevin P Gallagher, professor of Global Development Policy at Boston University’s Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies, where he directs the Global Development Policy Center.

Dr Adil Najam, the inaugural Dean of the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University