Simon Yazgi

Simon Yazgi

Consultant

Simon Yazgi has over 25 years experience working in peacekeeping and peacemaking on the political and security tracks, both as a UN staff member and as a consultant. As a consultant he supports international organisations, governments, non-governmental organisations and think tanks on security arrangements - ceasefires, Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR) and security sector reform (SSR) - in peace and mediation processes. From 2021 – 2023 he served as a Senior Advisor on Security Arrangements and DDR in the Political Affairs section of the United Nations Integrated Transition Assistance Mission in Sudan (UNITAMS) where he was seconded through UNDP by the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs’ Expert Pool on Civilian Peacebuilding. Simon started his career with the United Nations in 1999 as a Political Affairs Officer with the UN Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC), where he also worked on DDR. Following various assignments in field missions and at headquarters he was named as the Department of Peace Operations Chief of DDR in 2013. In 2016, Simon joined the Standby Team of Senior Mediation Advisors of the Department of Peacebuilding and Political Affairs. He served on the team as the Senior Advisor on Security Arrangements for four years (2016- 2020), working on peace processes in support of the UN and other partners in close to 20 countries around the globe. In 2020 he left the Team to launch a research programme on Conventional Arms Control and Conflict Prevention for the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR). With the programme up and running, he joined UNITAMS in 2021, leaving the mission at the end of 2023 when its mandate was not renewed. He remains a Non-Resident Senior Fellow with UNIDIR and has previously also served on the Advisory Board of the Bonn International Center for Conflict Studies and as a mentor with the Obama Foundation.