AFLP Secretariat Team
Nassrine AZIMI, AFLP Team Leader
greenlegacy@unitar.org
Nassrine Azimi is coordinator of the Green Legacy Hiroshima (GLH) Initiative (http://glh.unitar.org), a global campaign she co-founded in 2011 to disseminate and plant worldwide seeds and saplings of the hibakujumoku, trees that survived the 1945 atomic bombing of Hiroshima.
Dr. Azimi worked her entire career at the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), in Geneva, New York and Hiroshima, where she led numerous initiatives and programs around the world. She has been an adjunct professor at Doshisha Women’s College, a visiting professor at Hiroshima Shudo University and a Research Fellow at the San Diego Botanic Garden, part of efforts to bring botanic gardens to post-conflict and least developed countries. She has a BA in political science from the University of Lausanne, an MA in international relations from the Geneva Graduate Institute of International Studies, a second MA in urban studies from the School of Architecture, University of Geneva, and a doctorate in cultural studies from the Graduate School of Integrated Arts and Sciences, Hiroshima University. She was a visiting scholar at New York’s Columbia University and at the University of California in Los Angeles/UCLA, and a member of the International Scientific Advisory Board (ISAB-COOP) of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL), and has written and published extensively, notably on UN peacekeeping and peace-building (co-edited with Chang Li Lin), on post-conflict reconstruction, environmental and cultural governance, and Asia. Her 2015 book (co-authored with Michel Wasserman) was about Beate Sirota Gordon and her father, prominent figures in Japan and the United States. In 2019 she published ‘The United States and Cultural Heritage Protection in Japan (1945-1952)’ and more recently she co-edited (with Humaira Khan-Kamal) ‘The UNITAR Hiroshima Fellowship for Afghanistan — An Anthology’ released in April 2023. In 2019 she was one of EDEN’s original co-founders.
Humaira KHAN-KAMAL, AFLP Coordinator (Book)
Humaira Khan-Kamal, is CEO of a health-care company in the United States. She is a former UNITAR New York Office staff, was team leader for the Afghanistan Fellowship Programme, the design and implementation of which she spearheaded. She also led the research and development of several training programs in international trade, public-private partnerships for sustainable development, and policy issues in information and communication technologies at part of the New York Office.
Prior to her work with UNITAR she worked as the national marketing/fund-raising manager with a non-profit project to set up the national cancer care hospital in Pakistan – Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital & Research Center.
Khan-Kamal was one of the co-founders and coordinators of the Afghan Fellowship Legacy Projects (AFLP), created to distill the lessons learnt from the 2-decades-long UNITAR Hiroshima Fellowship for Afghanistan, and channel the experiences and knowledge of this worldwide community towards future innovative and sustainable international development assistance initiatives. As one of the AFLP initiatives she co-edited (with Nassrine Azimi) ‘The UNITAR Hiroshima Fellowship for Afghanistan — An Anthology’ released in April 2023.
Jenny Xin LUAN, Research Assistant
Born and raised in Beijing, China, Jenny Xin Luan joined the UNITAR Hiroshima Office in September 2018 after graduating from Oberlin College in the United States. Recently becoming a part of Green Legacy Hiroshima Secretariat Team, she is mainly responsible for GLH website maintenance and social media engagement while assisting with communication with partners. Luan hopes to let more people know about the stories of the A-bomb trees and see the seedlings travel globally along with the message of peace.
Taiga NISHIMURA, Research Assistant
aflp@unitar.org
Taiga is a Program Coordinator at Hiroshima Peacebuilders Center (HPC), a non-profit organization commissioned by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan to conduct the Program for Global Human Resource Development for Peacebuilding and Development.
His professional career started at the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), Hiroshima Office, where he has been a Research Assistant for the Afghan Fellowship Legacy Projects (AFLP) and the Green Legacy Hiroshima (GLH) Initiative, and Program Assistant for the Nuclear Disarmament and Non-proliferation and the Women's Leadership in Tsunami-based Disaster Risk Reduction programs of the UNITAR Division for Prosperity. As part of the AFLP team Taiga was deeply involved in the Botanical Gardens Network initiative, and was a member of the editorial team for the AFLP book, published in 2023.
Taiga holds a Master of Science degree in International Development with Conflict and Humanitarian Action from the University of Bath, the United Kingdom. He also obtained a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from Hiroshima Shudo University.
