UNITED NATIONS: United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has appointed senior Indian diplomat Amandeep Singh Gill as his Envoy on Technology. The world body described him as a "thought leader on digital technology" with a firm understanding of how to take advantage of digital transformation responsible and inclusively for the advancement of the Sustainable Development Goals.
Gill was the Indian Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva from 2016 to 2018 and is the Chief Executive Officer of the International Digital Health and Artificial Intelligence Research Cooperative (I-DAIR) project based at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva.
A statement issued by Un on Friday read, "A thought leader on digital technology, he brings to the position a deep knowledge of digital technologies coupled with a solid understanding of how to leverage the digital transformation responsibly and inclusively for progress on the Sustainable Development Goals".
Gill, before this was the Executive Director and Co-Lead of the United Nations Secretary-General's High-Level Panel on Digital Cooperation (2018-2019).
In addition to reporting the High-Level Panel on Digital Cooperation, Gill helped secure the high-impact international consensus recommendations on regulating Artificial Intelligence (Al) in lethal autonomous weapon systems in 2017 and 2018, the draft Al ethics recommendation of UNESCO in 2020, and a new international platform on digital health and Al.
A visiting scholar at Stanford University, Gill joined the Indian Diplomatic Service in 1992 and has served on various levels of disarmament and strategic technologies, and international security affairs, posted in Tehran and Colombo.
Gill holds a PhD in Nuclear Learning in Multilateral Forums from King's College, London, a Bachelor of Technology in Electronics and Electrical Communications from Panjab University, Chandigarh and an Advanced Diploma in French History and Language from Geneva University.
Source- PTI