Ms. Ilene Cohn, Director of UNMAS
Ms. Ilene Cohn is the Director of UNMAS in the Department of Peace Operations. In her 25 years of service with the United Nations, Ms. Cohn has served at Headquarters in the Department of Peace Operations and the Office of the SRSG for Children and Armed Conflict and in seven peace operations in Africa and Latin America. She served previously with UNMAS from 2003-2007.
Ms. Rita Gunaryati Lubis, Deputy Director
Ms. Lubis joined UNMAS in December 2022. She has extensive experience in Financial Management and Policy, having started as an Associate Budget Officer in the United Nations Office at Nairobi in 2001. Since then she has worked in the Finance Division of the Office of Programme Planning, Finance and Budget (OPPFB) in the Department of Management Strategy, Policy and Compliance (DMSPC) holding various positions, including as the UN International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS) Implementation Project Team Lead responsible for the implementation of IPSAS, as the Chief of Central Accounts Section responsible for the preparation of the UN financial statements, and most recently as the Chief of Financial Policy Section. She also briefly served as the Executive Officer of the (then) Department of Political Affairs. Prior to joining the UN, she worked as an Auditor in PriceWaterhouseCoopers in Jakarta, Indonesia.
Ms. Lubis is a Chartered Accountant and has a Bachelor’s Degree in Accounting from the University of Indonesia, Post Graduate Diploma in Financial Management from the University of London and Master of Science from the Zicklin School of Business, Baruch College, CUNY.
Mr. Richard Boulter, Chief, Design, Operational Support and Oversight
Mr. Richard Boulter was appointed Chief of Design, Operational Support and Oversight in October 2021. Under Mr. Boulter's leadership the section focuses on the design of new programmes and the validation of existing structures. The UNMAS Threat Mitigation Advisory Section, which is the UN Secretariats' principal Counter-IED advisory resource, also reports to Mr. Boulter, who Chairs the UN's Whole of System Counter-IED Task Force. For ten years he was an active member of the IMAS Review Board and now advises the Chair of the IMAS Steering Group.
Mr. Boulter has almost 30 years management experience in the mine action sector, including twenty years of field experience. Prior to joining the headquarters, he spent four and a half years managing the UNMAS programme in South Sudan and a further four years as the UNMAS Global Weapons and Ammunition Management Advisor. Prior to joining UNMAS he spent more than twenty years managing mine clearance and Weapons and Ammunition Management programmes for The HALO Trust. He has implemented programme activities in sixteen countries and consulted in a further ten.
Mr. Boulter holds a bachelor's degree in Civil Engineering and a Master's in Business Administration.
Mr. Bruno Donat, Chief, Geneva office
With more than 20 years in international affairs, Mr. Bruno Donat is currently – and for a second time - the Chief of the Geneva office of the United Nations Mine Action Service (UNMAS) within the Office of Rule of Law and Security Institutions (OROLSI) at the Department of Peace Operations (DPO).
Just before this posting, Mr. Donat was the Chief of the Section of the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO) working on Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR) – of armed groups - and Community Violence Reduction. And prior, he was the Team Leader for Political Affairs at the United Nations Mission for West Africa and the Sahel (UNOWAS) covering some 16 countries of the region. Earlier postings include Headquarters and country-level ones for both the United Nations and the World Bank, the last years of which at the Fragile States, Conflict, and Social Development unit of the World Bank’s Africa Region.
He received training in Conflict Resolution and Applied International Studies from the Caux Scholars Program in Switzerland and also studied International Relations at the Institut d'Etudes Politiques of Strasbourg, France. He was exposed as well to a military education through his participation as a cadet officer in the US Army R.O.T.C. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a B.A. summa cum laude in Theology and a M.A. in Political Science from Boston College, USA.
Ms. Abigail Hartley, Chief, Policy, Advocacy, Donor Relations and Outreach
Ms. Abigail Hartley was appointed Chief of the Policy, Advocacy and Public Information Section of UNMAS in May 2014. In mid-2020 Resource Mobilization was incorporated into the Section. Under Ms. Hartley’s supervision, the Section focuses on leadership of the Inter-Agency Coordination Group on Mine Action and the United Nations Coordinating Task Force on a UN whole-of-system approach to Improvised Explosive Devices, development of mine action policy, monitoring of the United Nations Mine Action Strategy 2019 - 2023, and advocacy in support of mine-related international legal instruments. The Section is also responsible for coordinating UNMAS resource mobilization efforts, as well as UNMAS communication and outreach.
Ms. Hartley has over 20 years of progressively responsible experience in the mine action and humanitarian sectors at both headquarters and field level. She spent almost 6 years working in Afghanistan, a country significantly impacted by landmines and other explosive remnants of war and the oldest and largest mine action programme in the world. Ms. Hartley joined the UNMAS programme as a Senior Programme Officer and thereafter held posts of Chief of Staff and Programme Manager overseeing policy, political, legal, humanitarian, social and economic aspects of the programme. Prior to this, Ms. Hartley worked for many years with the mine clearance organization Mines Advisory Group (MAG) all over the world but primarily in South Sudan, Sri Lanka and Sudan. In 2019 Ms. Hartley served temporarily as the Deputy Head of Office for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Somalia before returning to UNMAS in 2020.
Ms. Hartley is a graduate of the Universities of Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Bradford and holds a Master’s degree in International Politics and Security Studies.
Ms. Sonia Mrabet, Chief, Budget Financial Management & Reporting Section
Ms. Sonia Mrabet, was appointed as UNMAS Chief Budget and Finance Section in March 2014. With twenty five years of experience in progressively responsible management positions in international organizations and the private sector, Ms. Mrabet oversees the Financial and Budget matters of UNMAS, she has a rich international experience in Programme planning, budgeting and financial management and was instrumental in various UNMAS improvements and change initiatives while ensuring compliance with UN Financial Rules and regulations as well complex donor requirements.
Her professional financial and budget experience also includes strategic planning, programming and budgeting and strong Leadership and people management skills, including ability to motivate diverse groups in multicultural environments. The UNMAS Budget and Finance Section’s primary objective is to provide budgetary and financial services to staff, partners, vendors, suppliers, auditors and other clients.
Prior to joining UNMAS, Ms. Mrabet has served in various positions: UNDRR in Geneva/Switzerland, UNMIK in Prishtina/Kosovo and in ICMPD Vienna/Austria. A national of Tunisia, Ms. Mrabet holds a Master of Business Administration degree in finance and business administration from Webster University in Vienna Austria and a Maitrise d’Hautes Etudes Commerciales from IHEC Carthage Tunisia. Ms. Mrabet is fluent in Arabic, French, English and German and she has a working knowledge of Spanish and Italian. She is married and has two children.