Chairmanship and Secretary General

Ms Garza has served as an ICC Executive Board member since 2014 and is the ICC Regional Coordinator for the Americas and a member of the governing body of the ICC International Court of Arbitration.

A strong advocate of business ethics and corporate governance standards, Ms Garza was Chair of ICC Mexico until June 2020 and is a former member of the International Affairs Advisory Committee of the Ministry of Labour and former member of the National Advisory Committee of ACLAN. Ms Garza was Vice-President of the Confederation of Employers of the Mexican Republic (Coparmex) and was also a member of the Compliance Committee of Infonavit. She is a Board Member of the Corporate Responsibility Alliance AliaRSE and was a member of the Corporate Responsibility Network of the Business and Industry Advisory Committee to the OECD.

Philippe Varin, is Chair of ICC France and became vice-chair of ICC on 14 June 2022.

Mr Varin is former CEO of Corus. He is former Chair of the Managing Board of PSA Peugeot Citroën, and former Chair of the Board of Directors of AREVA and of Orano. He is also a former member of the Board of Directors of Saint-Gobain and chaired the Cercle de l’Industrie before becoming Chair of France Industrie and Vice-Chair of the Conseil National de l’Industrie (2017 to 2020). Most recently Mr Varin chaired the Board of Directors of SUEZ until February 2022 and is a member of the Board of Directors of the Groupe hospitalier Paris Saint-Joseph.

Nayla Comair-Obeid became ICC Vice-Chair on 14 June 2022. She is founding partner of Obeid & Partners where she heads the firm’s dispute resolution practice.
Ms Comair-Obeid is an esteemed professor of law and author of several publications. Ms Comair Obeid is an associate member of 3VB Chambers in London, a member of the international commercial expert committee of China’s Supreme People’s Court; a Member of the ICCA Governing Board; and Vice-Chair of the IBA Arbitration Committee. She is also a companion of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (CIArb). Ms Comair Obeid is former CIArb president (2017) and sits on the ICSID panel of arbitrators and conciliators.

Director of J.K.Organisation and Vice-Chair and Managing Director of JK Paper Ltd, Mr Singhania became ICC Vice-Chair on 14 June 2022. He also serves as Director on the Boards of JK Fenner (India) Ltd., Bhopal Udyog Ltd., Pulp & Paper Research Institute, JK Lakshmipat University, International Management Institute, and Pushpawati Singhania Research Institute for Liver, Renal & Digestive Diseases. Mr Singhania is Past President of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry and Past President of ICC India. He served four terms as Coordinator of ICC’s Asia-Pacific Regional Consultative Group and is a current member of ICC’s Governance and NetCom Committees.

Mr Singhania holds an MBA from the University of Massachusetts and is an alumnus of Harvard Business School.

Ajay Banga was Chair of ICC from June 2020 – June 2022.  Ajay Banga is Vice-Chair of General Atlantic and former chief executive officer and member of Mastercard’s board of directors. Prior to Mastercard, Mr Banga served as Chief Executive Officer of Citigroup Asia Pacific, and served as a member of President Obama’s Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity and a past member of the US President’s Advisory Committee for Trade Policy and Negotiations. He is also a member of the board of overseers of the Weill Cornell Medical College, and a director of Dow Inc. and member of its compensation and governance committees. 

John W.H. Denton AO @ICCSecGen is the Secretary General of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC). He is a global business leader and international advisor on policy and a legal expert on international trade and investment. 

In 2022, Mr Denton was appointed by United Nations Secretary General to represent the global private sector on the newly formed Steering Committee of the UN Global Crisis Response Group on Food, Energy and Finance. 

He currently serves on the WHO Foundation Strategic Advisory Group and the Global Task Force on Refugee Labour Mobility and is currently chair of the UN Business and Human Security Initiative of the London School of Economics and Political Science’s foreign policy think tank LSE IDEAS.

Mr Denton is a Board member of the UN Global Compact and Co-chair of the B20 finance and infrastructure taskforce, as well as a founding member of the Business 20 (B20), Co-founder of the Australia–China CEO Roundtable and Patron of UNHCR in Australia. 

He serves on the Board of IFM Global Investors, a leading institutional investment manager, and is Chair of the Moeller Institute Advisory Board at the University of Cambridge. 

He additionally serves on the Boards of the UN Development Programme’s Impact Investing Steering Group and UNICEF’s global education initiative, GenU, and he is a member of the Advisory Board of the African Green Infrastructure Investment Bank (AfGIIB) and the G7 Working Group on Impact Investment. 

A former diplomat, Mr Denton co-led the Australian Government’s 2012 White Paper on “Australia in the Asian Century” and previously chaired the APEC Finance and Economics Working Group.