Geneva, 25 September 1998
– The International Chamber of Commerce today elected Adnan Kassar, a prominent
Lebanese banker, as its President for two years from 1 January 1999.
Richard D. McCormick, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of
US West Inc., was elected Vice-President of the world business organization.
Both received unanimous votes from the ICC Council, the supreme governing body.
Mr Kassar replaces Helmut O. Maucher, Chairman of Nestl, who has completed
his mandate but remains one of the three members of the ICC presidency.
Mr Kassar, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the Fransabank
Group, has been an active member of ICC since the early 1970s. As ICC Vice President
he led a high level business delegation to the United Nations in New York last
February to forge a closer working relationship between business and the UN
system.
That meeting with Secretary General Kofi Annan and his senior
officials prepared the ground for the Geneva Business Dialogue, which ended
yesterday, a conference which brought together business leaders from all over
the world with the heads of intergovernmental organizations to debate how the
public and private sectors can work together in dealing with the challenges
of globalization.
As President, Mr Kassar plans to build stronger ICC links to
China and east Asia and to the countries of eastern Europe. He will preside
over the Millennium Congress of ICC in Budapest in the year 2000. He also looks
to extending ICC membership in the Arab world through the addition of new national
committees from the Gulf states and elsewhere.
Mr Kassar commented: "Despite the current financial turmoil,
I remain convinced that ICC is entering a period of expansion in a world in
which the private sector and personal initiative will play an ever greater role
in economic advancement."
The new President has twice served on the ICC Executive Board
and from 1990 to 1996 was President of the International Bureau of Chambers
of Commerce, a body within ICC which is the hub of the chamber of commerce movement
worldwide. He was one of the founders of ICC’s national committee in Lebanon
and remains its President.
Mr Kassar is also Chairman of the General Union of Chambers
of Commerce, Industry and Agriculture for the Arab countries, Deputy Chairman
of the General Assembly of the Chambers of Commerce and Industry of the Mediterranean
Countries "ASCAME" and Deputy Chairman of the French-Lebanese Chamber
of Commerce.
Besides heading US West, Mr McCormick serves on the boards of
UAL Corporation (United Airlines) and Norwest Corporation. He is Chairman of
the US Council for International Business, the US affiliate of ICC.
ICC has national committees and groups in 65 countr
ies and direct
members in 71 countries. It is the only representative body that speaks with
authority on behalf of enterprises from all sectors in every part of the world.
ICC promotes an open international trade and investment system and the market
economy.