Career
Currently (as of November 2007), she is the seniormost United Nations official in Chad. After joining the United Nations World Food Programme (World Food Program) in 1995, she served as Country Director for World Food Program in Djibouti and Cameroon, and also worked at the World Food Program headquarters in Rome. She covered numerous complex emergencies, including Kosovo, Liberia, Nicaragua, Sierra Leone, and Timor-Leste (East Timor).
On 1 November 2007, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, in consultation with the Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs John Holmes, appointed her as Deputy Humanitarian Coordinator (DHC) for eastern Chad.
She is based in the town of Abéché, located approximately 80 kilometres west of the border with the Sudan"s conflict-torn Darfur region. Chad currently hosts over 280,000 refugees and over 170,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs), most of whom are in the eastern region, and she was tasked with working for their return.
The official"s functions consist in providing support and guidance to a team composed of seven United Nations agencies and over 40 international non-governmental organizations (Non-governmental organizations) working in eastern Chad. Fatma Samora is married and has three children.
