Ashita Mittal, UNODC Regional Representative to Central Asia

Biography

Ms. Ashita Mittal is United Nations Office for Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Regional Representative to Central Asia, based in Tashkent, covering the countries of Central Asia: Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

Ms. Mittal has over 34 years of development experience, especially on counter-narcotics and crime prevention. She has been with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) since 1995. She has also served as the Deputy Representative for the UNODC Country Office in Afghanistan, from 2009 to 2014. Prior to that, she served as the Deputy Representative, UNODC Regional Office for South Asia covering Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal and Sri Lanka, where she joined in 1995. She worked on food security with the World Food Programme in India in the early ’90s. Before joining the UN, she worked with the civil society and has been well recognized for her pioneering work in the field of drug use prevention, treatment and rehabilitation as well as on gender, sustainable development and the rule of law since the ’80s.

With a Graduate degree in Psychology and a Masters Degree in Social Work from Delhi University, India, Ms. Mittal was also a Fulbright Fellow (1989-90) in the USA.