During an official two-day visit to the Republic of Korea on 12 and 13 October 2026, UNV Executive Coordinator Toily Kurbanov is meeting government representatives and international organizations. The visit takes place during the International Volunteer Year and will focus on how volunteer action can further strengthen solidarity and cooperation while responding to global peace and development challenges.

Troubled beginningsMy own entry into the UN was as a young tour guide at the UN Headquarters in New York. This opportunity opened a window into a vast and complex institution. Explaining the UN to visitors from around the world helped me see it from the inside – its energy, complexity and extraordinary potential. That experience set me on the path to UNDP.

In 1999, a cyclone struck Odisha in eastern India.Mukeshkumar Prajapati was thousands of kilometers away in Jamnagar, Gujarat, completing his medical training in pediatrics. When a call went out for medical specialists willing to help, he volunteered. His dean hesitated to send him alone. Mukesh never made the trip. But something had already revealed itself, something that would repeatedly shape the next quarter-century of his life—the impulse to step forward.

My mother was a teacher before she became a political trailblazer: Senegal’s first woman mayor and vice-president of the National Assembly. She led at a time when leadership by women was rare. She did not ask for permission to care. She simply did. And she showed me by example, that being a woman is not a limitation, but a source of strength.From her, I learned courage. Not the loud kind, but the steady kind. The courage to be who you are. To stand for others. To believe that leadership is not about status, but about responsibility.