BREAKING: China withdraws its candidate for Khattab’s sake in UNESCO vote

PARIS – 12 October 2017: In an unexpected move ahead of the fourth round of the UNESCO Director-General voting process on Thursday, China announced the withdrawal of its candidate Qian Tang in favor of Egypt’s candidate Ambassador Moushira Khattab, the Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Ahmed Abu Zeid, confirmed.

Khattab acquired 13 votes in the third round, and with the Chinese candidate’s withdrawal she has the chance to garner at least 18 votes in the upcoming. Tang - who is the current Assistant-Director General for the organization - got five votes in the second and third rounds. These five votes came from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Russia, and China.

Qatar’s Hamad bin Abdulaziz Al-Kawari and France’s Audrey Azoulay both received 18 votes each in the third round on Wednesday to replace UNESCO’s director-general Irina Bokova by the start of 2018.

The six candidates who made it to the vote were Moushira Khattab (Egypt), Audrey Azoulay (France), Polad Bülbüloglu (Azerbaijan), Juan Alfonso Fuentes Soria (Guatemala), Pham Sanh Chau (Vietnam), Qian Tang (China), and former Qatari Minister of Culture Hamad Abdul Aziz al-Kawari, who is currently the cultural affairs adviser to the Emir of Qatar.

Additional contribution by Noha El Tawil