Secretary General Kofi Annan picked Bertini for critical responsibilities that include furthering his agenda for UN reform and executing Connor's master plan for rebuilding the crumbling New York headquarters and finding new space (at minimal cost) for staff now scattered about the East Side in rented offices.

After Louise Frechette, the UN deputy Secretary General, Bertini will become the ranking woman in Annan's cabinet.

Bertini, a Republican, was President George H. W. Bush's nominee for the post of executive director of the World Food Program and was appointed jointly by the UN Secretary General and the Director General of the Food and Agriculture Organization in 1992. She was reappointed in 1997 with the endorsement of President Bill Clinton backed by the Group of 77 developing countries and the executive board of WFP, which is based in Rome. She stepped down earlier this year because of a term limit.

Even before this latest appointment, Bertini remained involved with the UN, as chairperson of the UN System Standing Committee on Nutrition and, last month, as Annan's personal envoy to assess the humanitarian needs of the inhabitants of the strife-torn Gaza strip and West Bank. For the fall semester, she is the Towsley Foundation Policy Maker in Residence at the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan.

Bertini, who is all business but at the same time possessed of immense personal charm, was named "The World's Most Powerful Woman" in an admiring profile in The Times of London a year before her reappointment to WFP. Prior to joining that agency, she served as an assistant secretary of agriculture in the US government, as a top executive in the US Department of Health and Human Services and in state government in Illinois and he native New York.

In the corporate world, she worked for 10 years as a public afairs officer, and in academia was a fellow at the Kennedy School.

In one of many tributes paid to Bertini during her active, multifaceted career, the American Public Welfare Association determined that she epitomized "the very best in public service."

Connor, who has not been in the best of health, is retiring after providing sterling service in a critically important post that had been buffeted by underperformance and frequent personnel changes at the top before he arrived on the UN scene. He is a former chief executive of Price Waterhouse, the major accounting firm that has since merged. He was nominated by President Clinton and is presumed to be a Democrat, although personal political afiliations are not a common topic of discussion about or among senior UN officials.

Bertini's official biography notes, "For many years, she has been active in politics in the United States." Aged 52, she is a graduate of the State Univesity of New York at Albany. She is married to Tom Haskell, a photojournalist. Their home is at Cortland, NY, where she plays clarinet in the local band.