{"id":5485,"date":"2026-03-27T10:00:05","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T02:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.atonefestival.com\/speaker\/irina-bokova\/"},"modified":"2026-04-17T11:31:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T03:31:12","slug":"irina-bokova","status":"publish","type":"speaker","link":"https:\/\/www.atonefestival.com\/en\/speaker\/irina-bokova\/","title":{"rendered":"Irina Bokova"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Irina Bokova, born in Sofia, Bulgaria, served two terms as Director-General of UNESCO from 2009 to 2017. During her tenure, she played a key role in advancing the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, particularly in education, cultural heritage protection, and the role of science.<\/p>\n<p>She has received state honors from over 40 countries and honorary doctorates from leading universities worldwide. In recent years, she has been elected International Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and Honorary Fellow of the World Academy of Arts and Sciences, and serves as Patron of the International Science Council.<\/p>\n<p>Bokova is also engaged with major academic institutions in China and holds honorary roles at Beijing Foreign Studies University. In 2025, she received both the Orchid Lifetime Achievement Award and the Chinese Government Friendship Award.<\/p>\n<p>She currently serves on the Board of the Ban Ki-moon Foundation, the Leadership Council of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network, and chairs the Governing Council of the UN University for Peace, among other roles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Irina Bokova, born in Sofia, Bulgaria, served two terms\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":5778,"template":"","speaker-category":[88],"class_list":["post-5485","speaker","type-speaker","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","speaker-category-impact-architects"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atonefestival.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/speaker\/5485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atonefestival.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/speaker"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atonefestival.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/speaker"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atonefestival.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atonefestival.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"speaker-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atonefestival.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/speaker-category?post=5485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}