Award-winning action heroine Michelle Yeoh has been appointed as United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Goodwill Ambassador. The UNDP works to eradicate poverty and reduce inequality.
- The actress will focus on raising awareness and mobilising support for the recently-launched Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
I want to be there for all those who are left behind in this world, whether it’s because they are born poor, born a woman or born in the area affected by devastation. As UNDP Goodwill Ambassador, I want to do all I can to help people overcome barriers and have a shot at a better life, in a safer world, on a healthier planet.
– Yeoh
- Yeoh, having personally experienced the deadly earthquake that struck Nepal on April 2015 while she was visiting the country, said she intends to leverage her influence as an actress and advocate shining a spotlight on disaster recovery efforts in Nepal and beyond.
- UNDP Administrator Helen Clark welcomed Yeoh to the global UNDP family.
- Yeoh is internationally acclaimed for her roles in the James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies and in Ang Lee’s multiple Academy Award-winning Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
- Her previous engagements concerning development issues included appointments as Global Ambassador for the Live to Love and Make Roads Safe campaign in 2012, advocacy during the Zero Discrimination Campaign (UNAIDS) in 2013, and a Live to Love humanitarian aid trip to Nepal this year.
Michelle Yeoh:
- Tan Sri Michelle Yeoh Choo-Kheng is a Chinese-Malaysian actress, best known for performing her own stunts in the Hong Kong action films that brought her to fame in the early 1990s.
- Born in Ipoh, Malaysia, she was chosen by People as one of the “50 Most Beautiful People in the World” in 1997.
- She is best known in the Western world for her roles in the 1997 James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies, playing Wai Lin, and the multiple Academy Award–winning Chinese-language martial arts film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, for which she was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in 2000.
- In 2009, she was listed by People magazine – as the only Asian actress – as one of the “35 All-Time Screen Beauties”.
- On 30 November 2013, she presided as the Chief Guest at the International Film Festival of India.
