Ismailimail concludes today’s first set of five readings with highlights of Mawlana Sultan Muhammad Shah at the League of Nations (the predecessor of the current United Nations) first as the Delegate of India and later as the President of League of Nations.
Mawlana Sultan Muhammad Shah was nominated to represent India to the League of Nations in 1932 and served as a member of the League of Nations (1934–37) becoming the President of the League of Nations in 1937.
“I am particularly happy to congratulate His Highness the Aga Khan on his election as President of the eighteenth session of the Assembly of the League of Nations.
It is an honour for the latter to be presided over by so distinguished a personality as His Highness the Aga Khan, representing as he does a country, whose culture has influenced numerous civilisations, including that of Europe.
I call upon His Highness the Aga Khan to take the Presidential Chair, and I wish him every success in the proceedings over which he will preside.”
– M. Hambro, Delegate of Norway
Chairman of the Nomination Committee
League of Nations, 1937
“The basis of all security is a foreign policy rooted in mutual goodwill and cooperation; a foreign policy in which no country covets its neighbor’s possessions or seeks to infringe its moral and spiritual rights.”
– His Highness Aga Sir Sultan Muhammad Shah, Aga Khan III
India’s Delegate to the League of Nations at the 14th Session
Disarmament Conference, Geneva, Switzerland. February 19, 1932
“Indeed all the problems that fall to the League of Nations may be ultimately reduced to one – that of man, and the dignity of man…
The tribulations of one people are the tribulations of all. That which weakens one weakens all. That which is a gain to one is surely a gain to all. This is no empty ideal.”
– His Highness Aga Sir Sultan Muhammad Shah, Aga Khan III
President of the Assembly, League of Nations
Adjournment Speech – “The Task Before the League of Nations”
18th Assembly of the League of Nations
Geneva, Switzerland. October 6, 1937
A Tradition of International Service
In recent generations, the Aga Khan’s family has followed a tradition of service in international affairs. The Aga Khan’s grandfather was President of the League of Nations and his father, Prince Aly Khan, was Pakistan’s Ambassador to the United Nations. His uncle, Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan, was the United Nations’ High Commissioner for Refugees, United Nations’ Coordinator for assistance to Afghanistan and United Nations’ Executive Delegate of Iraq-Turkey border areas.
The Aga Khan’s brother, Prince Amyn, joined the United Nations Secretariat, Department of Economic and Social Affairs following his graduation from Harvard in 1965. Since 1968, Prince Amyn has been closely involved with the governance of the principal development institutions of the Imamat. He is Director of the Aga Khan Foundation (AKF) and a member of the Board of the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development (AKFED) and Chairman of its Executive Committee. Prince Amyn was also deeply involved in the establishment and the development of the Tourism Promotion Services (TPS). He is also a Director of the Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC).
Extract from AKDN: About Us | His Highness the Aga Khan – A Tradition of International Service
Earlier and Related
Ismailimail Special Feature:
137th birth anniversary of His Highness Sir Sultan Muhammed Shah Aga Khan III
- Constellation of Honours of His Highness Aga Sir Sultan Muhammad Shah, Aga Khan III
- Dawn (Pakistan) | Aga Khan and Pakistan
- The Express Tribune (Pakistan) | Sir Aga Khan: The Visionary Leader
- Business Recorder (Pakistan) | Ismaili community marks Sir Aga Khan III’s birth anniversary today
- Constellations | His Highness Sir Sultan Muhammad Shah Aga Khan III & The League of Nations
- 137 yrs ago, began the resurrection of knowledge! His Highness Sir Sultan Muhammed Shah Aga Khan III
- Publication: Hazrat Mawlana Imam Sultan Muhammed Shah – A Bridge Between Two Epochs
- Reflection: Ismaili Gnosis | Mawlana Imam Sultan Muhammed Shah Aga Khan III on My Flag
- Retrospective: Readings on Mawlana Imam Sultan Muhammed Shah & Imam Hussein: Two Ismaili Imams Who Lived 1250 Years Apart
- Retrospective: Noureen Reimoo | Sir Sultan Muhammed Shah Aga Khan III: From Horse Carriages to Nuclear Physics – Seventy Years of Glorious Leadership
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