OSLO, (Reuters) – India’s Rajendra Pachauri quit as chair of the U.N. panel of climate scientists yesterday, ending 13 turbulent years in charge of the Nobel Peace Prize-winning group, after a sexual harassment complaint against him.
Pachauri, 74, has denied the allegation.
Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) since 2002, Pachauri pulled out of an IPCC meeting in Kenya this week after Indian police started investigating the complaint by a female researcher in India.
Pachauri, whose second term as IPCC chair had been due to end in October 2015, has also suffered cardiac problems.
In a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, he wrote that his inability to travel to Kenya showed he may be unable to ensure the “strong leadership and dedication of time and full attention by the chair” needed by the panel.
“I have, therefore, taken the decision to step down,” he wrote. His Indian think-tank, The Energy and Resources Institute, also said on Tuesday that he had gone on leave.