Tom Fletcher

Heading up the UN's humanitarian affairs is not a role for the faint-hearted

- Andrew Anthony

Two months ago Tom Fletcher, the man with what William Hague recently called "the toughest job in the world", spoke of "the world's largest humanitarian crisis" as a "grim example of indifference and impunity".

No one took much notice of the UN's humanitarian coordinator because he was referring to Sudan, an ongoing conflict that has drawn minimal international attention and inspired little protest.

By contrast, last week Fletcher was once again taken to task for his comments on Gaza - he claimed that the majority of UN aid that gets into the territory reaches civilians.

The heated online response was as nothing compared to the furious reaction to his address to the UN Security Council back in May, when he said that one in five Gazans faced starvation and called for action "to prevent genocide". Unless the restrictions were lifted, he went on to warn in a BBC interview, "14,000 babies would die within the next 48 hours".

That claim, based on a misinterpretation of a report, was later withdrawn, but not before the Israel foreign ministry tweeted: "When Tom Fletcher @ UNReliefChief, Head of @UNOCHA, ignores Hamas' atrocities but echoes their propaganda - it's not humanitarian work, it's blood libel."

"It was an unfortunate mistake," says one former senior UN figure. "Israel will continue to ram that down his and the UN's throat, but I doubt it has made any difference to the degree of practical cooperation there would have been."

An extremely well-informed and media-literate figure, Fletcher was well aware of the reactions he was likely to provoke, but for a career diplomat he has seldom been shy of controversy. Back in 2003, when the 50-year-old was still in his 20s, he was private secretary to the then foreign office minister, Chris Mullin.

The former Labour minister and celebrated diarist recalls him as "bright, personable, optimistic and slightly irreverent - which is a plus in my book".