Derran Moss

Derran studied Arts/Law at the University of Queensland, while also working as a teacher in primary schools in Brisbane. He graduated as Law School Valedictorian in 1998, and proceeded to work for two years in the District Court, before moving to Canberra to work in international law and counter terrorism with the Attorney-General's Department. In 2002, Derran was awarded an inaugural Rotary World Peace Fellowship to study at the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill). On completing his Masters in political science focusing on international security challenges, Derran returned to Brisbane to complete his Master of Laws and to work in anti-corruption, during which time he was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to study juvenile substance abuse in remote and indigenous communities in the USA and Canada. From 2008-2011 Derran was the Chief of Staff for two successive Attorneys-General before moving to Timor Leste to work with the United Nations as a Legal Advisor with UNMIT. Derran spent 2013 and the beginning of 2014 working in Afghanistan as a Political Advisor in the north of the country with the UNAMA peacekeeping mission, before moving to New York with the UN to work with the Department of Peacekeeping Operations and the Department of Political Affairs. In 2016, Derran started work with the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, where he was primarily the officer responsible for Myanmar and Bangladesh. During his time with OCHA, he undertook surge missions to head the coordination teams in northeast Syria (based in Gaziantep) in 2020 and the Ukraine in 2022, and was the head of office in Rakhine during 2018-19. In 2023, Derran moved to Cambodia to be the UNDP/DPPA Peace and Development Advisor. A writer in his spare time, in 2015 Derran’s first play, “Re:Late/Able”, was selected as part of the New York International Fringe Festival, and his second show "The Co-Operatives" again sold out its run as part of the 2016 Festival. Both plays starred fellow Duke Rotary Peace Fellow alum, Bautista Logioco, proving that UNC and Duke can get along off the basketball court. He is currently writing a third play, but work keeps getting in the way.