Biographical Note

New Head of Delegation of European Union Presents Appointment Letter

(Based on information provided by the Protocol and Liaison Service.)

The new Head of the Delegation of the European Union to the United Nations, Thomas Mayr-Harting, presented his letter of appointment to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today.

Mr. Mayr-Harting has been the Permanent Representative of Austria to the United Nations in New York since December 2008.  From 1 January 2009 to 31 December 2010, he represented his country on the Security Council, and was President of that body for the month of November 2009.

Before his appointment as Permanent Representative, he had served, since 2003, as Political Director (Director-General for Political Affairs) in his country’s Foreign Ministry.  He also served as President of the Supervisory Board of the Austrian Development Agency in 2008.

From 2002 to 2004 he was Special Representative of the Foreign Minister for South-Eastern Europe, and he served as Ambassador to Belgium from 1999 to 2003, concurrently serving as Head of the Austrian Mission to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).  From 1999 until 2002, he served as his country’s Permanent Representative to the Western European Union.

Mr. Mayr-Harting was Deputy Political Director (Deputy Director General for Political Affairs) in the Austrian Foreign Ministry from 1996 to 1999, prior to which he served as Director for Security and Policy Planning between 1995 and 1999.  From 1991 until 1995, he worked in the Private Office of the Foreign Minister.

Posted to Moscow from 1986 to 1990, he served as First Secretary and then as Counsellor.  Between 1982 and 1986, he was Second Secretary and then First Secretary at the Austrian Mission to the European Communities in Brussels.  From 1980 to 1982, he was a member of the General Secretariat of the Austrian Foreign Ministry, having joined the Foreign Service in 1979.

Mr. Mayr-Harting was educated at The Hague Academy of International Law, in the College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium, and Vienna University.

Born in 1954, he is married and has three children.

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*     This supersedes Press Release BIO/4046 of 9 December 2008.

For information media • not an official record