Biographical Note

NEW HEAD OF EUROPEAN COMMISSION DELEGATION SUBMITS

LETTER OF APPOINTMENT TO SECRETARY-GENERAL

(Based on information received from the Protocol and Liaison Service.)

John B. Richardson, the new Head of Delegation of the European Commission to the United Nations, submitted his letter of appointment to the Secretary-General today.

Before taking up the post, Mr. Richardson was previously Minister and Deputy Head of the European Commission’s Delegation in Washington from October 1996.  Most of his career has been devoted to the cause of European integration, and he has spent 23 years at the European Union headquarters in Brussels.

He began his career with the European Commission working on economic aspects of environment policy; the beginning of his interest in issues of sustainable development.

His subsequent posts related to international energy policy, relations with the Gulf States, and external aspects of the European Union’s Single Market.  From 1983 to 1989, Mr. Richardson worked on international trade in services, for which he was the European Union negotiator in the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade in Geneva, his first multilateral experience.

In 1989, Mr. Richardson became Head of Division for relations with the United States, then in 1993 for relations with Japan.

As a member of the board of the Salzburg Seminar, which runs a programme designed to bring together young leaders from Europe, and around the world, he has a long-time interest in understanding and bridging cultural differences.  He is also a member of the Advisory Board of the European Institute.

From 1969 to 1973, Mr.Richardson was employed by Unilever as an economist in both London and Hamburg.

He studied in Downing College, Cambridge, and University College, London from 1963 to 1969, and received degrees in Chemistry and Economics.  He has retained a keen interest in the evolution of scientific thought and claims to have been marked for life by reading, in the sixties, Robert Pirsig’s “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance”.

Mr. Richardson is married to the German radio journalist, Irmtraud (Irmy) Richardson and has three grown-up daughters.  In addition to his native English, he speaks French and German and is at home in Brussels and Provence.