Permanent Delegate of Australia to UNESCO

The permanent delegate of Australia to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is an officer of the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the head of the delegation of the Commonwealth of Australia to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in Paris, France. The position has the rank and status of an ambassador extraordinary and plenipotentiary and is but one of Australia's representatives to the United Nations and its other bodies, shared with the representatives present at the United Nations Office in Geneva, the United Nations Office in Vienna, the United Nations Office at Nairobi, and the delegation to the United Nations Agencies in Rome.

Permanent Delegate of Australia to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
Incumbent Greer Alblas since 5 November 2023
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade
Style	His Excellency
Reports to	Minister for Foreign Affairs
Nominator	Prime Minister of Australia
Appointer	Governor General of Australia
Inaugural holder	Dr William Gardner Davies
Formation	4 November 1946 (1946-11-04)
Website	Australian Permanent Delegation to UNESCO

The permanent delegate, since January 2020, isMegan Anderson.

Posting history

Australia has been a member of UNESCO since its establishment on 4 November 1946, with the permanent delegation based in the Australian Embassy in Paris. In 1977, Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser offered the position of Permanent Delegate to UNESCO to Sir John Kerr, who as Governor-General had been responsible for the dismissal of Gough Whitlam's government in the 1975 Australian constitutional crisis, but considerable public pressure prompted Fraser to withdraw the offer to Kerr, and offer the post to Professor Ralph Slatyer instead.^[1] At various periods of the office's history the Australian Permanent Delegate has been held by the Australian Ambassador to France.^[2] Since 1990 the Permanent Delegate has been typically held by the Deputy Head of Mission in Paris, who also serves since 2010 as Australia's non-resident Ambassador to the Republic of Chad.

List of permanent delegates

#	Officeholder	Other offices	Term start date	Term end date	Time in office	Notes
1	Dr William Gardner Davies	n/a	4 November 1946 (1946-11-04)	1972 (1972)	25–26 years	[2]
2	Alan Renouf	A	October 1972 (1972-10)	December 1973 (1973-12)	1 year, 2 months
3	Harold David Anderson	A	January 1974 (1974-01)	August 1975 (1975-08)	1 year, 7 months
4	James Oswin	n/a	September 1975 (1975-09)	September 1976 (1976-09)	1 year
(3)	Harold David Anderson	A	October 1976 (1976-10)	August 1978 (1978-08)	1 year, 10 months
5	Prof. Ralph Slatyer	n/a	September 1978 (1978-09)	September 1981 (1981-09)	3 years	[3]
6	Prof. Owen Harries		February 1982 (1982-02)	August 1983 (1983-08)	1 year, 6 months	[4]
7	Gough Whitlam		August 1983 (1983-08)	October 1986 (1986-10)	3 years, 2 months	[5]
8	Charles Mott		November 1986 (1986-11)	January 1988 (1988-01)	1 year, 2 months	[6][7]
10	Ted Pocock	A	January 1988 (1988-01)	September 1990 (1990-09)	2 years, 8 months	[2]
11	John Lander	n/a	September 1990 (1990-09)	January 1991 (1991-01)	4 months
12	Dr Malcolm Leader		February 1991 (1991-02)	April 1991 (1991-04)	2 months
13	Dr Robert Merrillees		May 1991 (1991-05)	August 1991 (1991-08)	3 months
14	Ross Burns		September 1991 (1991-09)	September 1992 (1992-09)	1 year
15	Mark Pierce		September 1992 (1992-09)	March 1994 (1994-03)	1 year, 6 months
16	Alan Brown	A	March 1994 (1994-03)	September 1996 (1996-09)	2 years, 6 months
17	Peter Shannon	n/a	October 1996 (1996-10)	January 1999 (1999-01)	2 years, 3 months
18	Matthew Peek		January 1999 (1999-01)	January 2003 (2003-01)	4 years
19	Jane Madden		January 2003 (2003-01)	January 2007 (2007-01)	4 years
20	Sally Mansfield	B	January 2007 (2007-01)	20 April 2010 (2010-04-20)	3 years, 3 months	[8]
21	Gita Kamath	B	20 April 2010 (2010-04-20)	26 June 2013 (2013-06-26)	3 years, 67 days	[9]
22	George Mina	B	9 September 2013 (2013-09-09)	20 January 2017 (2017-01-20)	3 years, 133 days	[10][11]
23	Angus Mackenzie	B	20 January 2017 (2017-01-20)	13 January 2020 (2020-01-13)	2 years, 358 days	[12][13]
24	Megan Anderson	B	13 January 2020 (2020-01-13)	Incumbent	5 years, 204 days	[14][15][16]

Notes

^A Also Ambassador to France.

^B Also non-resident Ambassador to Chad, 2010–present.

See also

• Australia and the United Nations