Ambassador Andrew Tesoriere

Ambassador Andrew Tesoriere is an experienced British and UN diplomat. He took up his appointment as Head of OSCE Centre in Bishkek on 23 May 2008.

He has previously served as UK Ambassador to Algeria (2005-7), Latvia (2002-5) and Albania (1995-8); and, in Afghanistan, as Director of the UN Special Mission (1998-2000) and Head of Humanitarian Field Operations (1994-5).

He brings wide-ranging skills and experience in each of the OSCE's three dimensions, notably in political, governance, economic, programming, humanitarian and electoral work as well as human rights protection and promotion. He has specialist knowledge of Afghanistan and the wider region. He has served as the UN's mediator in Afghanistan and chaired the intra-Afghan peace talks in Ashgabat in March 1999. He was a senior OSCE observer at the Afghan Elections in 2004 and 2005 and, prior to his current appointment, was a senior NATO advisor in Afghanistan from 2007-8.

In the governance field, he has helped develop anti-corruption and law-enforcement programmes. In the economic domain, he has developed investment promotion, business and employment generation schemes. He has worked on environmental, climate and energy security issues.

He graduated from the University of Wales in International Relations and Russian and completed post-graduate studies at London and Cambridge Universities and Paris (Ecole Nationale d'Administration). He speaks English and French and has knowledge of Russian, Farsi, Dari, Pushtu, Arabic, Latvian, Spanish and Albanian.