Robert Cooper (strategist)

Sir Robert Cooper
Special Adviser at the European Commission
In office April 2013 – March 2014
EEAS Counsellor
In office 2010–2013
DG for External and Politico-Military Affairs (Council of the European Union)
In office 2002–2010
Personal details
Born	(1947-08-28) 28 August 1947 (age 69) Brentwood, United Kingdom
Nationality	British
Alma mater	Worcester College, Oxford University of Pennsylvania

Sir Robert Francis Cooper KCMG MVO (born 1947 in Essex, United Kingdom) is a British diplomat and adviser currently serving as a Special Advisor at the European Commission with regard to Myanmar. He is also a member of the European Council on Foreign Relations and is an acclaimed publisher on foreign affairs.

He was born on 28 August 1947, in Brentwood, Essex, the son of Norman and Frances Cooper, and educated at the Delamere School for Boys, Nairobi, Kenya, and Worcester College, Oxford. He won a Thouron Award, and spent the academic year 1969–70 at the University of Pennsylvania, joining the Diplomatic Service of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in 1970.

As a diplomat, he has worked at various British Embassies abroad, notably those in Tokyo and Bonn. At the Foreign Office, he was Head of the Policy Planning Staff from 1989 to 1993. He has also been seconded to the Bank of England and spent a period in the Cabinet Office as Deputy Secretary for Defence and Overseas Affairs. He was the UK's Special Representative in Afghanistan until mid-2002.

In 2002 he began to work for the European Union (EU). He assumed the role of Director-General for External and Politico-Military Affairs at the General Secretariat of the Council of the European Union. In that role, he was responsible to Javier Solana, the former High Representative of the EU's Common Foreign and Security Policy, and has assisted with the implementation of European strategic, security and defence policy. Since 2007 he has also been a member of the European Council on Foreign Relations.

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