His Excellency Syed Akbaruddin |
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Permanent Representative of India to the United Nations | |
Assumed office January 2016 |
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Preceded by | Asoke Kumar Mukerji |
Joint Secretary (External Publicity) in Ministry of External Affairs at New Delhi |
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In office January 2012 – April 2015 |
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Preceded by | Vishnu Prakash |
Succeeded by | Vikas Swarup |
Personal details | |
Born | 27 April 1960 |
Nationality | Indian |
Children | 2 |
Occupation | Diplomat (Indian Foreign Service) |
Syed Akbaruddin is an Indian Foreign Service officer serving as India's permanent representative at the United Nations since January 2016.
He is the son of S Bashiruddin, formerly the head of the department of Journalism and Communication at Osmania University, who headed the department for many years and served as Indian ambassador to Qatar, vice chancellor of Dr B R Ambedkar Open University and director of the research wing of the Film and Television Institute of India in Pune, and Dr Zeba Bashiruddin, who was a member of the English department at Sri Sathya Sai University.
Akbaruddin is a 1985 batch civil servant. At the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, he was on deputation for four years and returned to India in 2011. He is considered an expert on the West Asia issues in India and has served in various capacities in that region including consul-general at Jeddah from 2000 to 2004. He was the director at the Foreign Secretary's Office of the Ministry from 2004 to 2005.
Akbaruddin was the official spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs of India from January 2012 to April 2015 and was succeeded by Vikas Swarup. He headed the External Publicity and Public Diplomacy division of the Ministry of External Affairs in the capacity of Joint Secretary to Government of India. He was also the chief coordinator for the India-Africa Summit in October 2015. He was later Additional Secretary in the Ministry of External Affairs (India) from April 2015 to September 2015. In November 2015, Akbaruddin was appointed as India's permanent representative to the United Nations in New York, succeeding Asoke Kumar Mukerji.