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Paul Johnston

Ambassador to Ireland

Part of UK in Sweden

9th August 2013

HIGH TECH AND TRADITIONAL DIPLOMACY

As you may have seen Carl Bildt invited William Hague to visit Stockholm for talks later this month, via Twitter today.

Between them they have over 400,000 twitter followers and have sent over 8000 tweets.

But they also value face-to-face contact, good old-fashioned, as well as high-tech, communication.

So it’s excellent the Foreign Secretary’s coming to Stockholm at the end of August, a few days before another international visitor…

The two Foreign Ministers will, as Carl Bildt said on Twitter, have much to discuss privately.

And they’ll be talking publicly, at a Conference organised by the leading Swedish think tank UI, on Europe and globalisation.

The Foreign Secretary will also be talking to Sweden’s Ambassadors from round the world about his vision for the UK Foreign Service and more widely about diplomacy in the 21st century.

So the visit will be a timely opportunity to talk about challenges and opportunities facing us in Europe and beyond over the coming months. All of us at the Embassy are looking forward to it.

About Paul Johnston

Paul Johnston joined the UK Civil Service in 1990, working for the Ministry of Defence initially. He has served in Paris and New York and has also had a wide…

Paul Johnston joined the UK Civil Service in 1990, working for the Ministry of Defence initially.

He has served in Paris and New York and has also had a wide range of political and security roles in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London. Paul joined the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in 1993 as Desk Officer for Bosnia. As part of this role he was also Private Secretary to EU negotiator Lord Owen and his representative on Bosnia Contact Group.

His first foreign posting was to Paris in 1995-99 as Second Secretary Political. He was Private Secretary to the Ambassador and latterly part of the UK delegation to the Kosovo Rambouillet negotiations. Then he returned to London as Head of the Kosovo Policy Team, leading work on post-conflict policy in the EU, NATO, UN and G8.

Before his second overseas posting to New York in 2005, Paul held a variety of other EU policy and security appointments in London, such as Head of European Defence Section between 2000-01 and Head of Security Policy Department between 2002-04.

As Head of the Political Section in UKMIS New York, he advised on major policy issues for the UK on the Security Council and the UN World Summit, including the UK EU Presidency in 2005.

Paul returned to London in 2008 as Director, International Security for the FCO. He was responsible for policy on UN, NATO, European Security, arms control and disarmament, human rights and good governance.

Paul was British Ambassador to Sweden from August 2011 to August 2015 and then was Deputy Permanent Representative to NATO.

He was UK Ambassador to the EU for Political and Security affairs from 2017 to January 2020 and became Ambassador to Ireland in September 2020.

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