New Delhi: Across the 150-odd diplomatic embassies in India’s capital, ambassadors usually serve between two to five years before they head home or for the next posting. However, in certain cases, some have served for over a decade, either due to their country sharing a “special relationship” with New Delhi or political instability back home or unfixed ambassadorial tenures.
According to an analysis by ThePrint, the longest-serving ambassadors to India hail from Bhutan, Palestine, Yemen and four African countries — Eritrea, Equatorial Guinea, Mozambique and Morocco.
The Eritrean and Bhutanese ambassadors have served for a whopping 17 and 15 years, respectively.
According to Amit Ranjan, Research Fellow at Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS), National University of Singapore (NUS), Bhutan ambassador Maj. General Vetsop Namgyel’s long tenure in India could be owed to the “special relationship” between India and Bhutan.
“Bhutan and India have always shared a special relationship, which may be why Thimphu has retained its ambassador for such a long time. Perhaps, there is a desire to maintain a safe pair of hands in New Delhi who enjoys well-established contacts and relationships with officials here,” said Ranjan.
Sources in the Bhutanese embassy in India told ThePrint that Bhutanese ambassadors to other countries usually have a fixed tenure of four years but that the “situation is different in India”. Namgyel’s predecessor, Lyonpo Dago Tshering, also served for a decade in India from 1998-2008.
Meanwhile, Palestinian ambassador Adnan Abu Al Haija, who has been serving in New Delhi since 2014, told ThePrint: “I was not expecting to stay in India for longer than four years. Perhaps, due to the regional issues in our region, the Palestinian government has not been rotating ambassadors in certain countries as frequently.”
The late Alexander Kadakin was the Russian ambassador to India from October 2009 till his death in January 2017, and previously from 1999 to 2004. He was known as an Indophile and was fond of Bollywood films and songs. He was fluent in Hindi, English, Urdu, Romanian and French.
Born in Moldova, he began his diplomatic career as a probationer at the Soviet Embassy in India in August 1971, and also served as Russia’s envoy to Sweden and Nepal. He was awarded the Padma Bhushan posthumously in 2018.
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Eritrea (17 years)
The longest-serving ambassador to India is Ambassador Alem Tsehaye Woldemariam from Eritrea, an East African country. In July 2007, Woldemariam presented his credentials to late Indian president A.P.J. Abdul Kalam.
Woldemariam, 82, recently participated in the Indian Navy’s Milan Exercise this February.
Born on 28 April, 1942, Woldemariam was raised in the capital of Eritrea, Asmara. He underwent school education in Asmara. From 1965 to 1966, he studied international relations and diplomacy courses, as well as public administration at the Institute of Bookkeepers in London.
In his early years, he worked in the corporate sector across shipping and maritime firms as well as the Board Director of the Asmara Chamber of Commerce, and later as the Director-General in the Ministry of Trade and industry (1991-2002). He also served as Director-General in the Ministry of Transport and Communication (1996-2004) in Eritrea.
Before his posting in India, he served in China as Counsellor, Economic Affairs, and Deputy Head of Mission at the Eritrea embassy in Beijing (2005-2007). He shared a close friendship with former Chinese ambassador to India, Sun Weidong, who served in India from 2019 to 2022 before returning to Beijing in his new posting as vice foreign minister.
In October 2022, Woldemariam bid farewell to Sun, with the latter noting their “highly cherished” friendship.
Bhutan (15 years)
Ambassador Maj. General Namgyel is the first ambassador to India since Bhutan completed its successful transition to a constitutional monarchy in 2008 and adopted its constitution. In January 2009, he presented his credentials to former Indian president Pratibha Patil.
He has served in Delhi for the last 15 years, after a power-packed career as both a member of Bhutan’s Royal Secretariat as well as an officer of the Royal Body Guards. He was awarded the highest military decoration, the Druk Yugyel Medal, in 2004. Years after being promoted to the Rank of Major General, he was conferred the prestigious national award, the Druk Thuksey Medal, in 2010.
Namgyel was born on 15 August, 1952, in Pangbisa village in Paro, Bhutan. He underwent schooling at St. Joseph’s College, North Point, Darjeeling in West Bengal but was called to join the Royal Bhutan Army and was commissioned from the Indian Military Academy (IMA) in 1972. Two years later, he was appointed as Aide-de-Camp to His Majesty Jigme Singye Wangchuck, the Fourth King of Bhutan.
Namgyel has also been a member of Bhutan’s delegation to all the Summits of the Non-Aligned Movement from 1976 to 1989 and the Summits of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) from 1985 to 1997.
According to the Bhutan embassy website, his hobbies include reading, listening to music and playing golf.
Palestine (9 years)
Palestine ambassador Adnan Abu Al Haija has served in India for almost a decade. In September 2014, he presented his credentials to late Indian president Pranab Mukherjee marking strong ties between India and Palestine.
India was one of the first non-Arab countries to recognise the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the PLO opened an office in New Delhi in 1975.
Al Haija was born in the late 1950s in a refugee camp in Jordan and did his early schooling in Irbid. He joined the Fatah movement, formerly the Palestinian National Liberation Movement, as a teenager. He served as the president of Palestine Students in Lebanon, when PLO was operating out of Lebanon prior to 1982. He has a Bachelor’s degree in international business from Schiller International University, London.
Al Haija’s diplomatic career began in 2005 with a posting to Mozambique, followed by a posting to Mauritania from 2009 to 2014 and finally, India. Apart from the ongoing Israel-Hamas war, the ambassador has also grappled with major challenges in his career while serving in India.
In late 2017, he was summoned by the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) when India lodged a strong protest against Palestine’s ambassador to Pakistan who had at the time shared the stage with 2008 Mumbai attacks mastermind and Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed.
Shortly after, the Palestinian government decided to recall its ambassador to Pakistan.
Equatorial Guinea & Mozambique (7 years)
Manuel Mbela Bama Ndong is the first-ever ambassador from the African country of Equatorial Guinea to be posted to India. In July, he, along with Mozambique High Commissioner Ermindo Augusto Ferreira, will complete eight years in India. In July 2016, the two envoys presented their credentials to Indian President Pranab Mukherjee on the same day.
“I am honoured to represent the Republic of Equatorial Guinea as the first ambassador to India with accreditation to Australia, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Burma, Maldives, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. Having served my country as a diplomat for the last 16 years, I am glad to be here in India, the land of opportunities,” he said in a media interview in December 2018.
Equatorial Guinea, a Central African country, shares a strong relationship with India especially in the oil and gas sector. In his own words, Ndong notes: “India’s relationship with Equatorial Guinea is characterised by the strong partnership in the oil and gas sector. Equatorial Guinea is the fourth largest supplier of natural gas to India.”
In 2018, two years after Ndong’s posting, India announced reciprocal plans to set up a mission in Equatorial Guinea. Ndong hosted a reception to mark the occasion in November that year. Earlier that year, former President Ram Nath Kovind visited Equatorial Guinea on a three-day visit during which he was awarded the African country’s highest civilian honour.
Mozambique’s envoy Ferreira previously held diplomatic postings in Japan in the late 2000s, and in France, in the late 1990s.
Mozambique is strategically viewed by India in terms of its gas resources. New Delhi has made efforts to revive a $20 billion liquefied natural gas (LNG) project with the East African country which has been on hold after Islamic State-linked insurgents attacked civilians in the Cabo Delgado province where the project is located.
In 2008, while serving as Minister-Counsellor at the Mozambican Embassy in Tokyo, Ferreira had predicted that demand for Africa’s resources from China and India will only grow.
“With globalisation and the rise of emerging market countries such as China and India, demand for Africa’s natural resources is increasing. Ferreira believes the rising role of new donors could be the reason for Japan’s new-found interest in the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD),” he said, according to a US cable released by WikiLeaks.
Yemen & Morocco (7 years)
Yemen and Morocco ambassadors, Abdulmalik Abdullah Al Eryani and Mohammed Maliki, respectively, have both served for seven years in India. In February 2017, they both presented credentials before late Indian president Pranab Mukherjee.
Under Al Eryani’s tenure, Yemen has secured anti-cholera medicines and other critical medical and pharma products for the nation. Due to the conflict in the country, India’s mission has in the past been forced to move to Djibouti.
Al Eryani is considered a tall figure among heads of diplomatic missions from the Middle East. Last May, on assuming charge, Qatar ambassador to India Mohammed Hassan Jabir Al Jabir paid a visit to the Yemen embassy to meet with the ambassador.
On assuming charges as Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the State of Qatar to the Republic of India, H.E. Mr. Mohammed Hassan Jabir Al Jabir paid a visit to H.E. Mr. Abdulmalik Al Eryani, Ambassador of the Republic of Yemen to India, on Tuesday, May 23, 2023 pic.twitter.com/vOkDYUZyiY
— سفارة قطر – نيودلهي (@QatarEmb_ND) May 23, 2023
Morocco’s Maliki is accredited not just to India but Nepal, Bhutan, Maldives and Sri Lanka too. He joined the foreign service in 1989 and served overseas as deputy ambassador to Pakistan (2003-2007) and deputy ambassador to Cameroon (1994 -2000).
He also served as Head (Director) of Asia and Oceania Affairs Directorate (AOAD) at Morocco’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2011-2016).
He has a diplomatic studies diploma from Pakistan Foreign Service Academy in Islamabad (1992) and an advanced studies diploma (Morocco, 1990) and a B.A. in English Literature (Morocco, 1987).
(Edited by Nida Fatima Siddiqui)
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Anatoly Dobrynin was Soviet Ambassador to the United States from 1962 to 1986.
Nice analysis. One way to look how at how a particular country is diplomatically important for other country is to look at what kind of postings do the diplomats get after being posted in that particular country. Former Indian envoy to China amb. Misri taking over as deputy NSA & former Chinese envoy to India & Pakistan amb. Weidong taking over as vice foreign minister in China ( just below the foreign minister who was Chinese envoy to the US) says something about the diplomatic importance that India & China give to each other. I’m not reading to much into the outgoing UK high commissioner being posted to Spain.