In diplomacy for 37 years, with experiences ranging from 4 and a half years as a commercial advisor in Moscow, at the head of the embassy in Canberra, in coordination on multilateral programs concerning Antarctica, up to the assignment to the diplomatic office in Kiev . These are just some of the experiences that have marked the career of Pier Francesco Zazo, the Ambassador of the Italian Republic to Ukraine who returned to the capital, after the choice made in the first days of the war to transfer the headquarters of the diplomatic mission to Lviv.
Today, Monday 18 April, the Italian embassy in the capital, target of missiles launched by the Russians from the Black Sea in the last few days, is fully operational again. Zazo will immediately get to work “with the Ukrainian institutions for diplomacy and to reach at least a ceasefire,” explained Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio. The minister recalled that the Italian embassy was “among the last to leave the Ukrainian capital and is now among the first to return”.
Zazo: Kiev embassy reopening sign of hope
Once back in Kiev, the diplomat wanted to highlight that «the reopening of our Embassy in Kiev represents for us an exciting and hopeful moment more than fifty days after the beginning of the conflict. As highlighted by Foreign Minister Di Maio – he added -, the reopening of our headquarters is a symbolic gesture but which these Authorities greatly appreciate. Today we feel even closer to the Ukrainian government and people and we will continue to assist our compatriots in the best possible way ».
Speak five languages
Originally from Benevento, 63 years old, married with two children, he speaks five foreign languages, besides Italian: German, English, Russian, French and Spanish. After graduating in political science at the “Luiss” University of Rome in 1984, the following year he entered diplomacy and in 1986 was Secretary of Legation at the Department for Development Cooperation. Then the experience of military conscription from 25 January 1986 to 20 January 1987.
First overseas assignment in Seoul
The first overseas assignment is in February 1988 as second secretary in Seoul. In May 1992 he was in Stockholm as first commercial secretary and then legation councilor. He will remain in Sweden until 1996, when he returns to Rome to work again in the Directorate General for Development Cooperation where he remains until 1999 when he arrives for the first time in Kiev and assumes the role of first councilor. Three years later he became a commercial advisor in Moscow, where in 2003 he became an embassy advisor, then first commercial advisor.