The Diplomat in Spain

Ybáñez and Escobar./ Photo: @IgnacioYbanez / Tierra Santa

The Diplomat. 04/03/2017

The Council of Ministers announced yesterday the appointment of several ambassadors, among which stands out for the importance of its destinations, Ignacio Ybáñez to Russia (as The Diplomat advanced) and Juan José Escobar Stemmann to Iraq.

Ignacio Ybáñez, who served as Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs between November 2014 and January last year, when he was relieved by ldefonso Castro, was assigned to Spanish diplomatic representations in Tanzania, Egypt and Guatemala and was an economic adviser and Commercial of the Embassy in the Dominican Republic, adviser in the Permanent Representation to the EU and vocal adviser in the Cabinet of the Presidency of the Government.

In May 2012, Ybáñez was elected Director General for the Maghreb, Africa, Mediterranean and Middle East and in May 2013 was appointed Director General of Foreign Policy and Multilateral, Global and Security Affairs.

For his part, Juan José Escobar is an experienced diplomat who until March 2014 served as Spain’s consul general in Jerusalem, a post from which he acted as an unofficial “ambassador” to the Palestinian Authority.

Since September 2016, he was vice-president of the Spanish Section of the Spanish-American Standing Committee of the General Secretariat for Defense Policy, the body responsible for ensuring the necessary coordination between the United States and Spain regarding the application of the Defense Agreement between both countries.

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Belzuz is ambassador to Slovakia, De Salas of Bangladesh and Cacho de Vanuatu with residence in Canberra

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Previously it had been destined in the Spanish diplomatic representations in Bulgaria, Honduras and Morocco. Since 2006, he had served as Deputy Consul General of Spain in Buenos Aires and, in July 2011, was appointed ambassador to the Special Mission for Mediterranean Affairs.

In addition, the government appointed Luis Belzuz de los Ríos as the ambassador to Slovakia. Belzuz was head of the Cabinet of the director of the National Intelligence Center (FNI), Félix Sanz Roldán, between 2009 and 2010, and later the Minister of Industry, Energy and Tourism, José Manuel Soria, from 2014 to 2016, as The Diplomat had also advanced.

Likewise, Álvaro de Salas Giménez de Azcárate, currently serving as the head of the Cifra Guard Section, will be the new ambassador in Balgladesh and Manuel Cacho has been appointed ambassador to Vanuatu, residing in Canberra.