Ambassador Francisco Seixas da Costa is the guest of a new session of the conference cycle «Before and After. For tomorrow», which will take place on Friday, at 21 pm, at the Salão Nobre of the Paços do Concelho de Loulé. The diplomat will speak on the topic “Does Portugal still have a foreign policy? – The European crisis and Portuguese foreign policy».
At this conference, the presentation of the main guest, «the greatest name in the Portuguese diplomatic career», will be given by Adriano Pimpão, current president of the Municipal Assembly of Loulé and former dean of the University of Algarve. The debate will be moderated by the Master in International Relations Rebeca Martins.
The conferences “Before and After. For Tomorrow» have been promoted in Loulé, as a way to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the 25th of April. The organization is the responsibility of the Municipal Commission that was created to celebrate the Carnation Revolution, four decades later, in Loulé.
About Francisco Seixas da Costa:
«Ambassador Seixas da Costa, between 1995 and 2001, was a member of the XIII and XIV Constitutional Governments. In this capacity, he was the main Portuguese negotiator of the Treaty of Amsterdam (1995-1997) and the Treaty of Nice (2000), having chaired the Committee of Ministers of the Schengen Agreement (1997) and the Council of Ministers for the Internal Market of the European Union (2000).
Returning to his diplomatic career, in 2001, he was permanent representative ambassador to the United Nations (2001-2002), where he held the positions of vice-president of the Social and Economic Council – ECOSOC (2001), president of the Economic and Finance Committee of the 56th General Assembly (2001-2002), vice-president of the 57th General Assembly (2002), having joined, at the invitation of the secretary general, Kofi Annan, the board of UNFIP – United Nations Fund for International Partnerships ( 2001-2002).
In 2002, he was appointed permanent representative ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (2002-2004), during the organization's Portuguese presidency, and then chaired its Permanent Council (2002). Between 2005 and 2009, he was Portugal's ambassador to Brazil and between 2009 and 2013 he was Portugal's ambassador to France. In 2010, he was cumulatively appointed non-resident ambassador of Portugal to Monaco, residing in Paris.
From 2012, he began, in accumulation, to assume functions as permanent representative ambassador to UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) and to the Latin Union. From February 1, 2013 to January 31, 2014, he directed the North-South Center of the Council of Europe. At 65 years of age, he retired from public service, on March 11, 2013, maintaining the degree of Ambassador of Portugal, and since that date, he has worked as a consultant for the company Mota-Engil and for the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and, since 11 April 2013, he has been a non-executive director of the company Jerónimo Martins.
Among other positions, he was president of the General Council of the University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro (2009-2012) and is a member of the Advisory Board of the Faculty of Economics of the University of Coimbra (since 2010), member of the General Council of the Foundation City of Guimarães (since 2011) and member of the Faculty Council of the Faculty of Social and Human Sciences, Universidade Nova de Lisboa.
Author of several works in the diplomatic, foreign and European policy scope, Ambassador Francisco Seixas da Costa is one of the most contemporary figures of reference in the diplomatic career».
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