Andrej Benedejcic

My Cousin through Tonin family.

Ambassador

Mr. Andrej Benedejcic assumed the duties of the Ambassador of the Republic of Slovenia in Moscow on March 14, 2005. He presented his Letters of Credence to the President of the Russian Federation Mr. Vladimir Putin on April 20 and, by non-resident accreditation, to the President of the Mejlis of Turkmenistan Mr. Ovezgeldy Atayev on June 27, to the President of the Republic of Belarus Mr. Alexander Lukashenko on July 29, to the President of the Kyrgyz Republic Mr. Kurmanbek Bakiyev on August 30, to the State Secretary of the Republic of Kazakhstan Mr. Oralbay Abdykarimov on September 30 and to the President of the Tajik Republic Mr. Emomali Rakhmon on October 25, 2005, as well as to the Foreign Minister of the Republic of Uzbekistan Mr. Vladimir Norov on December 18, 2007. He is a career member of the Slovenian diplomatic corps.

Mr. Benedejcic studied at Harvard University, where he graduated in 1996 in Economics. During his university years he witnessed the Slovenian Ten-Day War of Independence and later served in the Territorial Defense of Slovenia, in an infantry battalion. He received his secondary school education at the Cairo American College in Egypt and his elementary instruction at the Russian Primary School of the Embassy of USSR in Beijing, China.

Mr. Benedejcic joined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Slovenia in 1996 as an analyst in the Research and Planning Department, where he followed Slovenian relations with the United States and NATO. He was also appointed the Secretary of the Slovenian Diplomatic Academy.

In 1997 he was posted to the Embassy of Slovenia in Moscow, where he worked in the Consular Section.

Later in the year, following the election of Slovenia to the Security Council for the period 1998-1999, he joined the Permanent Mission of Slovenia to the United Nations in New York. His portfolio included issues of Sub-Saharan Africa and the UN economic sanctions. At the beginning of 1999 he was named an Alternate Representative of Slovenia to the Security Council.

Mr. Benedejcic returned to Ljubljana in 2000 and became the Assistant to the Secretary General of the Foreign Ministry. Later in the year he was posted to the Slovenian Embassy in Washington, DC, where he worked in the Political Section.

At the beginning of 2001 he joined the Office of the Prime Minister of Slovenia as Adviser on International Relations in the rank of State Undersecretary. His portfolio included NATO accession and cooperation with the Russian Federation. He served as a member of the Organizational Committee for the preparation of the Bush-Putin Summit in Slovenia in June 2001. He also took an active part in the preparation of the first official visit of the Slovenian Prime Minister to the Russian Federation in September 2002.

At the end of 2002 he joined the Office of the President of Slovenia as Foreign Policy Adviser to the President. In this capacity he participated in the establishment of the Forum for Slavic Cultures in Ljubljana. He also supervised the organization of several conferences devoted to East-West relations, with a special emphasis on the role of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

In June 2004 he was appointed the Deputy Head of the Permanent Mission of Slovenia to the OSCE in Vienna. As the representative of the incoming Slovenian OSCE Chairmanship he took an active part in the 2nd Annual Security Review Conference, as well as in the visit of the OSCE delegation to Georgia in September 2004 and in the regional meeting of the OSCE Heads of Missions in Almaty in November 2004.

Mr. Benedejcic was born on 21 November 1970 in Ljubljana. He is a member of the Olimpija Fencing Club and the Harvard Club of Russia. He is married and has a daughter.
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