Sir Ivor Roberts, KCMG, MA (Oxon), FCIL

Born in 1946 in Liverpool. Open Scholarship in Modern Languages at Keble College, Oxford.  HM Diplomatic Service 1968-2006. Served in Lebanon, Paris, Luxembourg, Canberra, Vanuatu (formerly New Hebrides), was Minister in the British Embassy in Madrid and Ambassador in Belgrade, Dublin and Rome. He was head of counterterrorism in the Foreign Office in the 1980s.

From January 1998 to February 1999 he was on a sabbatical as a Senior Associate Member of St. Antony’s College, Oxford, writing and lecturing on his experiences in Yugoslavia.

Sir Ivor speaks fluent Italian, French and Spanish and very rusty Serbo-Croatian. His hobbies include Italian opera, theatre, photography and sport (skiing, golf). He was for many years a rugby referee and is now President of Oxford University Rugby Football Club.

Sir Ivor is an Honorary Fellow of Keble College Oxford and Trinity College Oxford.  He is  a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Linguists (FCIL), a Patron of the Venice in Peril Fund and was Chairman of the Council of the British School of Archaeology and Fine Art in Rome from 2007-2012.  He chairs the Trustees of the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra and the Keats-Shelley Memorial Association.

He was made a Knight Commander of the Order of St. Michael and St. George (KCMG) in 2000.

He retired from the Diplomatic Service in September 2006 on his election as the President of Trinity College, a post he held until 2017.  He is a Visiting Professor at St Mary’s College, London.

In 2009, he published, as editor and major contributor, the first new edition for 30 years of the classic reference book on diplomacy ‘Satow’s Diplomatic Practice’ (Oxford University Press). A further revised, centenary edition was published at the beginning of 2017. His book on his experiences in Yugoslavia during the Bosnian war and the Kosovo crisis, Conversations with Milošević, was published in 2016.