Friday, January 06, 2012
Daouda Diabaté returned to the United States for a second tour as ambassador from Côte d’Ivoire in February 2011, part of a diplomatic offensive by the internationally-recognized President-elect Alassane Ouattara against incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo, who refused to leave power.
A career diplomat, Daouda Diabaté was born January 1, 1948, in Saoundi, which was in the colony of Côte d’Ivoire, which at the time was part of French West Africa, along with Mauritania, Senegal, French Sudan (now Mali), French Guinea (now Guinea), Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso), Dahomey (now Benin) and Niger. He earned a B.A. in English at the National University of Abidjan in 1974, a graduate degree in diplomatic administration at the same university in 1975, and a graduate degree in advanced diplomatic studies from the International Institute for Public Administration and International Relations in Paris, France, in 1976.
Diabaté joined the Côte d’Ivoire Foreign Ministry in 1977, serving as Head of the Press & Information Service until 1978. From 1979 to 1981, he was First Counselor at the Ivoirian Embassy to Liberia and Sierra Leone, followed by a lengthy stint in Europe from 1981 to 1986 as Counselor at the Embassy to Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg. From 1986 to 1994 he served in Côte d’Ivoire, first as Deputy Director of Bilateral Cooperation (1986-1987); as Secretary General for Administrative Reform, Ministry of Civil Service (1987-1990); and as Chief of Staff of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (1991-1994).
From 1994 to 1996, Diabaté was Ambassador of Côte d’Ivoire to Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda and Permanent Representative to the OAU (now the African Union) and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in Nairobi, Kenya. On behalf of the OAU, in 1995 and 1996 he served as an Observer of the presidential elections in Algeria and Uganda.
From 1997 to 2001 Diabaté was Ambassador to Morocco. During the 2002 Ivoirian political crisis, Diabaté was serving as Secretary General of the Department of State, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a position he held from 2001 to 2004, and as such he served as spokesman of the Foreign Minister after the outbreak of the crisis. In April 2004, however, Diabaté was named ambassador to the U.S. and the Bahamas, a job he kept until November 2007, when he was named ambassador to Brazil. Diabaté was still ambassador to Brazil when he was reassigned, again, to the United States.
Diabaté and his wife, Cecile, have five children. In addition to his native French, Diabaté speaks fluent English and intermediate Spanish.
Video of Ambassador Diabaté answering questions from an audience
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