Alan Ewen Donald

Sir Alan Ewen Donald KCMG (born 5 May 1931) is a retired British diplomat who was ambassador to Indonesia and China.

Education

Donald was educated at Aberdeen Grammar School, Fettes College, then Trinity Hall, Cambridge (BA, LLM).

Career

• National Service with Royal Horse Artillery 1949–50.
• Joined HM Foreign Service 1954: Third Secretary, Peking, 1955–57.
• Foreign Office (FO), 1958–61: Private Secretary to Parliamentary Under-Secretary, FO, 1959–61.
• Second, later First Secretary, UK Delegation to NATO, Paris, 1961–64.
• First Secretary, Peking, 1964–66.
• Personnel Dept, Diplomatic Service Admin Office, later FCO, 1967–71.
• Counsellor (Commercial), Athens, 1971–73.
• Political Adviser to Governor of Hong Kong, 1974–77.
• Ambassador to Republics of Zaire, Congo Brazzaville, Burundi and Rwanda, 1977–80.^[1][2][3]
• Assistant Under-Secretary of State (Asia and the Pacific), FCO, 1980–84.
• Ambassador to Republic of Indonesia, 1984–88.
• Ambassador to People’s Republic of China, 1988–91.
• Director: China Fund Inc. (NY), 1992–2003; HSBC China Fund Ltd, 1994–2004; J.P. Morgan Fleming Asian Investment Trust Ltd, 1997–2001 (Fleming Far Eastern Investment Trust, 1991–97).
• President, China Association, 2003–08.

Honours

• CMG, 1979.
• KCMG, 1988.^[4]
• Hon. LLD Aberdeen, 1991.

Sources

• DONALD, Sir Alan (Ewen), Who's Who 2014, A & C Black, 2014 (online edition, Oxford University Press, 2014)

References

External links

• A despatch by Donald, headed "First Impressions of Indonesia", is included in The Spanish Ambassador's Suitcase: Stories from the Diplomatic Bag by Matthew Parris (Penguin, 2012, ISBN 9780241957097)
• A despatch by Donald, headed "China: Valedictory Despatch", is included in Parting Shots by Matthew Parris (Penguin, 2011, ISBN 9780670919291)