Francesco Paolo Fulci

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Francesco Paolo Fulci

Italian Ambassador to the United Nations
In office 1993 – 1999

Born	19 March 1931 (1931-03-19) (age 77) Messina, Italy
Occupation	Corporate Vice President

Francesco Paolo Fulci (born in Messina, Italy, March 19, 1931) is a retired Italian diplomat, currently serving as Vice President of Ferrero SpA.

[edit] Career

Before retiring from Italy's foreign service, Ambassador Fulci was Permanent Representative of Italy to the United Nations (1993-1999). In 1999, he became President of the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), after serving as its Vice-President a year earlier. In 1997, he was elected to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child. During his tenure as Italian Ambassador to the United Nations, the longest in his country's history, Ambassador Fulci served twice as President of the Security Council.^[1]

At the UN, he founded the so-called "Coffee Club," a powerful lobby of countries formed in the early 1990s to oppose the expansion of the permanent membership of the Security Council, and push for the enlargement of non-permanent seats. The "Coffee Club" was recently revived by Italy and Pakistan under the name of "Uniting for Consensus" to block a bid by Germany, India, Japan, and Brazil to obtain a permanent seat in the Council.^[2]

A career diplomat, Ambassador Fulci served as Secretary-General of Italy's Executive Committee for Intelligence and Security from 1991 until 1993. From 1985 to 1991, he was Italy's Ambassador to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in Brussels. From 1980 to 1995, Ambassador Fulci served as Italy's Ambassador to Canada. From 1976 to 1980, he was Chief of Staff to the Speaker of the Italian Senate, Amintore Fanfani.

During his long diplomatic career, Ambassador Fulci served his country in important world capitals, including Tokyo, Paris, and Moscow. He entered the Italian foreign service in 1956.

Ambassador Fulci is Knight of the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Italy and Knight of Honour and Devotion of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta.

He graduated in law in 1953 from the University of Messina and obtained a Master's degree in comparative law at Columbia University, New York, where he studied as a Fulbright scholar from 1954 to 1955. He later received a diploma from Hague Academy of International Law, and attended the College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium, from 1955 to 1956.