H.E. Amb. Dr. Smiljana Knez is a Slovenian diplomat, and Ambassador-at-Large for Climate Diplomacy. From August 2019 to December 2022, she served as a Foreign Policy Advisor of the President of the Republic of Slovenia. Previously to that, she was posted as the Ambassador of the Republic of Slovenia to Croatia (2016 - 2019) and to the Czech Republic (2011 - 2015). She joined Slovenia’s MFA in 1992 and since then held a number of different roles; among others she served as deputy Ambassador to the Czech Republic (1996 - 2000) and the United Kingdom (2002 - 2006). From 2006 - 2011 and again in 2015), she was the Human Rights Director in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Slovenia. In 2008, during the Slovenia’s first Presidency to the Council of the European Union, she chaired EU Working Group on Human Rights (COHOM). Smiljana Knez graduated from sociology at Ljubljana University in 1985, obtained her MA at King’s College London in 2006, and PhD at Ljubljana University in 2013.
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