New Permanent Representative of Belgium Presents Credentials to the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva

Christophe Payot, the new Permanent Representative of Belgium to the United Nations Office at Geneva, today presented his credentials to Tatiana Valovaya, the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva.

Prior to his appointment to Geneva, Mr. Payot had been holding the position of Director of the European Union Trade Policy and World Trade Organization Department at the Belgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation, since 2021.  Before that, he held a variety of positions, including as the Deputy Chief of Mission at the Embassy of Belgium in Washington from 2017 to 2021; Ambassador of Belgium to Qatar from 2014 to 2017; Advisor to the Minister of Foreign Affairs from 2011 to 2014; and European Correspondent at the Foreign Ministry from 2009 to 2011.

After completing his studies, Mr. Payot joined Belgium’s Foreign Service as a diplomat in 2000, and attended a traineeship at the Belgian Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York in 2001.  He was posted to Pakistan in 2002 as Deputy Head of Mission and was in charge of Belgium’s diplomatic representation in Afghanistan from 2003 to 2004 and from 2005 to 2006.  He also joined the Belgian Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York in 2006, where he was responsible for counterterrorism during the Belgian mandate in the Security Council in 2007-2008. 

Mr. Payot has a master’s degree in financial economics from the Catholic University of Leuven in 2000, and a bachelor’s degree in political science from the Catholic University of Louvain in 1999.  He was born in 1977 in Brussels and is married with two young children.

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