Surin Pitsuwan

Date of Birth: October 28, 1949

 

Dr.Surin Pitsuwan, 65, is a native of Nakorn Sri Thammarat, Southern Thailand. He received his primary and secondary education in his home province.

 

He was awarded the American Field Service (AFS) exchange scholarship and was a high school exchange student in Minnesota, USA, in 1967-1968. He returned to Bangkok, Thailand and attended Thammasat University for 2 years before winning a scholarship from Claremont Men’s College (now Claremont McKenna College) in California, to complete his B.A. in Political Science (cum laude) in 1972. He then went on to Harvard University, Cambridge, where he received his M.A. and Ph.D. in 1974 and 1982 respectively, in the field of Political Science and Middle Eastern Studies.

 

Dr.Surin taught at the Faculty of Political Science at Thammasat University from 1978-1983 and 1984-1986. He joined the American Political Science Association’s Congressional Fellowship Program in 1983-1984, when he interned in the Congressional Office of the late US Representative Geraldine A. Ferraro (D-New York), who later became the Vice Presidential Candidate for the Democrat Party in 1984, and worked for the Senate Republican Conference in the later half of 1984. He returned to Thailand in 1984 to assume a teaching position at Thammasat and ran for a Parliamentary seat from Nakorn Sri Thammarat, his home town two years later. He had been returned to Parliament 8 times since 1986.

 

As an MP, he was appointed Secretary to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Secretary to Deputy Minister of Interior, Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs during 1992-1995, and Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1997 to 2001. In September 1999, while the ASEAN Chair, he led the efforts to get Southeast Asian governments to help restore law and order, and that joint undertaking, with the support of the United Nations and the international community, brought about peace and security in East Timor.

 

He assumed his post as the Secretary General of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) from 1 January 2008 until 31 December 2012.

 

After his term as Secretary General of ASEAN, Dr.Surin has been appointed Professor Emeritus at Thammasat University. He is concurrently a Visiting Professor, an Adjunct Professor and a Visiting Fellow at the Graduate Institute for Policy Studies, Tokyo, University of Nara, Japan, University of Malaya, and the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, Oxford University, UK.