Piers Cazalet started his career in the British Diplomatic Service in 1991, covering Angola and Mozambique. Piers later served on secondment to the UN as an elections monitor in Mozambique’s first democratic election in 1994. He then worked in London on the Balkans, UN and EU issues, before a posting to Cyprus in 1995. On return to London in 1999, he headed up the India Section in the FCO.
In December 2002, Piers was posted as Deputy Head of Mission to Jerusalem, covering the Occupied Palestinian Territories, where he ran several security sector reform programmes. In 2006, Piers moved to Jakarta, where he headed up the Political team, managing programmes on economic reform and governance, and climate change. In 2008, Piers moved to Beirut as Deputy Head of Mission. Here he was responsible for the Embassy’s political work and security sector reform programmes.
He came to Brussels in August 2012 as Defence Counsellor in the UK Delegation to NATO. Piers oversaw the teams working on capabilities, politics, communications, and resource issues, and acted as Deputy Permanent Representative for 6 months during a transition in the Delegation in 2016-17.
In March 2017, Piers joined the International Staff of NATO as Head of Press and Media and Deputy Spokesperson. In July 2022 he transferred to Operations Division as Director, Defence and Security Cooperation. In his current role, he oversees the programmes of practical support to and cooperation with NATO’s 35 partner countries. The programmes cover a range of areas including capacity building, defence education, building integrity, science and innovation research, and disaster response.
