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Ms Ashton has made a number of promises on gender, geographic balance and equal treatment of EU officials and diplomats (Photo: Council of the European Union)

Old boys club dominates EU diplomacy

by Andrew Rettman, Brussels,

Belgian, Dutch, Italian, French and German men make up the lion's share of EU ambassadors abroad, a new study timed to coincide with a major recruitment round for the European External Action Service (EEAS), has said.

The five founding members of the EU together have 66 heads of delegation out of the EU's 115 foreign missions which are run by an official with the top-level grade.

The UK and Spain, two large countries which joined the EU later on, hold another 20,

Ms Ashton has made a number of promises on gender, geographic balance and equal treatment of EU officials and diplomats (Photo: Council of the European Union)

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Author Bio

Andrew Rettman is EUobserver's Foreign Affairs Editor. He has been writing about foreign and security affairs for EUobserver since 2005. He is Polish but grew up in the UK. He has also written for The Guardian, The Telegraph, and The Times of London.

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