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,
Andrew Rettman is EUobserver's foreign editor, writing about foreign and security issues since 2005. He is Polish, but grew up in the UK, and lives in Brussels. He has also written for The Guardian, The Times of London, and Intelligence Online.