Berhanu Dinka

Berhanu Dinka (; 4 June 1935 – 8 July 2013) was an Ethiopian diplomat. His distinguished diplomatic career spanned more than five decades, during which he held a number of senior portfolios in the Ethiopian Foreign Service, including as the first Ethiopian ambassador to Djibouti and as the permanent representative to the United Nations for Ethiopia, and as an official of the United Nations, including as Under-Secretary-General, Special Envoy for Sierra Leone, and Special Representative for the Great Lakes region and for Burundi.

Early life and education Berhanu was born in the former Welega Province of the Ethiopian Empire, on 4 June 1935. Educated in Ethiopia and the United States, he earned degrees in economics and politics. He held a Master of International Studies from American University in Washington, D.C., a certificate in policy analysis from the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, and participated in the International Visitor Leadership Program of the United States Department of State.

Career Berhanu served as a career diplomat with the Ethiopian foreign service for twenty-seven years. Early on, he worked as diplomat at the Ethiopian embassies in Monrovia, Liberia; Cairo, Egypt; and Washington, D.C. under the government of Haile Selassie. Following the Ethiopian Revolution and installation of the Derg, he was promoted to the rank of ambassador as the head of the Department of Africa and Middle East Affairs within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1975. He was released, along with eighty-seven other political prisoners, in 1989. His release took place just five days before peace talks were due to begin in Atlanta, officiated by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, between the Mengistu Haile Mariam regime and Eritrean rebels.

United Nations Berhanu joined the United Nations as an official in 1992. special representative of the Secretary-General for the Great Lakes region of Central Africa from 1997 to 2002; and special representative of the Secretary-General for Burundi from 2002 to 2004.