Nikolay Kozyrev

Nikolai Ivanovich Kozyrev (; 27 June 1934 – 11 September 2021) was a Soviet and Russian diplomat. He served as a member of diplomatic staff from the 1950s and into the 1990s, and as the Soviet and later Russian ambassador to Ireland from 1991 until 1998.

Early life and postings Kozyrev was born in Moscow. He studied at Moscow State Institute of International Relations, graduating in 1958 and joining the USSR's Ministry of Foreign Affairs that year. He was then recalled to work in the ministry's central apparatus, before being appointed third, then second secretary at the embassy in Iran, remaining there until 1968. Returning to the Soviet Union for another period of work and study in the ministry, he graduated from the Higher Diplomatic School of the Soviet Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1970 as a specialist in the international relations of Eastern countries.

Kozyrev returned to Tehran in 1972, this time as the embassy's first secretary, a post he held until 1976. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union later that year, he was formally confirmed in post as ambassador of Russia on 10 February 1992, as the Soviet Union's legal successor, until his recall on 6 April 1998. Retiring that year, he joined the Diplomatic Academy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia as Vice-Rector for Personnel, later becoming an advisor at the academy's Centre for Eurasian Studies of the Institute of Contemporary International Problems. He also taught in the academy's Department of Russian Diplomacy and Foreign Policy, where he was known as a prominent expert on Iran and Afghanistan, and was an Honorary Professor of the Diplomatic Academy.

Death Kozyrev died on 11 September 2021, at the age of 87.