King presents appointment letters to five envoys

The Yang di-Pertuan Agong, Tuanku Abdul Halim Mu'adzam Shah, today presented the instruments of appointment to five Malaysian envoys at the Istana Negara. They are Datuk Selwyn Vijayarajan Das (Ambassador to Austria); Datuk Ku Jaafar Ku Shaari (Ambassador to Egypt); Datin Seri Blanche Olbery (Ambassador to Finland); Datuk Husni Zai Yaacob (High Commissioner to Singapore) and Datuk Zainal Abidin Ahmad (High Commissioner to Australia). Das, who was Foreign Ministry deputy secretary-general (multilateral affairs), has been with Wisma Putra since 1979 and served as Malaysia's High Commissioner to Canada from 2009 to 2010 and as High Commissioner to Kenya from 2005 to 2009. Ku Jaafar served as Ambassador to Qatar from 2004 to 2007, as High Commissioner to Brunei from 2007 to 2010, and has served in the Malaysian missions in Canada, Croatia, Laos and Jordan. Blanche, wife of People's Progressive Party (PPP) president Datuk M. Kayveas, served as the High Commissioner to Papua New Guinea, accredited also to Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands, from June 2009. She is a legal practitioner and LLB (Hons) graduate from the University of Buckingham, United Kingdom. Husni Zai served as Ambassador to Thailand from 2008 to 2010, as Ambassador to Kuwait from 2003 to 2005 and served in several Malaysian missions, including in Pakistan, the Philippines and the United Kingdom. Zainal Abidin served as Ambassador to Laos from 2007 to 2010 before returning to the Foreign Ministry to serve as the director-general of the Asean-Malaysia National Secretariat. Deputy Foreign Minister Datuk Hamzah Zainuddin and Foreign Ministry secretary-general Tan Sri Mohd Radzi Abdul Rahman were also present at the function.