H.E. Mr. Olivier Jean Patrick Nduhungirehe is the Ambassador of the Republic of Rwanda to the Kingdom of the Netherlands and Permanent Representative to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), since November 2020. In The Hague, he also serves as non-resident Ambassador to the Republics of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
The Ambassador is also in charge of following activities of international jurisdictions based in The Hague, mainly the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT) and the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA).
Ambassador Nduhungirehe is an experienced diplomat, who held the following positions over the past fifteen (15) years:
- Minister of State in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, in charge of the East African Community – EAC (September 2017 – April 2020).
- Ambassador of the Republic of Rwanda in Brussels, having jurisdiction over the Kingdom of Belgium, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, the European Union (EU), the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States and the World Customs Organization (WCO) (December 2015 – September 2017);
- Acting Director General in charge of Multilateral Cooperation in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation (May 2015 – December 2015);
- Minister Counsellor, Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations in charge of the UN Security Council, New York (December 2012 – May 2015)– Rwanda was non-permanent member of the Security Council in 2013 and 2014-;
- First Counsellor at the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Rwanda to the United Nations, New York (August 2010 – December 2012);
- First Counsellor at the Embassy of the Republic of Rwanda to the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, Permanent Mission to the African Union (March 2007 – August 2010);
Prior to his diplomatic career, Ambassador Nduhungirehe served as Personal Assistant to the Minister of State in charge of Industry and Investment Promotion in the Ministry of Trade and Industry (November 2004 – June 2005), Personal Assistant to the Minister of Agriculture and Animal Resources (June 2005 – August 2005) and member of the Business Law Reform Cell (August 2005 – January 2007), which was tasked to reform administrative and business laws in order to attract investments in Rwanda. During that period, he was also a part-time lecturer in various universities in Rwanda, teaching Tax Law, Social Law and Economic and Financial Law.
He holds a Master degree in Tax Management from the Solvay Business School of the Free University of Brussels (ULB, Belgium) and is a Bachelor of Law from the Catholic University of Louvain (UCL, Belgium).
Ambassador Olivier J.P. Nduhungirehe, who fluently speaks Kinyarwanda, French and English, was born in Huye District, Southern Province, Republic of Rwanda on 13th September 1975. He is married with two children.
