Witold Spirydowicz

Witold Czesław Spirydowicz (born 5 October 1958, Warsaw) is a Polish civil servant and diplomat, serving as an ambassador to Morocco (2010-2015) and Algeria (since 2017).

Life

Witold Spirydowicz has graduated from Law Faculty at the University of Warsaw (1981). He was member of the Independent Students' Union at that time. He has gained also postraduate diplomas at the Faculty of Journalism and Political Science, UW (1983), Centre Européen Universitaire de Nancy (1983) and Diplomatic Academy – Polytechnic School of Central London (1990). In 1992 he defended his Ph.D. thesis on criminology. Besides Polish, he speaks English, French, German and Italian languages.

Between 1984 and 1990 he has been working for the Institute of Justice of Warsaw, the Institute for Juvenile Research. In September 1990 he joined the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA). Firstly, he was head of section at the Consular Department. Following working on a post at the embassy in Vienna (1992–1993), in 1993, he became First Secretary at the embassy in Bonn. In 1997 he returned to the MFA headquarter. Between 2000 and 2004 he was Consul-General in Montreal. For the next two years he has been at the Legal and Treaty Department. From 2006 to 2008 he was director of the department at the Office for War Veterans and Victims of Oppression. In January 2008 he returned to the MFA as a deputy director of the Director General's Office. The same year, in September, he became the director of the MFA Bureau of Control and Audit.

Between 2006 and 2007 he back at the Permanent Representation to the EU, this time as chargé d’affaires. For the next year he was the MFA director general. Between 2010 and 2015 he was Poland ambassador to Morocco. In 2016 he was invitited by the president Andrzej Duda to the National Development Council. On 7 June 2016 he was nominated an ambassador to Algeria. Next month, he began his term.

He is married, with daughter Aldona.

Honours

• Pro Memoria Medal (2008)
• Officer of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Hungary (2014)
• Grand Cross of the Order of Ouissam Alaouite (2015)

Works

Translations

• Hans Joachim Schneider, Zysk z przestępstwa: środki masowego przekazu a zjawiska kryminalne [original title: Massenmedien aund Kriminalitat], Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN, 1992, ISBN 83-01-10602-6.