Germany's NATO Representative Appointed Ambassador To Turkey

Germany has appointed its permanent representative to NATO's North Atlantic Council, Martin Erdmann, as the country's new ambassador to Turkey.

Erdmann will replace Eberhard Pohl, the current German ambassador in Ankara, whose period in office recently ended. Ankara has already approved the appointment of Erdmann, according to the German Foreign Ministry. The new ambassador will have to deal with strained Turkish-German ties after the Bundestag passed a resolution describing the 1915 massacres of Ottoman Armenians as genocide. Erdmann is an expert in security policies and is expected to attach special importance to security policies in the course of his duties in Turkey.

Married with three children, Erdmann joined the German Foreign Service in 1982. He later worked as personal assistant to the parliamentary state secretary at the Foreign Ministry. In 1990 Erdmann was appointed first secretary at the German delegation to NATO in Brussels. In the mid-1990s, Erdmann became the Foreign Ministry's spokesperson. Also working as assistant secretary-general for political affairs for former NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, Erdmann was appointed as a permanent representative on the North Atlantic Council in March 2010.

Former German Ambassador to Turkey Pohl will become Germany's permanent representative of at the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).

Lamiya Adilgızı, Berlin (Cihan/Today's Zaman)