In Scandinavia, there is now usually equal representation of men and women at the training courses for young diplomats. In due course, there will be equal numbers of men and women in the service, and maybe even more women.

“Still, there are more male ambassadors and consuls general, 64 per cent men against 35 per cent women,” says Norwegian ambassador Cecilie Landsverk. She is now completing her second ambassadorship, first in Turkey and then Pakistan, and is soon she is off for her third posting nearer home, in Iceland. Maybe her calendar will be less busy there, but perhaps the size of the country doesn’t decide the workload?

In the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, there are already enough women who could apply to become ambassadors. They have reached the level of department director, but they don’t always apply. The Norwegian Ombudsman for Equality has pointed out that there should be more women ambassadors. There is also a need to get more Scandinavian diplomats with immigrant backgrounds.

Espen Barth Eide, Norwegian minister for foreign affairs, addressed the issue at last year’s meeting of all ambassadors. But he said positive discrimination was not on the agenda.

The Swedish Ambassador, Tomas Rosander, says that it is obvious that the influx of immigrants must also be reflected in the recruitment to the Foreign Service. In Sweden, about 20 per cent of the population is of immigrant background.

In Pakistan, the Norwegian embassy has for the last three years had a diplomat whose ethnic ancestors are South Korean. He was adopted into a Norwegian family as a boy.

A few years ago, Laila Bokhari was a Norwegian diplomat in Pakistan; born and bred in Norway to an ethnic Norwegian mother and a father from Pakistan. Last year, she became assistant minister for security in the Prime Minister’s Office.

Laila has had a busy calendar, of course, and recently, she presented a framework for integration and security in an official government report – a few weeks in advance of the sad 3-year marking on 22 July of the shooting tragedy when Anders Behring Breivik in terrorist attacks killed 77 young men and women at a summer camp and downtown Oslo.

Published in Dawn, July 13th, 2014