Manuel Lobo Antunes

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Manuel Lobo Antunes ComIH GCIH ComM (born 27 June 1958) is a Portuguese lawyer and diplomat. He was born in Lisbon into a medical family; his father was a respected professor of neurology. He is the brother of writer António Lobo Antunes and neurosurgeon João Lobo Antunes. He studied law at the Catholic University of Portugal and then European affairs at the same university.

He began his diplomatic career in 1984 as a adviser to President António Ramalho Eanes. His first overseas posting was in The Hague in 1988 as a secretary, followed by Harare, Zimbabwe as a councillor. In 1996 he returned to Lisbon as director for Sub-Saharan African affairs, and he held various roles, including diplomatic adviser to Prime Minister António Guterres (2001–02), director general for EU affairs (2004–05), and deputy representative to the convention on the Future of Europe.

After the 2005 election of José Sócrates, he served as Secretary of State for National Defence and the Sea. In 2006 he became Secretary of State for European Affairs, helping oversee Portugal’s EU presidency and negotiating the final phase of the Treaty of Lisbon. He left frontline politics in 2008 and became Portugal’s Permanent Representative to the European Union, a post he held until 2012. He then served as Ambassador to Italy in Rome for four years, and in 2016 became Portugal’s Ambassador to the United Kingdom in London.

In April 2022 he was appointed as Portugal’s Permanent Representative to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). He is married to Maria and they have five children. He speaks Portuguese, English and Italian.