Badriddin Obidov, who earlier served as the Uzbek Ambassador to Latvia, has been appointed Deputy Minister of Foreign Trade in charge of Uzbekistan’s accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO), the Ministry of Foreign Trade said.

He graduated from the Tashkent Automobile and Road Institute and the Tashkent State Pedagogical Institute of Foreign Languages. He is also a graduate of diplomatic and language courses at the University of London (1993), the University of Surrey (1995), the Malaysian Institute of Diplomacy and External Relations (1994).

He began his career as a research-assistant at the Tashkent Automobile and Road Institute (1992-1993). Afterwards, he joined the diplomatic service, from 1993 to 2013, he held various positions within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Uzbekistan diplomatic missions. In particular, from 2003 to 2013, he served as first secretary and acting chief of the Permanent Mission of Uzbekistan to the UN Office and other international organizations in Geneva.

In 2014, he was appointed head of the international cooperation department on human rights issues at the National Center for Human Rights. After that, he worked as the Head of the Department for Foreign Economic Activity and Investments of UzPakhtaSanoatExport holding (2016), First Secretary and Acting Head of the Department for Cooperation with EU and NATO in the Foreign Ministry (2016–2018).

In his new role he will be in charge of the negotiation group on Uzbekistan’s accession to the WTO, as well as the improvement of foreign trade customs and tariffs regulation, optimization of imports, development of transport corridors and diversification of export routes. The position was introduced by a presidential decree of November 27.