David Yardley

Background

About David Yardley

Senior Career Diplomat - Senior Executive Service Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Australia Ambassador and Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations in Geneva Former High Commissioner of Australia to the Republic of Kiribati Assistant Secretary (Senior Executive Band 1) and Chief Negotiator, WTO Joint Statement Initiative on Electronic Commerce, Digital Trade and Multilateral Economic Cooperation Branch Former Counsellor (Political), Permanent Mission of Australia to the United Nations in New York David Yardley is Ambassador and Deputy Permanent Representative at the Permanent Mission of Australia to the United Nations in Geneva. In 2023-24 he served as Assistant Secretary, Digital Trade and Multilateral Economic Cooperation and Chief Negotiator for the WTO Joint Statement Initiative on E-Commerce. Mr Yardley served as Australia’s High Commissioner to Kiribati (2021-2023). Prior to that, Mr Yardley served: as Counsellor (Political) at Australia’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York (2016-2020); in Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations (2015); in the United Kingdom’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office as a secondee (2014-2015); and as Counsellor and A/g Deputy Ambassador at the Australian Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan (2013-14). He earlier worked at the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, including as an Australian representative to peak meetings of the International Labour Organisation. He holds Bachelors Degrees with First Class Honours in Science and Law from the University of Sydney, and a Master’s from the University of Cambridge, Personal Profile: With a true sense of vocation for public service, I am a proven, adaptable and outstanding leader that inspires, empowers, shapes strategies, builds influential stakeholder relationships and achieves results. I have extensive leadership expertise in headquarters and the field in international trade, foreign policy, development, multilateral and bilateral relations, including navigating the changing Indo-Pacific. Outside work I enjoy a second existence as a singer, composer and medieval harpist – with three albums of original compositions out in the world to date. Singing since I was 8, composing since 12 and playing the medieval harp since 2013, music has been a life-long passion.