Dayan Jayatilleka, a former Sri Lankan diplomat and academic, is an author and commentator in the media. Until January 2013 he served as Sri Lanka’s Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to France, Portugal and Spain and Permanent Delegate to UNESCO. Previously he was Ambassador/ Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka to the United Nations in Geneva (2007-09), including to the Conference on Disarmament. He was a Vice-President of the UN Human Rights Council (2007-08). While in Geneva, he was also appointed Chairman of the Governing body of the International Labour Organization (ILO) in 2007. He was the Editor of the Lanka Guardian (1996-1998) and the Director of Conflict Studies at the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) Colombo. The youngest Minister in the provincial council system at the time, he held the portfolio of Planning and Youth Affairs in the North-East Provincial Council of Sri Lanka (1988–89). He was the Assistant Secretary of the Sri Lanka Mahajana Party (SLMP). Dayan Jayatilleka graduated with a First Class Honours Degree in Political Science from the University of Peradeniya, and received a Fulbright scholarship in 1982–83. He holds an M. Phil from the University of Colombo and a Ph.D. from Griffith University, Brisbane, also in Political Science. His publications include Fidel's Ethics of Violence: The Moral Dimension of the Political Thought of Fidel Castro (Pluto, London 2007) and The Travails of a Democracy: Unfinished War, Protracted Crisis (Vikas, New Delhi 1995).