{"id":75178,"date":"2026-08-09T15:34:17","date_gmt":"2026-08-09T07:34:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=75178"},"modified":"2026-08-09T15:34:17","modified_gmt":"2026-08-09T07:34:17","slug":"veteran-diplomat-and-lawyer-tommy-koh-to-retire-from-foreign-service-receives-lifetime-distinguished-service-award-singapore-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=75178","title":{"rendered":"Veteran diplomat and lawyer Tommy Koh to retire from foreign service, receives lifetime distinguished service award, Singapore News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Veteran diplomat and lawyer Professor Tommy Koh will retire from the foreign service at the end of August, following a 55-year career at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA).<\/p>\n<p>Announcing this in a Facebook post on Friday (Aug 7), Prof Koh recounted that he has served under every one of Singapore&#8217;s seven post-independence foreign affairs ministers, starting from S. Rajaratnam.<\/p>\n<p>He described the over five decades spent at MFA as &#8220;happy years&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>The 88-year-old, who is presently Ambassador-at-Large, was presented with the inaugural lifetime distinguished service award at the ministry&#8217;s National Day observance ceremony on Friday.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Minister for Foreign Affairs Dr Vivian Balakrishnan said in Facebook post on Friday night that Prof Koh&#8217;s legacy extends beyond the milestones he helped achieve.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Through his intellectual rigour, integrity, generosity of spirit and unwavering commitment to Singapore, he has inspired generations of MFA officers. His example will continue to guide Singapore\u2019s diplomacy for years to come,&#8221; the foreign affairs minister wrote.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"793\" width=\"500\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/post.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2FVivian.Balakrishnan.Sg%2Fposts%2Fpfbid0256ujDQQw45EoDWqWmtyPzUczpkvtJ1KxUxkeX7CpVHTwSKi2XzQe7qnHveLULPY7l&amp;show_text=true&amp;width=500\" allowfullscreen=\"\" allow=\"autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; picture-in-picture; web-share\">\u00a0<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Second Minister for Foreign Affairs Sim Ann also paid tribute to Prof Koh in a separate Facebook post, saying that he is a stalwart in international law advocacy.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;His contributions to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) have left an enduring legacy in the development of the modern law of the sea,&#8221; she added.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, the octogenarian is not fully retiring yet, despite retiring from the MFA.<\/p>\n<p>According to Prof Koh, he will be based at the National University of Singapore&#8217;s Centre for International Law from Sept 1, where he is the chairman of the centre&#8217;s international advisory panel.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"706\" width=\"500\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/post.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Ftommy.koh.752%2Fposts%2Fpfbid02Eis5xqMW6DbDwQf5WHqA6sVuN6Gh3aYqka6kHCtznNiptV4ifPbBMEQr9cYuKZgSl&amp;show_text=true&amp;width=500\" allowfullscreen=\"\" allow=\"autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; picture-in-picture; web-share\">\u00a0<\/iframe><\/p>\n<h2>Tommy Koh&#8217;s career<\/h2>\n<p>The 88-year-old served as Singapore&#8217;s permanent representative to the United Nations from 1968 to 1971, and again from 1974 to 1984.<\/p>\n<p>During these periods, he presided over the third United Nations conference on the Law of the Sea between 1980 and 1982.<\/p>\n<p>Prof Koh was also a member of three World Trade Organisation dispute panels, chairing it twice.<\/p>\n<p>In 1993, he was the UN secretary-general&#8217;s special envoy, on a peace mission, to Russia, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.<\/p>\n<p>Most notably, Prof Koh was also Singapore&#8217;s agent for its dispute over Pedra Branca with Malaysia at the International Court of Justice.<\/p>\n<p>He is credited with leading Singapore&#8217;s legal team through the multi-year case that resulted in Singapore being awarded the sovereignty of the island in May 2008.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>That year, he was awarded the Order of Nila Utama (First Class).<\/p>\n<p>Locally, Prof Koh was the founding chairman of the National Arts Council between 1991 to 1996. He was also director of the Institute of Policy Studies between 1990 to 1997, and again from 2000 to 2004.<\/p>\n<p>[[nid:741544]]<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.asiaone.com\/singapore\/mailto:editor@asiaone.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">editor@asiaone.com<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<center><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.asiaone.com\/singapore\/tommy-koh-retires-mfa\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read Full Article At Source <\/a><br \/>\n<center\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Veteran diplomat and lawyer Professor Tommy Koh will retire from the foreign service at the end of August, following a 55-year career at the Ministry&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":75179,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2611],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75178","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-buzz-headlines","wpcat-2611-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=75178"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75178\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/75179"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=75178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=75178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=75178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}