MARGELOV, Mikhail Vitalyevich

Chairman of the Federation Council Committee for International Affairs 03/07/2007

Mikhail Margelov (Михаил Витальевич Маргелов) was born December 22, 1964 in Moscow. A Russian politician, he has been chairman of the Federation Council Committee for Foreign Affairs since 2001 and the Russian president's special envoy to Africa since March 2011.

Margelov's father was a career diplomat and his grandfather led the Soviet Airforce for over twenty years. Margelov himself graduated from the Institute of Asian and African Countries at Moscow State University in 1986, and worked as a translator for the Communist Party Central Committee for the last two years of his studies.

In the late 1980s Margelov taught Arabic at the KGB Higher School before joining the TASS News Agency (now ITAR-TASS) as the first editor of its Arabic editorial division.In the early 1990s he worked as a consultant for various American companies including Boston Consulting Group and Bain & Company.

He moved into politics in 1995 when he was put in charge of running the publicity campaign of Grigory Yavlinsky and the Yabloko party. The following year he was involved in President Yeltsin's election campaign, before running the public relations department of the Presidential Administration from 1997 to 1998.

He then joined the management at RIA Novosti news agency before running the Rosinformcentre from 1998 to 1999. He worked on Vladimir Putin's successful 2000 presidential campaign. Later the same year he joined the Federation Council, representing the Pskov Region. In 2001 Margelov was named head of the Federation Council's Committee for Foreign Affairs, a post he still holds today.

Since March 20 2011, Margelov has been the Russian president's special envoy to Africa.

Margelov is married and has one son.

Margelov biography on the Federation Council Website

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