Omar Sharaf

His father Dr. Mohammed Abdel Aziz Sharaf (Beni Suef Governorate 1889 – Cairo 1953) was a British-educated and trained medical doctor, who earned his PhD in general surgery from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.

His mother Raohia Zaki Saleh (1904–1981) was a maternal granddaughter of Hassouna El Nawawy, Grand Sheikh of Al-Azhar.

She was educated, well versed, a popular socialite, and the daughter of a one-time governor; one source mentioned her father as governor of Suez Governorate.

while another mentioned him as the governor of Beni Suef governorate.

Moving around with his parents, Sharaf attended several primary and secondary schools in both upper and lower Egypt, the family finally settling in the Cairo suburb of Heliopolis.

His siblings included: Sameha Sharaf (1922–1996), a lecturer and translator at the Middle East News Agency (MENA); Ezz El-din Sharaf (1927–2010), former police officer and Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs; Sami Sharaf (1929–), former army officer and government minister; Salwa Sharaf (1935–), socialite; Tarek Sharaf (1936–1996), former army officer and doyen of the Arabic language simultaneous translators at the United Nations.

Omar Abdel Aziz Sharaf (22 October 1925 – 8 September 1993; عمر شرف) was an Egyptian career diplomat, an Assistant Secretary General of the Arab League, a Deputy Representative of the UNHCR for the Middle East, as well as an Omani and international diplomat.

Sharaf was born in Aswan Governorate, southern Egypt on 22 October 1925, the eldest male and the second child of six siblings to a middle class Egyptian family.

Sharaf completed his secondary school education graduating from El Mansoura secondary school, lower Egypt, in September 1942.

He matriculated to the faculty of Law at Fu ād Ist University (Cairo University), where he graduated with a degree in 1947.

In 1948, he sat for and passed the Egyptian Diplomatic Corps examinations held at Alexandria, then summer seat of the Government of H.M. King Farouk.

Dr. Mohammed Abdel Aziz Sharaf had achieved some notability, having been mourned by Egypt's first post-23 July 1952 revolution president General Mohamed Naguib.

At the time of his birth in the mid-Twenties, his father was inspector of health in Beni Suef governorate.

Prior to that, he was First Secretary of the permanent Mission of the United Arab Republic to the United Nations at New York City (1957–1960), Second Secretary of the Embassy of Egypt at Ankara (1954–1956), Third secretary of the Embassy of Egypt at Bucharest (1953–1954), and Third Secretary of the Legation of the Kingdom of Egypt at Moscow (1951–1953).

He was a proficient linguist, and considered one of the Egyptian foreign ministry's foremost experts on Asian affairs and a Sinologist.

While posted to the United Nations in New York City, Sharaf returned to Egypt in February 1959 to marry Noha Elwi (née Wadoud Wagdy Elwi); it was an arranged marriage, typical of the time.

She was the second daughter of Wagdy Elwi, a bureaucrat at the Egyptian Ministry of Justice, and a great-grandson of Elwi Pasha, personal ophthalmologist to the Khedive of Egypt.

Her mother Samia Rostom was the daughter of second-generation immigrants from Turkey, and the niece of the Egyptian silver screen star of the Forties and Fifties, Zaki Rostom.

The marriage produced three children.

Sharaf served with distinction at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs for nearly four decades, from the early Fifties to the mid-Eighties, witnessing much of Egypt's diplomatic, political and military turmoil.

His family of diplomats included: his brother Ezz El-din, a former ambassador to Madagascar and Pakistan; his son Karim (1963–), deputy Assistant Minister, ambassador and former head of mission to Iraq, Afghanistan, and Bosnia Herzegovina; his nephew Abdul Rehim Shalaby, Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs and former ambassador to Myanmar, Indonesia and Kuwait; his nephew Omar Shalaby, counselor, permanent delegation of Egypt to UNESCO; his brother-in-law Ali Wagdy Elwai (1943–2000), deputy Assistant Minister and former ambassador to the Central African Republic; his cousin Essam Eldin Hawas, former ambassador to the State of Qatar.

Sharaf was promoted to the rank of Ambassador in 1977.

As a diplomat, his tenure as Assistant Secretary of the League was unfulfilling for several reasons, the most important of which was that his nomination to the position by the then deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs, Dr. Ahmed Asmat Abdel-Meguid, came at the height of the Arab boycott of Egypt for having signed the Camp David Peace Accords with Israel in 1979.

At the time, Sharaf was among a handful of Egyptian senior officials at the League's extensive headquarters in Cairo's Tahrir square, the League, and most of its specialized agencies having been moved out of Cairo to Tunis.

The move was a consequence of the decisions and decrees taken at the second Baghdad summit of March 1979 that expelled Egypt from the Arab League, and boycotted and imposed sanctions on it over its peace accords with Israel.

His few noted achievements at the League were administrative, succeeding with the assistance of his friend and colleague ambassador Dr. Osama El-Baz in securing from President Hosni Mubarak approval for the restructuring of pay scales for Egyptians working at the league, equating them to their Arab counterparts.

He was a Commander Grand Cross of the Order of the Polar Star (Sweden 1982), a recipient of the Order of Merit, First Class (Egypt, August 1977), and a recipient of the Order of the Republic, Second Class (Egypt, February 1973).

During his career he was the recipient of the Order of the Republic, Second Class, Egypt, February 1973, the Order of Merit, First Class, Egypt, August 1977, and the Order of the Polar Star, Sweden, 21 October 1982.

Sharaf was appointed to the People's Republic of China in 1982, becoming the seventh Egyptian diplomat to assume the post since the establishment of diplomatic relation between the two countries in 1956.

He assumed his new position in September 1982, and presented his credentials in Beijing to the Deputy Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress on 22 September 1982.

He established a working relationship with Chinese Communist Party leaders, including paramount leader Deng Xiaoping, and Premier and General Secretary of the Communist Party Zhao Ziyang, which successfully resulted in several important bilateral visits including that by Zhao Ziyang to Cairo in December 1982.

During this visit many international, regional and bilateral issues were discussed amongst them was the Middle East Peace Process.

He was promoted again to the category of Ambassador Par Excellence in December 1983.

His rapport and contacts in both Cairo and Beijing enabled him to arrange for the first visit ever by an Egyptian president, Hosni Mubarak, to the People's Republic of China, in April 1983.

Sharaf was quoted in the press expounding the development of Egyptian–Chinese bilateral relations, emphasizing the importance of Mubarak's visit, the nature of the consultations the president would hold with his Chinese counterpart, and the various issues to be discussed.

Sharaf also pointed out to the press China's keen and growing interest in peace and stability in the Middle East, the Far East and the globe.

During his lengthy career, Sharaf assumed several positions of relative importance: he was Assistant Secretary-General of the Arab League (1985–1986); Ambassador of Egypt to the People's Republic of China (1982–1985), Ambassador of Egypt to the Kingdom of Sweden (1979–1982); Deputy Chief of Mission of the Sultanate of Oman to the Islamic Republic of Pakistan (1974–1977); Consul General of the United Arab Republic (UAR) at Hong Kong (1966–1971); Deputy Representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees for the Middle East (1962–1966).

He retired from the Diplomatic Corps and active service in 1985.

In October 1985, Sharaf was appointed Assistant Secretary General of the Arab League.

He was also a lawyer, a member of the Egyptian Bar association, who until his death in 1993, was Doyen of a family clan of diplomats, politicians, linguists and lawyers.