Michael Alexander was born 19 June 1936, the son of the late Conel Hugh O’Donel Alexander, CMG, CBE, and Enid Constance Crichton Neate; he was educated at Foyle College, Londonderry; Hall School, Hampstead; St Paul’s School (Scholar); King’s College, Cambridge (Scholar); Harkness Fellow (Yale and Berkeley) 1960-62. MA (Cantab), AM (Yale). In 1960 he married Traute Krohn. Alexander died on 1 June 2002.

Alexander entered the Foreign (later Diplomatic) Service in 1962 and his career included: Moscow [Soviet Union], 1963-65; Office of Political Adviser, Singapore, 1965-68; Foreign and Commonwealth Office, 1968-72; Assistant Private Secretary to Secretary of State (Sir Alec Douglas-Home, MP, and James Callaghan, MP) 1972-74; Counsellor (Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe) and later Head of Chancery, UK Mission, Geneva [Switzerland], 1974-77; Deputy Head, 1977-78, Head, 1978-79, Personnel Operations Department, FCO; Private Secretary (Overseas Affairs) to the Prime Minister (Margaret Thatcher, MP), 1979-81; Ambassador, Vienna [Austria], 1982-86; concurrently Head of UK Delegation to the Negotiations on Mutual and Balanced Reduction of Forces and Armaments in Central Europe, 1985-86; Ambassador and UK Permanent Representative on North Atlantic Council, Brussels [Belgium], 1986-92 (Dean of Council, 1991-92).

He was awarded the GCMG in 1992 (KCMG 1988; CMG 1982) and died in June 2002.