MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Former Falklands Department Head to be Montserrat Governor.

A diplomat well-known to Falkland Islanders as former Head of the South Atlantic and Antarctic Department, Tony Longrigg, has been appointed Governor of Montseratt, the Caribbean Island whose inhabitants are still suffering from the effects of volcanic eruptions in recent years.

Mr Longrigg was the senior diplomat with responsibility for the Falkland Islands and the British Antarctic Territories from 1995 to 1997. He had previously served in South America during the Falklands Conflict, as First Secretary at the British Embassy in the Brazilian capital , Brasilia, from 1981 to 1985. He also spent four years in Madrid.

For more than half his 28- year Foreign Office career, he has specialised in Soviet affairs, having served in the Soviet Department in London and also in Moscow on three different assignments, as First Secretary, Counsellor, and for the past three years as Minister and Deputy Head of Chancery.

Mr Longrigg, who is 56 and married with three daughters, takes up his post as Governor of Montserrat in May next year.