Frédéric PUAUX appointed Director of International Affairs at the French Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (ART)

Paris, 17 July 1997

Frédéric Puaux has just been appointed Director of International Affairs at the French Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (ART), thus completing ART's senior executive staff.

Frédéric Puaux, 44, is a graduate of the Ecole Nationale d'Administration (ENA). He began his career in 1980 in the customs legislation department at the Budget Ministry, before joining France's Permanent Representation at the European Communities in Brussels, in 1983, where he was responsible for customs union and the achievement of the single market. He returned to France in 1987 to manage the arms section of the economic affairs directorate at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and then back to Brussels in 1990, as European Union representative of the Thomson SA group. In 1997 he became an international affairs advisor to the French defence minister, Charles Millon.

The International Affairs Division at the French Telecommunications Regulatory Authority in responsible for:

- regulatory cooperation (particularly within Europe),

- ensuring equivalent treatment for operators licensed to provide international services,

- strategic analysis and forecasting of international deregulation,

- harmonising the positions forwarded by ART's staff at international level.