Senior diplomat Anil Wadhwa new Ambassador to Italy

NEW DELHI: Senior diplomat Anil Wadhwa, currently Secretary (East) in the External Affairs Ministry, has been appointed as India's Ambassador to Italy, with which the ties are still reeling under the strain of marines' issue.

A 1979-batch IFS officer, Wadhwa will replace Basant Kumar Gupta and is expected to take up his assignment shortly, MEA announced today.

Wadhwa has served as the Indian Ambassador to Poland (March 2004 to August 2007), to the Sultanate of Oman (August 2007 to September 2011), and to the Kingdom of Thailand (November 2011 to Jan 2014).

His posting to Italy as the top envoy comes at a time when the two countries are embroiled in a long-drawn judicial case involving two Italian marines accused of killing as many Indian fishermen off the Kerala coast in 2012.

Earlier in August, the Supreme Court stayed all proceedings in the case after a UN tribunal asked both Italy and India to "suspend" all court proceedings and also refrain from initiating new ones that might "aggravate or extend" the dispute.