Mr. Andres B. Munoz Mosquera is NATO's senior legal advisor for the Allied Command Operations, the NATO command which plans and conducts NATO operations worldwide from the NATO body: Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers, Europe (SHAPE). He joined NATO in 2000 as a civilian and has served as the NATO Supreme Commander’s Legal Advisor (Director of the ACO/SHAPE Office of Legal Affairs) since 2014.
He served in the Spanish Armed Forces, in two cavalry regiments, as secretario de causas (case officer) and tank commander until 1991. From 1991 to 1999, he was a permanent member of the Spanish inter-ministerial delegation to the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) in Geneva, working at the Spanish CHOD. In 1994, he was also deployed to Bosnia and Herzegovina, where he handled press information duties for General Rose. He was involved in negotiating anti-sniping agreements and facilitating the exchange of prisoners and corpses in Sarajevo. From 1997 to 1998, he served as a counter-intelligence officer for the US-led Allied Military Intelligence Battalion (ACCI-trained), where he helped identify and collect evidence of war crimes committed between 1991-1995, and tracked persons indicted for war crimes (PIFWC), in support of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY). Today, he is a reserve officer in the Spanish elite unit, La Legión.
Since 2000, he has been involved in rule of law matters in the Balkans and the Middle East, where he provides pro bono support to his bar association. He developed SHAPE’s concept of strategic legal information (legal intelligence) and operations (legal vigilance). He has led and continues to handle multi-million-dollar cases related to NATO operations in the Balkans and Afghanistan, as well as cases involving the daily operations of NATO’s permanent headquarters, particularly those concerning Host Nation support matters and the applications of the Paris Protocol and NATO Status of Forces. He has served as a dual-hatted legal advisor for the NATO Airborne Early Warning (NAEW) Commander and the NATO Special Operations Headquarters (NSHQ), and as a judge at the EU SatCen Appeals Board before it was absorbed by the European Court of Justice.
Mr. Munoz Mosquera is an academic and the author of numerous books, book chapters, and scholarly articles on public international law, international institutional law, and international relations (security studies). He has lectured at the Royal Academy of Law and Jurisprudence in Madrid, and he is a visiting professor at several universities in Europe and the USA. He held fellowships at the Marine Corps University (2021-2023) and Reichman University (2022). He is currently a Senior Fellow at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (Center for International Law and Governance). He also regularly lectures at USMA-West Point and the National Defense University. He has received the Livery Collar of the Household of Feigenblatt for his contribution to higher education.
He is a member of the Society of Military Law and Law of War, the Madrid Bar Association, and is a CCB European Lawyer. He is also a member of the Association of American Law Schools (AALS) and the American Society of International Law (ASIL). In 1996, he was the Honor Graduate for his academic achievements at Keesler Technical Centre, USA (Law and Electromagnetic Spectrum). He holds the Madrid Bar Award for his work on Legal Resilience. He is also an Honor Auditor of the Spanish Legal Corps.
Mr. Munoz Mosquera has been awarded fifteen decorations, including the NATO Meritorious Medal, the NATO Legal Long Service Medal, and the French Republic’s Medal of Ex-Yugoslavia. He has been knighted twice: Caballero de la Orden de San Hermenegildo and Caballero de la Imperial Orden de Carlos V.
He is a graduate of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (Tufts) and NATO Defense College (GFOAC). PhD, Leiden University.
In addition, he holds a black belt in Judo, and since 2020, he has led religious services for the 1951-established Shomrei Shalom community at SHAPE International Chapel. He has two children, Abraham and Rebeca.
His motto is inspired by the first-century sage Tarfon:
"You are not required to finish your work, yet neither are you permitted to desist from it.”
Updated December 2024
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