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Biography - Paul Medhurst

Paul Medhurst was educated at the King’s School Canterbury, UK, the world’s oldest extant school, founded in 597 AD. He subsequently became a Police Officer, first in the Surrey Constabulary, then the London Metropolitan Police, whose Headquarters is New Scotland Yard. It was while serving in London that he first encountered a notorious terrorist as part of a team securing the suspect in a high-security police station, awaiting trial. In 1980, he was on duty at the Iranian Embassy Siege at Princes Gate, London.

Following his police service in 1981, he volunteered as an Infantry Officer Cadet with E Company, 5th Battalion of the Queen’s Regiment, during which time he lectured his peers on terrorism. He later served in 63 Squadron, Corps of Royal Military Police, from which he took an appointment with the Security and Safety Service within the United Nations Secretariat.

In addition to UN postings totaling 20 years in New York, Geneva, Vienna, Jerusalem, Damascus, Naqoura, Luanda, Rawalpindi and Srinagar, he has undergone short temporary tours of duty at many other stations. His UN duties have mostly been in the areas of security and administration in the Department of Peacekeeping Operations.

While attached to the United Nations Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan, he was appointed as the Political Assistant to the Chief Military Observer or General Officer Commanding. He authored a 570-page guide with campaign maps pertaining to the dispute in the former Princely State of Jammu and Kashmir. This included the map-plotting of (and in some cases photographing) several dozen militant training camps.

During his service with the UN, he enrolled with Middlesex University, defended his research and was conferred with the terminal degree, a Ph.D. Research Degree by Published Works, in Political Science on the topic of terrorism. The content of this research was later cited by the UN Secretary-General in his address to the 188 Ambassadors of the UN General Assembly as part of Measures to Eliminate International Terrorism. UN record A 55 179 refers.

Medhurst was an Instructor on the first UN Police Officer’s course (for Scandinavian Police Forces) conducted by the Swedish Armed Forces (SWEDINT). He was also appointed as an IAEA Instructor for law enforcement and border authorities on the topic of illicit trafficking in nuclear materials. After passing the UN Competitive Professional Examination in Security, Medhurst was appointed as Deputy Chief of Security and Safety for the United Nations in Geneva, then Vienna, whose purvey was the physical security and safety of numerous UN organizations, including the UN Terrorism Prevention Branch, IAEA, the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs, and several thousand staff, diplomats and visitors.

He first authored Field Security for UN Peacekeepers and secondly, Global Terrorism, for the UN Institute for Training and Research. Part of the material contained in the latter course was later documented by a UN Police Commander as having saved UN Police lives in a terrorist multiple-bombing attack in Kosovo, material which KFOR troops tragically disregarded and were blown up. More than 26,000 students in over 50 nations have taken Medhurst’s UN courses.

He was based in several locations around the world where terrorism and security threats are endemic. He has personal experience being held by irregular armed elements, negotiating release and being under fire and bombardment. In Angola as the Mission Security officer, he twice led defacto a local army platoon in short fire-fights involving automatic weapons, repelling several night raiding parties of looters and renegade soldiers, preventing them from entering the UN Peacekeeping HQs camp.

He was the only staff member in the UN security field to have served in all three main security categories S, FS, and P and at the three largest HQs in New York, Geneva and Vienna.

In 2000, Medhurst was invited to teach at the American Military University within APUS. He has subsequently taught for the Departments of Unconventional Warfare, Criminal Justice, National Security, Intelligence and Space, and the School of Security and Global Studies. He has taught, authored and drafted courses on Intelligence, Counter-Intelligence, Counter-Insurgency Intelligence Support, Terrorism, Forecasting Terrorism, Ethics in Intelligence, National Security, Covert Action and Assassination. His appointments have included those of Thesis Advisor for The UN Institute for Training and Research, later the Peace Operations Training Institute.

Medhurst was seconded for temporary duty as 2 i / c of the Management Advisory Unit in the UN Office for Drugs and Crime.

Following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, he was requested by the UN to lecture members of the US Intelligence Community at a U.S. Naval facility, on Anti-Terrorism security measures.

Since entering his chosen fields of Security, Intelligence and Political Science, he has accomplished in excess of 10,000 hours of reading on the topics and related subjects.

Medhurst speaks limited Arabic, German and French. He is a member of the following societies and associations: Association of Former Intelligence Officers, Royal United Services Institute for Defence Security Studies, International Association of Chiefs of Police, Queen’s Regimental Association, International Society of Explosives Engineers, Institute of Nuclear Materials Management, Forensic Science Society, Royal Military Police Association, UK National Defence Association, Association of American University Professors, Action for Armed Forces (AAF), Royal British Legion (RBL), Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) and the Old King’s Scholars’ Association.

Among other decorations, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize which was awarded to UN peacekeepers in service prior to 10th December 1988.