Åge Bernhard Grutle (born 19 June 1952) is a Norwegian diplomat and royal servant. He was born in Haugesund, has a master's degree in international affairs, and started his career in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1978. In his early diplomatic career he was stationed at the embassies in

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula and sharing a land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed by the Yellow Sea, while its eas ...

and the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

. In 1987 he was declared as expelled from the latter country, during a minor diplomatic crisis. He was a sub-director in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 1992 to 1994, secretary for the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs from 1994 to 1999 as well as leader of the international secretariat, and deputy under-secretary of state in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 1999 to 2004. He then became a Norwegian ambassador, first to Japan from 2004 to 2009. In 2005 he led the insight committee on how the Ministry of Foreign Affairs responded to the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami. In 2009 Grutle was appointed as the

Lord Chamberlain The Lord Chamberlain of the Household is the most senior officer of the Royal Household of the United Kingdom, supervising the departments which support and provide advice to the Sovereign of the United Kingdom while also acting as the main c ...

at the Norwegian Royal Court, but in 2015 he returned to the foreign service as ambassador to

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

. The Grand Cross of the

Order of St Olav The Royal Norwegian Order of Saint Olav ( no, Den Kongelige Norske Sankt Olavs Orden; or ''Sanct Olafs Orden'', the old Norwegian name) is a Norwegian order of chivalry instituted by King Oscar I on 21 August 1847. It is named after King Olav II ...

was bestowed upon Grutle on 26 August 2015.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Grutle, Aage 1952 births Living people People from Haugesund Norwegian civil servants Norwegian expatriates in the Soviet Union Ambassadors of Norway to Japan Ambassadors of Norway to Finland 20th-century Norwegian civil servants 21st-century Norwegian civil servants