Rolf Holmboe

Head of Mission

Rolf M.H.P. Holmboe is a distinguished diplomat with extensive experience in international relations and conflict resolution. He has held various key positions within the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, showcasing his commitment to promoting peace and stability in fragile states.

Rolf Holmboe joined EUAM Ukraine as Head of Mission in June 2023 after serving as Denmark’s ambassador to Mali (2020-2023) and Pakistan (2017-2020), as well as to Lebanon and Syria (2012-2015). From 2010 to 2012, he served as Director of Strategy and Policy Planning at the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

As Head of the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs Department for Stabilisation and Afghanistan from 2009 to 2010, he dealt extensively with combined political, stabilisation and development interventions in fragile states. Prior to that, he served as Denmark's Representative to the Palestinian Authority from 2005 to 2009.

From 1992-2005 he was inter alia responsible for Neighbourhood Programmes, including in Ukraine, Caucasus and the Balkans. As an army reserve officer, he has participated in several missions of longer or shorter duration in conflict zones as well as an arms control inspector under the CFE and Open Skies Treaties. Until 2016, he served as commander of a reserve specialist corps (battalion structure), providing mission area expertise to Danish military missions abroad. As an external lecturer, he has taught conflict studies in fragile states at the Institute of Political Science, Copenhagen University. From 2015-2017 he was a research fellow on temporary leave at the Canadian Global Affairs Institute in Ottawa. Rolf Holmboe holds a Master’s Degree in Political Science and a Supplementary Degree in Arabic Studies from Aarhus University.

Maura O'Sullivan

Deputy Head of Mission

Maura O’Sullivan has divided her career between law enforcement work in her native Ireland, and international missions, mainly civilian missions of the European Union. She initially graduated as a police officer with ‘An Garda Siochana’, Ireland’s national police force. From 2001 to 2003, she was a lecturer in legal and police studies at the Garda Training College, and later joined its International Department, working in the Europol National Unit and International Coordination Department, and during which time she embarked on her first international mission – as Chief of Reporting with the EU Police Mission (EUPM) in Bosnia in 2006. She also served as an Operations/Planning Officer with EULEX Kosovo in 2008-09.

Since 2010, she has focused exclusively on her international career, first working on a voluntary basis with the International Women’s Association in Georgia, before being appointed as Deputy Head of Field Office at the EU Monitoring Mission (EUMM) in Georgia in 2012. This was the first of two posts she held at EUMM, where she would later work as Deputy Head of Operations, the post she held immediately before moving to EUAM. In between, she was a Police Advisor at the OSCE Mission to Skopje in 2015-17, and with her extensive expertise in training and community policing, in 2017-18 she was valued member of EUAM’s Community Policing Unit, working as community policing advisor. In 2019-23 she took the position of the EUAM Chief of Staff.

In 2015, she completed a Master’s Degree in International Studies. Prior to joining the police she had completed a Bachelor’s Degree in European Studies.

Lynn Sheehan

Head of Operations

Lynn Sheehan practised as a solicitor in her native Ireland until 2004 specialising in EU law, competition law and international trade. During this time she lectured at the Law School of the Law Society of Ireland (the professional training body for solicitors in Ireland) and was both an internal and external examiner in EU law.  Lynn has an MA in European Studies from the Universidad Autonoma de Barcelona and an LLM in European Law from the College of Europe in Bruges.  She was admitted to the Roll of Solicitors in Ireland in 1999.

Since commencing her overseas career Lynn has worked in the Balkans, Myanmar, Palestine, Niger and Ukraine.  In 2006 Lynn was appointed by the High Representative to Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) as an international member of the High Judicial and Prosecutorial Council of BiH which, inter alia, had the task of overseeing the reform of the justice sector in BiH post the war of 1992-1995.  From 2008-2012 she served as Head of the Legal Unit of the International Civilian Office/EUSR in Kosovo which was tasked with supervising the independence of Kosovo after its declaration of independence in February 2008.  Lynn commenced her work in Common Security and Defence Policy missions in 2012 and has served as Head of the Rule of Law Section of EUPOL COPPS in Palestine and Chief of Staff at EUCAP Sahel Niger.  She worked as Deputy Head of Operations at EUAM Ukraine from 2016-2020 and in October 2022 she returned to EUAM as Head of Operations. 

Jean-Michel Blaudez

Chief of Staff

Born in Germany, Jean-Michel Blaudez is a commissioned officer of the French National Gendarmerie. During his 32-year career, he constantly alternated between law enforcement and international experience. As a police officer he was successively leader of a riot control / SWAT unit, trainer, head of a police division, head of a police department and deputy director of a police academy. His international experience started with a deployment within the UN-IPTF mission in Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1997. From 2004 to 2008, he was head of unit for EU cooperation within the Gendarmerie and a member of the French delegation to the Law Enforcement Working Group of the EU Council. From 2011 to 2015, he had an assignment to the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the field of Security Sector Reform (SSR). During this period, amongst others, he implemented the European Union Police Services Training programme (EUPST) in African countries. From 2021 he was involved in EU external Border Management within the context of the migration crisis in the English Channel. In addition, he developed an European police training model for frontline agents under the Erasmus+ programme. From March 2022 he participated in the design of French forensic missions deployed to alleged war crimes investigations in Ukraine. He is graduated in law and criminal sciences and holds a Master in international relations.