Obituary of Mr Michael Gaul (1959-2024), Board Member
- English
- French
It is with great sadness that the International Board of Auditors for NATO (IBAN) must announce that Mr Michael Gaul, Board Member from the Federal Republic of Germany, passed away on the 21st of December, 2024. Mr Gaul was appointed to IBAN as a Board Member by the North Atlantic Council as of 1st August 2021.
Mr Gaul was born in 1959 in Bad Kreuznach, Federal Republic of Germany. He graduated from the Faculty of Law of the University Johannes-Gutenberg of Mainz in 1985 and then worked as a lawyer for German and US law firms.
In 1989 he was appointed as a judge (Public Prosecutor) and worked for the Ministry of Justice of Mainz until 1991. He then became Deputy Head of the International Policy of Privatisation and Public Management Administration Section at the Federal Ministry of Finance in Bonn/Berlin from 1991 until 1998.
Mr Gaul began his long association with NATO in 1998 when he held the post of Deputy Head, Finance, Economic Affairs and Personnel at the Permanent Delegation of the Federal Republic of Germany to NATO. In 2004, he was appointed as the Chairman of the NATO Budget Committee.
His career at NATO continued when he joined the NATO International Staff in 2007 as the Head of the Defence and Security Economics Directorate at the Political Affairs and Security Policy Division until 2010.
Mr Gaul then transitioned back to national service and worked as a Senior Financial and Political Advisor at the Permanent Delegation of the Federal Republic of Germany to NATO. During this time, he also held the voluntary national contribution post of Senior Advisor, Science for Peace and Security Programme in the Emerging Security Challenges Division at NATO from 2011 until 2017. From 2017 until 2021 (when he joined IBAN), he was again the Head of Finance, Headquarters and Personnel at the Permanent Delegation of the Federal Republic of Germany to NATO.
While at IBAN, Mr Gaul was responsible for the annual audits of the NATO International Staff, Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic, and the BICES Group Executive.
Funeral services for Mr Gaul will be held in Gutenberg, the Federal Republic of Germany on the 7th of February, 2025. Mr Gaul is survived by his two adult children, Dominique and Felix.