[2] Hughes served as an Assistant Commissioner of the AFP, holding the position of Deputy Chief Police Officer of the Australian Capital Territory.
[citation needed] The AFP nominated Hughes for the role of Fiji Commissioner of Police following a request by the Fijian Constitutional Officers Committee.
Under the Fijian constitution, the office of Police Commissioner need not be held by a citizen, and in the wake of the Fiji coup of 2000, in which the elected government of Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry was deposed, it was thought that a non-citizen would be better able to present an image of fairness and impartiality in the prosecution of coup-related cases.
His areas of disagreement with the government included the controversial Reconciliation, Tolerance, and Unity Bill, which proposed to establish a Commission empowered to compensate victims and pardon perpetrators of the coup; Hughes expressed serious reservations about the amnesty provisions.
On 22 March, Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase told Radio Sargam, which is affiliated to the Fiji Village news service, that he hoped Hughes would stay on.
The next day, according to the Fiji Live news service, the military junta announced that it had dismissed Hughes from office, citing "dereliction of duty".
[5] On 9 August 2007, Ban Ki-moon, the Secretary General of the United Nations, announced Andrew Hughes' appointment as Police Advisor to the UN.