Jan Kenneth Eliasson (born 17 September 1940) is a Swedish diplomat who was Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations from July 2012 to December 2016.

[1][2] A member of the Swedish Social Democratic Party, Eliasson served as Minister for Foreign Affairs from 24 April to 6 October 2006.

Eliasson was appointed as Governing Board Chair of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute in April 2017 and assumed his role as of 1 June 2017.

In 1991, Eliasson was chairman of the U.N. General Assembly's working group on emergency relief and Vice President of the U.N. Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) from 1991 to 1992.

[4] From 24 April 2006 to 6 October 2006 he also served as Swedish Minister of Foreign Affairs in the Social Democratic cabinet of Göran Persson.

[4] Eliasson condemned the 2006 Lebanon War: "The military offensive of Israel is an extremely dangerous escalation of the situation in the region".

Eliasson is an Eminent Member of the Sergio Vieira de Mello Foundation and he currently sits on the advisory board of the Alliance for Peacebuilding.

On 23 October 2017, the Tallberg Foundation announced that its Global Leadership Prize will henceforth be named after Jan Eliasson.

[7] On 13 May 2022, Eliasson published a memoir titled Ord och Handling : ett liv i diplomatins tjänst ("Words and Action : a life in service of diplomacy").