Renato Raffaele Martino (born 23 November 1932) is an Italian prelate of the Roman Catholic Church. He has been a cardinal since 2003. He has been the longest serving cardinal deacon, the cardinal protodeacon, since June 2014. He served for more than twenty years in the diplomatic service of the Holy See, including sixteen years as Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations. He held positions in the Roman Curia from 2002 to 2009. Early life Born in Salerno, Martino was ordained as a priest in 1957. He holds a doctorate in Canon law and is fluent in Italian, English, French, Spanish, and Portuguese. To prepare for a diplomatic career he entered the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy in 1960. He entered the diplomatic service of the Holy See in 1962, serving in Nicaragua, the Philippines, Lebanon, Canada, and Brazil. Apostolic Nuncio On 14 September 1980, Martino was named Apostolic Pro-Nuncio to Thailand, Apostolic Delegate to Laos, Malaysia, and Singapore, and Titular Archbishop of Segerme. On 24 June 1981, his responsibilities were divided into the roles of Delegate to Singapore and Delegate to Laos and Malaysia. On 7 December 1983, they were reorganized further and he took on the titles Delegate to Laos and Delegate to Malaysia and Brunei. On 3 December 1986, he was appointed Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations. He was in that post during the United States invasion of Panama, when president Manuel Noriega had taken refuge at the Vatican embassy. In 1991, he opposed the American-led invasion of Iraq and was later critical of state sanctions against Iraq. In 1992, he participated at the UN Conference for the environment in Rio de Janeiro, speaking about the "centrality of the human person". In June 1994, Martino demanded at the UN that a "safe haven" be created for Tutsi refugees in Rwanda in order to save over 30 000 lives in Kabgayi. In September 1994, he was the official spokesman for the Holy See at the International Conference on Population and Development. Martino was Pope John Paul II's official representative at the 1994 International Conference on Population and Development, and he had the task of defending the Church's anti-abortion teachings before a European-American bloc that strongly supported access to abortion. Martino was able to find support from Latin-American and Arab countries that were anti-abortion, and the Cairo conference was ultimately inconclusive. Later