The Economist Asia editor James Astill has departed the organization for a job at the International Monetary Fund.

He was previously the paper’s Washington bureau chief and Lexington columnist.

Astill also worked as The Economist’s South Asia bureau chief, stationed in New Delhi 2007-2010. He has also worked as the publication’s defense editor, energy and environment editor and Afghanistan correspondent.

He has won several journalism awards including America’s Gerald R. Ford Prize for Reporting on National Defence, the Grantham Prize for Excellence in Environmental Reporting and a Ramnath Goenka Award for writing on India.