New #US ambassador appointed #libya

New US Ambassador to Libya Deborah K. Jones (Photo: US State Department)

Tripoli, 13 March 2103:
US President Barack Obama has appointed a new ambassador to Libya. She is Deborah K. Jones. She is the first US ambassador since Chris Stevens was killed in Benghazi, along with three other diplomatic staff, on 11 September 2012. Since then the US embassy has been under temporary Chargés d’Affaires, first Laurence Pope and since the beginning of the year William Roebuck.
Jones’ appointment has not officially been announced by the US, although a source at the Libya Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Monday that it had approved the appointment.
It is expected to be formally announced later today, when US Secretary of State John Kerry meets with Prime Minister Ali Zeidan who is visiting the US at present.
From New Mexico, Jones joined the U.S. Department of State in 1982. She speaks Arabic, having studied it the Foreign Service Institute in Roslyn, Virginia and at the State Department’s Field School in Tunisia. She also speaks French and Spanish.
She was US ambassador to Kuwait between 2008 and 2011. Earlier she served for two years as the State Departments’ Country Director of the Office of Arabian Peninsula and Iran Affairs. She then became Desk Officer for Jordan and worked in the State Department’s Operations Center and on its Board of Examiners until 2005. From August 2005 to 2007, she served as Principal Officer at the US Consulate-General in Istanbul. She has also worked in Abu Dhabi, where her husband Richard G. Olson was ambassador from 2008 to 2011, as well as in Addis Ababa, Baghdad, Damascus and Buenos Aires.
Her husband is currently US ambassador to Pakistan.
Asked about the her reported appointment, Chuck Dittrich, executive director of the US-Libya Business Association, said “if true, she would be a very good choice. She has been a successful US Ambassador to Kuwait, as well as Deputy Chief of Mission in the UAE and Consul-General in Dubai and Istanbul. She has the depth and breadth of experience needed to guide this important bilateral relationship through a critical period. As Acting Assistant Secretary of State for Near East Affairs, she has unique insight into the risks and great promise of the transition now occurring in Libya and her nomination would signal the Obama Administration’s commitment to maintaining a high level of engagement with Libya.”
libya herald.