U.S. Ambassador to the Kyrgyz Republic Donald Lu was sworn in on September 18, 2018. Prior to this assignment, Ambassador Lu was the U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Albania. His overseas postings include Deputy Chief of Mission in India, Azerbaijan and Kyrgyzstan. He also served for a year as Chargé d’Affaires at the U.S. Embassy in Azerbaijan. Ambassador Lu worked on the Ebola crisis in West Africa as Deputy Coordinator for Ebola Response in the State Department. Mr. Lu is from Huntington Beach, California. He graduated from Princeton University with both master’s and bachelor’s degrees in international relations. He is married to Dr. Ariel Ahart, and together they have two children, Kip, age 16, and Aliya, age 13. He speaks Albanian, Russian, Georgian, Azerbaijani, Urdu, Hindi, and West African Krio. He enjoys biking, watching movies, traveling, and spending time with his family. Recorded: December 7, 2020

Mid-level Foreign Service Officers Lia Miller and Christina Tilghman, both of whom served as President of the Pickering and Rangel Fellows Association, share how they leveraged their leadership in the Employee Affinity Group to promote diversity and inclusion at the State Department, and advice for successful careers in foreign policy. Read Lia and Christina's recent article with Ana Escrogima in the Foreign Service Journal, "Diversity at State: A Dream Deferred and a Collective Responsibility": https://www.afsa.org/diversity-state-dream-deferred-and-collective-responsibility Recorded: November 20, 2020

Herro Mustafa, a career member of the Senior Foreign Service, was confirmed by the U.S. Senate as Ambassador to the Republic of Bulgaria on September 26, 2019. Previously, she was the Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Lisbon, Portugal, where she also served as Chargé d’Affaires for the first seven months of the Trump Administration. A career member of the Foreign Service, Ambassador Mustafa worked in the Office of the Vice President from 2009-2011, providing counsel on issues related to the Middle East and South and Central Asia. Earlier Washington assignments included Deputy Director of the Afghanistan Office; Advisor on the Middle East in the Office of the Under Secretary for Political Affairs; Director for Iran, Israeli-Palestinian Affairs, and Jordan at the National Security Council (NSC); and NSC Director for Iraq and Afghanistan. Her overseas diplomatic postings were as the Political Minister Counselor at Embassy New Delhi, India; the lead U.S. Civilian Coordinator in Mosul, Iraq; a Consular Officer in Beirut, Lebanon; and a Political Officer in Athens, Greece. Prior to joining the State Department, Ambassador Mustafa was an International Elections Supervisor with the OSCE in Bosnia. She is the recipient of notable awards from the State Department, including the Matilda W. Sinclaire Award for superior achievement in a foreign language. She speaks Portuguese, Arabic, Hindi, Russian, Greek, among other languages, and is studying Bulgarian. Ambassador Mustafa grew up in Minot, North Dakota and her family story is the subject of the documentary film American Herro. She has an undergraduate degree from Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service and a master’s from Princeton University. She is married and has two children. Recorded: November 2, 2020

Dereck J. Hogan is a career member of the U.S. Senior Foreign Service. Prior to being sworn in as Ambassador to U.S. Embassy Moldova, he served as the Deputy Executive Secretary of the U.S. Department of State. Mr. Hogan previously served as the Deputy Chief of Mission and Chargé d’affaires in U.S. Embassy Baku, Azerbaijan. Mr. Hogan’s other senior positions in the U.S. State Department include Director of the Central European Affairs and Nordic and Baltic Affairs Offices and Senior Advisor to the President’s Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan. He previously served as the U.S. Department of State Representative on two civilian-military Provincial Reconstruction Teams in southern and eastern Afghanistan. His other overseas assignments include Russia, Belarus, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic. In Washington, Mr. Hogan served as Special Assistant to Secretary of State Colin Powell and a Watch Officer in the State Department’s Operations Center. Mr. Hogan has a Bachelor’s Degree from the University of Pittsburgh and a Master’s Degree in Public Affairs from the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs. He speaks Russian, Spanish, and Romanian. Recorded: October 8, 2020

Julieta Valls Noyes, a career member of the Senior Foreign Service, currently serves as the Deputy Director of the Foreign Service Institute of the U.S. Department of State. Prior to this assignment, she was U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Croatia, a NATO Ally and member of the European Union. From 2013-2015, Ambassador Noyes held the position of Deputy Assistant Secretary, Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, where she was responsible for managing relations with twelve countries in Western Europe and the European Union. As Deputy Executive Secretary for the Department of State from 2011-2013, Ambassador Noyes managed trips and oversaw the preparation of briefing materials for two Secretaries of State. She organized close to twenty trips, traveling over 200,000 miles, and visiting every continent. Ambassador Noyes was Chargé d’Affaires, a.i., and Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy to the Holy See from 2008-2011. Ambassador Noyes has also served as Deputy Director of the Operations Center, the 24-hour crisis management and communications center of the State Department; Director of the Office of Multilateral and Global Affairs in the bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor; and in domestic and overseas positions in the Bureaus of European and Western Hemisphere Affairs. As Political Chief at the U.S. Embassy in Panama from 1999-2002, she negotiated a status of forces agreement, an achievement for which she earned a Distinguished Service Award. Ambassador Noyes speaks Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, and some French and Croatian. A graduate of Wellesley College, she has a Master’s Degree from the Eisenhower College of the National Defense University. She is the recipient of numerous Superior and Meritorious Honor Awards. She is married to Nicholas Noyes, Jr., a retired Foreign Service Officer, and they have three children.

Lawrence Randolph joined the U.S. Department of State as a career Foreign Service Officer in 2003. He is slated to be the next Consul General at the U.S. Consulate General in Casablanca, Morocco. He is currently a Senior Advisor in the Bureau for Global Talent Management (GTM). Prior to this assignment, he was the Deputy Chief of Mission and Chargé d’Affaires, a.i. at the U.S. Embassy in Algiers, Algeria from 2016-2019. As the Deputy Chief of Mission, Lawrence managed a team of almost 500 and oversaw the transition of the Embassy from an unaccompanied to fully accompanied mission. Lawrence has also served as Public Affairs Officer in U.S. Consulate General Frankfurt, Germany where he coordinated all Public Affairs programming in Southwest Germany. His additional prior overseas postings include Kabul, Dhahran, and Cairo. Lawrence speaks Spanish, French, Arabic, and German. He holds a Bachelors degree from Morehouse College and a Masters Degree from Columbia University.

Ambassador (ret.) Lino Gutiérrez is CEO of Gutiérrez Global LLC, a consulting firm specializing in strategic advice for corporations interested in investing in Latin America and Europe. He serves as an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University and George Washington University. In December 2010, Gutiérrez was named Executive Director of the Una Chapman Cox Foundation, which is dedicated to a strong and professional Foreign Service. In 2007, Gutiérrez Global LLC signed a one-year contract with the Department of Commerce. Ambassador Gutiérrez served as Senior Advisor to Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutiérrez on Cuba transition and Latin America from 2007-09. In 2010, Gutiérrez Global LLC won a State Department contract to direct and teach a course on the Southern Cone countries at the Foreign Service Institute. After a 29-year career in which he served six U.S. Presidents and 13 Secretaries of State, Lino Gutiérrez retired from the Department of State in November 2006. His last posting was as Ambassador to Argentina from 2003-2006. During his tenure, the United States and Argentina signed agreements on counter-terrorism and counter-narcotics cooperation, and container security. In 2005, Ambassador Gutiérrez welcomed President Bush to Argentina as he attended the Summit of the Americas. Gutiérrez also served as Acting Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere affairs and Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary from 1999-2002. He led the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs on September 11, 2001, and beyond. He accompanied Secretary of State Colin Powell to Lima, Peru for the signing of the Inter-American Democratic Charter, and returned with the Secretary’s party to the United States on September 11, 2001. In 1996, President Clinton nominated Lino Gutiérrez to serve as Ambassador to Nicaragua. After being confirmed by the Senate, he served until 1999. While in Nicaragua, Ambassador Gutiérrez coordinated the relief effort after Hurricane Mitch. Other overseas postings included tours in the Dominican Republic, Portugal, Haiti, France, and the Bahamas. Gutiérrez serves on the Board of Visitors of the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security in Fort Benning, Ga. He is a member of the American Academy of Diplomacy, the SOUTHCOM Advisory Board, and serves on the Pickering Fellows interviewing panel for the Department of State. From 2002-2003, Gutiérrez occupied the George Kennan chair as International Affairs Advisor at the National War College. Lino Gutiérrez has been the recipient of the State Department’s Distinguished Honor Award, Superior Honor Award (twice) and Meritorious Honor Award (three times). He has also earned the U.S. Army’s Civilian Award. A native of Havana, Cuba, Gutiérrez has a master’s and bachelor’s from the University of Alabama, and also attended the University of Miami. After graduating from college, he taught social studies for the Dade County (Fla.) school system and the Urban League. He is married to the former Miriam Messina from Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic. The couple has three daughters and five grandchildren.

Greg is serving as a political officer in the Office for Israel and Palestinian Affairs. Previously, he served as the public diplomacy officer for India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Maldives. In that role, Greg developed a $1.15 million U.S.-India university research partnership initiative and also established exchange programs for leaders from the government, civil society, and media in the South Asia region. Prior to that, he has served in Kolkata and New Delhi, India and in the Office for Cuban Affairs. He is president of the Hispanic Employee Council for Foreign Affairs Agencies and a 2008 Rangel International Affairs Fellow. He also helped establish the Diversity and Inclusion Working Group for the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs. Originally from San Antonio, Greg holds a BA in international relations and political science from St. Mary's University and masters from the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin. He speaks Spanish, Hindi, and Bengali. He was recently named a Latino Next Generation National Security & Foreign Policy Leader by New America & Diversity in National Security Network and returns to San Antonio regularly to encourage first-generation college students to consider careers in public service. David currently serves as the Honduras Desk Officer in the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs (WHA) Office of Central American Affairs (WHA/CEN). In this capacity, he is the lead officer overseeing the planning and execution of U.S. foreign policy toward Honduras. David began his career supporting democracy and human rights programs in Latin America and the Caribbean, first as an implementer with a D.C-based non-profit organization and then with the Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor (DRL). While working in DRL’s Office of Global Programming, David managed programs supporting civil society and human rights in Cuba. Upon being awarded the Presidential Management Fellowship (PMF), David began work as a Staff Assistant in the WHA Front Office. As part of the PMF, David served as a Program Officer in the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) on the Mexico desk. In this capacity, he coordinated INL’s foreign assistance programs in Mexico, specifically working to expand INL’s police professionalization and counternarcotics efforts throughout the country. He also served in the INL section at Embassy Tegucigalpa in the spring of 2018 where he coordinated programs aimed at preventing and reducing crime in Honduras, and improving Honduran National Police effectiveness in investigating major crimes. David graduated from Brown University with a bachelor’s degree in International Relations and received a Master’s of Science in Foreign Service from Georgetown University.

Julie Chung assumed the position of Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs in November 2018. She was previously the Director for Japan in the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs and served as Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary from February-September 2018. A career member of the Senior Foreign Service, class of Minister-Counselor, she held positions as the Deputy Chief of Mission in Cambodia and Economic Counselor in Thailand. Ms. Chung served as the Deputy Political Counselor in Bogota, where she managed the U.S. government’s largest extradition program, including paramilitary and narco-trafficking cases. As the United States representative to the G24 in Bogota, Ms. Chung led initiatives focused on demining, labor, and human rights. In Baghdad, she served as Chief of Staff coordinating civilian-military foreign assistance with thirteen agencies and sections, and managed the interagency Emergency Assistance Coordination Team in response to suicide bombings. While working in the Office of Korean Affairs in Washington, she frequently traveled to the DPRK to implement the U.S.-North Korea Agreed Framework. She also served in Guangzhou, Tokyo, and Hanoi as a public diplomacy officer and APEC coordinator. Ms. Chung is from Huntington Beach, California and joined the Foreign Service in 1996 as the first cohort of the Thomas R. Pickering Fellowship program. She received a B.A. in Political Science from the University of California San Diego and an M.A. in International Affairs from Columbia University. Her foreign languages include Korean, Japanese, Spanish, and Khmer. Ms. Chung is currently a senior advisor for The Pickering and Rangel Fellows Association (PRFA) and the Asian American Foreign Affairs Association (AAFAA).

Prof. Bibbins Sedaca serves as the Chair for the Global Politics and Security Concentration in Georgetown University’s Master of Science in Foreign Service (MSFS) program and is a Professor in the Practice of International Affairs in MSFS. Ms. Bibbins Sedaca has held numerous positions in the public and non-governmental sectors in the United States and Ecuador. She served for ten years in the United States Department of State, working on democracy promotion, human rights, human trafficking, religious freedom, refugees, and counterterrorism. During this time, her positions included: the Senior Advisor to the Under Secretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs, the Senior Director for Strategic Planning and External Affairs in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, and the Special Assistant to the Ambassador-At-Large for Counterterrorism. Following her governmental service, she opened and directed the International Republican Institute’s local governance program in Ecuador. She also taught at the Universidad de San Francisco de Quito (Ecuador) on democratization and conflict resolution. She also co-led the USFQ Model United Nations team that won several awards in April 2009. Prior to returning to Georgetown full-time, she served as the Director of the Washington Office of Independent Diplomat, a diplomatic advisory group. Ms. Bibbins Sedaca holds a Master’s degree from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and a Bachelor’s degree in International Relations from The College of William and Mary, where she was a Presidential and Monroe Scholar. She studied at Humboldt Universitaet in Berlin, Germany, while on a Rotary International Scholarship. In 2015, she was awarded Georgetown’s 1820 Graduate Award for outstanding leadership and service by graduate alumni to the Georgetown alumni community. She has earned three Superior Honor Awards and a Meritorious Honor Award from the U.S. Department of State. While at Georgetown, she received the Dean’s Citation and Dean’s Award for Academic Excellence, and also was a Georgetown University Scholarship Recipient, Dorothy Danforth Scholarship Recipient and Edward Weintal Distinguished Scholar. She serves at the Chairperson of the Board of the International Justice Mission, a non-governmental organization fighting human trafficking and violence against the poor. She has served as the Chair of the Board of the Institute for Global Engagement, a non-governmental organization promoting religious freedom overseas, and also served on the Board of Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service, the William and Mary Fund and the William and Mary Washington Office.

Hammad serves as a Special Assistant to the Deputy Secretary of State. Prior to his current assignment, Hammad served as a political officer at the U.S. Embassy Mexico City from 2016 to 2019; as an economic and commercial officer at the U.S. Mission to Libya, based in Tunis; as a Political officer and Vice Consul in Caracas, Venezuela; and as the Kuwait desk officer in Washington, DC. Prior to joining the Foreign Service, Hammad served as a Fulbright Scholar in the Netherlands and co-founded an NGO called Inspire Dreams which worked in refugee camps in the West Bank. A native of California, Hammad has a Master’s Degree in Law and Diplomacy from the Fletcher School at Tufts University and a bachelor’s degree in International Politics from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University.

Stephanie Syptak-Ramnath is a Deputy Executive Secretary in the Office of the Secretary of State. She most recently served as Chargé d’Affaires, a.i. at U.S. Embassy Singapore from January 2017 to July 2019, overseeing 19 U.S. government sections and agencies in the advancement of bilateral security, economic, and people-to-people cooperation. During that time, she also led Embassy efforts in support of the historic June 2018 Singapore Summit between President Trump and Chairman Kim. Prior to Singapore, Stephanie was Minister Counselor for Public Diplomacy at U.S. Embassy Mexico, coordinating U.S. government public outreach for 29 agencies at the Embassy and its 9 Consulates. She previously served as Deputy Chief of Mission in Bamako, Mali where she led a team in shaping and implementing the U.S. response to simultaneous political, security, and humanitarian crises. A specialist in the field of Public Diplomacy, her other assignments include the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs, Tunis, the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, and Monterrey, Mexico. In November 2015, Stephanie was awarded the Department of State’s Edward R. Murrow Award for Excellence in Public Diplomacy. Prior to joining the Foreign Service, Stephanie was an officer in the U.S. Navy. She was a member of the International Women’s Forum Leadership Foundation 2011-2012 Fellows Class, for which she completed executive programs at Harvard Business School and INSEAD. She is a graduate of Georgetown University’s School of the Foreign Service and is married with two teenage daughters.

Ambassador (ret.) James Irwin Gadsden, is a former Senior Career Foreign Service Officer and former Senior Counselor for International Affairs at the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation in Princeton, New Jersey. Before joining the Foundation, he was a Diplomat-in-Residence and Lecturer at Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs where he continues to direct the Junior Summer Institute for non-Princeton undergraduates who aspire to complete graduate work and careers in international affairs. In 2007, he was Senior Advisor for European Affairs at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations. His assignments prior to that included Deputy to the Commandant and International Affairs Advisor at the National War College (NWC), Senior Advisor for European Affairs at the US Mission to the UN, and Deputy Commandant and International Affairs Advisor at the NWC. He joined the NWC faculty in 2005, after completing three years as US Ambassador to Iceland. Previously, he was Deputy Chief of Mission at the US Embassy in Budapest, Counselor for Economic Affairs at the US Embassy in Paris, economic/political officer at the US Mission to the European Communities in Brussels, and European Communities desk officer at the State Department. Ambassador Gadsden was a member of the ISD Board of Advisers from 2015-2019. He earned a BA degree in economics from Harvard University and an MA degree in East Asian Studies from Stanford University.

Bernadette Meehan is the Chief International Officer at The Obama Foundation, following a 13-year career in the US Foreign Service. From January 2016 to January 2017 she served as a Senior Advisor at the National Security Council (NSC), conducting negotiations with the Cuban government; prior to that assignment, she served as Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs and NSC Spokesperson. Bernadette also served as Special Assistant to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Her overseas diplomatic assignments include Dubai, Baghdad, and Bogota. In 2007 Bernadette was selected as a Powell Fellow, recognized as one of the 12 most promising future leaders in the Department of State. Prior to her work in government, Bernadette was a Vice President of Private Banking at J.P. Morgan and Vice President of Asset Management at Lehman Brothers. Bernadette was an adjunct professor and Rusk State Department Fellow at Georgetown University’s Institute for the Study of Diplomacy in the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service from 2015 to 2016. She graduated from Boston College with a degree in political science. A native of New York, Bernadette speaks Spanish and conversational Arabic.

Ambassador Thomas-Greenfield retired in 2017 after a 35-year career with the U.S. Foreign Service. She is currently the inaugural Distinguished Resident Fellow in African Studies at the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown University. From 2013 to 2017 she served as the Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of African Affairs, where she led the bureau focused on the development and management of U.S. policy toward sub-Saharan Africa. Prior to this appointment, she served as Director General of the Foreign Service and Director of Human Resources (2012-2013), leading a team in charge of the State Department’s 70,000-strong workforce. Ambassador Thomas-Greenfield’s distinguished Foreign Service career includes an ambassadorship to Liberia (2008-2012), and postings in Switzerland (at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations), Pakistan, Kenya, The Gambia, Nigeria, and Jamaica. In Washington, she served as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Bureau of African Affairs (2006-2008), and as Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration (2004-2006). She earned a bachelor’s degree from Louisiana State University and a master’s degree from the University of Wisconsin, where she worked towards a PhD.

RAJ WADHWANI Raj WadhwaniRaj Wadhwani currently serves as Deputy Director in the Near Eastern Affairs Bureau of the US Department of State. A former Rusk Fellow at Georgetown's Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, he previously served as Political and Economic Section Chief at the US Consulate General in Mumbai. His other Foreign Service assignments include Baghdad, as Deputy Spokesman/Information Officer; in Washington as Desk Officer for Economic Affairs in the Office of Iranian Affairs; as Political Officer and Vice Consul in Amman; as Vice Consul in the US Embassy in Riyadh; and as Provincial Action Officer on the Provincial Reconstruction Team in Baghdad. ANA ESCROGIMA Ana EscrogimaAna Escrogima is a 16-year veteran Foreign Service Officer, serving currently as the Office Director for Regional and Multilateral Affairs in the Near Eastern Affairs Bureau of the U.S. Department of State. She was previously the Deputy Chief of Mission at the Yemen Affairs Unit in Saudi Arabia, which was established in 2015 after the closure the U.S. Embassy in Sana’a. A former Rusk Fellow at Georgetown's Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Ana has extensive experience abroad and in Washington, DC, in primarily political and public affairs positions, having served previously in Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Syria, and the United Arab Emirates. She graduated from Brown University with a B.A. in International Relations and Affairs and French; and holds an Master of International Affairs from Columbia University.

Uzra Zeya is CEO of Alliance for Peacebuilding, the leading network for non-governmental organizations working to end conflict and build sustainable peace around the world. A 2018-2019 Non-resident Fellow at the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Ms. Zeya has over two decades of diplomatic experience in Near East, South Asian, European, human rights, and multilateral affairs. As Chargé d’Affaires and Deputy Chief of Mission at US Embassy Paris from 2014 to 2017, she oversaw the day-to-day operations of Embassy Paris, six constituent posts, and 50 offices and agencies working to take U.S.-French cooperation to unprecedented levels. Ms. Zeya served previously as Acting Assistant Secretary and Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor. Since joining the Foreign Service in 1990, Ms. Zeya served in New Delhi, Muscat, Damascus, Cairo, and Kingston. As Chief of Staff to the Deputy Secretary of State, she helped shape the U.S. response to the Arab Spring and deepened US engagement with emerging powers. She also served as Deputy Executive Secretary to the Secretary of State, as Director of the Executive Secretariat Staff, and as UN General Assembly Coordinator.

Ramon is a career Foreign Service Officer who has served in a diverse range of tours in the Middle East, Europe, and Latin America. Currently assigned to the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City, he serves as energy officer, tasked with supporting U.S. investors and companies in the Mexican energy sector. He was an ISD Rusk Fellow at Georgetown in 2015-2016. Prior assignments include the Colombia Desk at the State Department, where he assisted Special Envoy Bernard Aronson in the U.S. effort to end Latin America’s longest-running conflict. From 2012-2013, Ramon worked in the Executive Secretariat, coordinating information flows and travel for Secretary Clinton and then Secretary Kerry. Other assignments include as energy officer in the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad; as staff aide to Ambassador Louis Susman in the U.S. Embassy in London; and as political and economic officer in Saudi Arabia. Ramon holds a B.A. in business marketing from the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee and a dual M.A. in International Affairs from Columbia University in New York and Sciences Politiques in Paris. Ramon speaks fluent Spanish and French, and intermediate Arabic. Prior to entering public service, he worked in marketing research.