U.S. Senate approves ambassadors to Armenia and Turkey
U.S. ambassador to Armenia nominee John Heffern was approved unanimously by the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee by voice vote on Tuesday evening.
A native of St. Louis, Missouri, and a graduate of Michigan State University, John Heffern is a member of the Senior Foreign Service. He has focused most of his career on East Asia, with postings in Malaysia, Japan and China, and Indonesia. He is currently serving as Deputy Permanent Representative at the U.S. Mission to NATO in Brussels.
John Heffern joined the Foreign Service in 1982. His early postings included China, Taiwan and Cote d'Ivoire. Subsequently, he was assigned to Kuala Lumpur, and then took postings in Washington, D.C., related to Southeast Asia. From 1994 to 1996, he worked on the House International Relations Committee as a Pearson Fellow for Congressman Bereuter. From there, he served as Deputy Political Counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo and as Political Counselor at the U.S. Mission to NATO. After postings in the Human Resources Bureau in Washington, as Executive Assistant to Under Secretary for Political Affairs, and as Deputy Chief of Mission at U.S. Embassy Jakarta, he reported in 2009 to the U.S. Mission to NATO as the Deputy Permanent Representative.
Ambassador Francis Ricciardone also received the U.S. Senate's approval to serve as the United States top envoy to Ankara.
Voting against the Ricciardone nomination were Senators Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and Jim Risch (R-ID).
