WASHINGTON: The United States Senate on Thursday confirmed the appointment of Donald Armin Blome as the next US Ambassador to Pakistan. Following the confirmation of Blome, the US state department stated, “Partnership with Pakistan is key to progress on regional security, trade and investment, the climate crisis, and human rights”.
As a seasoned diplomat and a career foreign service official, Blome is currently the US Ambassador to Tunisia and has served missions in Baghdad, Kuwait, Kabul, Jerusalem, and Cairo.
Blome has also served as the co-director of the Multi-National Force Strategic Engagement Cell in Baghdad in 2007.
Pakistan’s Ambassador to the United States, Asad Majeed Khan, congratulated Ambassador Blome on his confirmation, saying, “We look forward to working closely with him in further strengthening Pak-US partnership”.
Blome’s appointment comes some four years after Ambassador David Hale completed his three-year term in Islamabad and left for Washington to take over as undersecretary of state for political affairs. In 2021, Hale joined the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, a Washington-based think-tank, as a Distinguished Diplomatic Fellow on detail from the State Department.
In October 2021, the United States announced that Pakistan would have a full-time ambassador as President Joe Biden named Donald Armin Blome, as the country’s new envoy to Islamabad.
The appointment of Blome to Pakistan suggests a positive development in the context of Pakistan-US ties that has often been marred by mistrust. –Agencies
