Hillary Clinton calls historic meeting of ambassadors
By JENNIFER EPSTEIN & LAURA ROZEN | 1/31/11 6:23 AM EST Updated: 1/31/11 10:30 AM ESTSecretary of State Hillary Clinton has called top envoys from all U.S. embassies to gather in Washington on Monday for a wide-ranging foreign policy meeting.
Ambassadors from almost all 260 U.S. embassies, consulates and other posts in more than 180 countries are expected to convene at the State Department for what’s being billed as the first-ever meeting of its kind.
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Wow! Working weekend to history-making work week! Here are P.J. Crowley's comments from today's press briefing.
Philip J. Crowley
Assistant Secretary
Daily Press BriefingWashington, DC
January 31, 2011All this week, we are hosting the 2011 Global Chiefs of Mission Conference here at the Department. It’s an historic gathering which provides the opportunity for our ambassadors to review the outcomes of the Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review and discuss strategies for implementation of this and other key initiatives in the context of current and future budget realities. For those of you who have read the QDDR from cover to cover – I’m sure everybody in this room has done so – it really talks about a changing role and the changing demands of our ambassadors at post as they – as the world becomes more complicated, our operations across government become more integrated, our ambassadors in running our missions are running, in fact, a whole-of-government operation and will be working through this week the implications of that.
But at the same time, we want to hear from ambassadors – they’re, in essence, our field generals at posts around the world – on what they see in terms of the challenges that the Department faces going forward. And there will be breakout sessions where we at the Department, here at Main State, will be listening to the ambassadors as they help us understand the challenges of preventing conflict in weak and struggling states, reforming security and justice around the world, countering violent extremism, building private-public partnerships, supporting commercial and economic diplomacy, strengthening public diplomacy, enhancing regional engagement, strengthening planning and budgeting, advancing human rights and democracy, and promoting sustainable development.
During the course of the week, the Secretary will have some significant interaction with our ambassadors on Wednesday and Thursday of this week, but we have others within the interagency coming in. The ambassadors will hear from Chairman Mike Mullen later in the week, hear from National Security Advisor Tom Donilon. They’ll go through our anticipated budget for 2012 and also what we’re currently hearing from the Hill in terms of our budget for 2011, so a wide-ranging discussion with them.
