Nomination of Robert William Farrand To Be United States Ambassador to Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, and Vanuatu

The President today announced his intention to nominate Robert William Farrand, a career member of the Senior Foreign Service, Class of Minister-Counselor, to be Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to Papua New Guinea and to serve concurrently and without additional compensation as Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to Solomon Islands and to the Republic of Vanuatu. He would succeed Everett E. Bierman.

Since 1987 Mr. Farrand has served as Senior Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs at the Department of State in Washington, DC. Prior to this, he served as Deputy Director of the Office of Foreign Service Career Counseling and Assignments, 1985 - 1987; deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Prague, Czechoslovakia, 1983 - 1985; Deputy Director of the Office of Eastern European/Yugoslav Affairs at the Department of State, 1981 - 1983; student in the National War College, 1980 - 1981; officer in charge of bilateral affairs in the Office of the Soviet Union at the Department of State, 1978 - 1980; Director of the U.S. Commercial Office in Moscow, 1976 - 1978; chief of the economic/commercial section at the U.S. Embassy in Prague, Czechoslovakia, 1973 - 1976; economic officer for the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs at the Department of State, 1970 - 1973; chief of the consular section at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, 1968 - 1970; Russian language training, 1967 - 1968; and rotational officer at the U.S. Embassy in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 1965 - 1967.

Mr. Farrand graduated from Mount St. Mary's College (B.S., 1957) and Georgetown University (M.A., 1968). He was born April 7, 1934, in Watertown, NY. Mr. Farrand served in the U.S. Navy, 1957 - 1961. He is married, has five children, and resides in McLean, VA.