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WASHINGTON – When Linda Thomas-Greenfield was detained at gunpoint on a diplomatic mission in Rwanda in 1994, she did her best to appear calm while explaining to a “glassy-eyed young man” that she was not the woman she was supposed to be. that he should kill. .
– I was scared, don’t get me wrong, but I didn’t panic – recalled at a TED conference Thomas-Greenfield, now one of the most experienced diplomats in the United States and chosen by President-elect Joe Biden to be the ambassador to The United Nations. .
The Tutsi woman who was the abductor’s target was among the hundreds of thousands killed during the genocide that year.
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Some 26 years after that heartbreaking episode, Thomas-Greenfield will soon prepare for his Senate confirmation hearing, drawing on his experience on four continents, including State Department assignments in Jamaica, Nigeria, Switzerland and Pakistan. as well as in Washington, where she was undersecretary of state for African affairs.
After four years of repeating the “USA First” slogan of President Donald Trump and Secretaries of State Rex Tillerson and Michael Pompeo, the appointment of Thomas-Greenfield is a clear sign of a return to traditional diplomacy and cooperation instead. of the confrontation in UNITED NATIONS. It is also a vote of confidence to career diplomats whose influence has waned.
– America is back. Multilateralism is back. Diplomacy is back, ”Thomas-Greenfield said Tuesday, when Biden introduced his foreign policy team.
In a show of how this reflects a change in attitude, Pompeo responded on Fox News hours later that “multilateralism, in this case, is going out with your friends for a good cocktail. This is not in the interest of the United States of America.” .
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Gumbo diplomacy
Raised in Louisiana, Thomas-Greenfield was the oldest of eight siblings and was taken by bus to a school where whites and blacks were segregated as children. His father dropped out of school in third grade and his mother attended eighth grade. She attended Louisiana State University, where she faced harassment and discrimination from students and teachers, according to a person close to her.
Thomas-Greenfield, 67, who will be one of the highest-ranking black officials in the Biden administration, said Tuesday that he is exploring his Louisiana roots to conduct “gumbo diplomacy.”
“Wherever I was assigned around the world, I invited people of different backgrounds and beliefs to help me make a roux sauce (with fat and flour) and chop onions for the Holy Trinity, and make a homemade gumbo,” he said. .
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Gumbo is the most striking dish in Cajun cuisine in Louisiana (southern United States). It is a thick stew or soup, usually with various types of meat or seafood, eaten with white rice. Holy Trinity Cajun cuisine is a base made of onions, peppers, and celery.
“It was my way of breaking down barriers, connecting with people,” he said.
Biden plans to give her envoy to the UN the full ministerial status that current Ambassador Kelly Craft lacks, but working at the world body will not be easy. Under Trump, the United States clashed with other members of the organization on issues ranging from reimposing sanctions on Iran to withdrawing from the World Health Organization (WHO), a move Biden vowed to reverse.
Last week, he wrote on Twitter that “the challenges we face – a global pandemic, a global economic crisis, a global climate crisis, mass migration and extreme poverty, social justice – are relentless and interconnected. But they are not insoluble if the United States lead. “
“His appointment will be seen at the UN as a sign that Washington will meet with the world and that the Biden government will have no individuals who oppose the organization,” said Charles Kupchan, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.
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Thomas-Greenfield’s experience and contacts in Africa will come in handy at a time when African countries were exasperated with the United States, which recently delayed the appointment of African diplomats to head the UN mission in Libya in favor of a Bulgarian citizen. .
Like his recent predecessors, he will have to deal with China’s rise to the UN. The Asian country gained influence by having its citizens elected to head the main agencies.
“China has been much more willing to play the game than the United States,” said Daniel Drezner, professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Tufts University. – Anything that questions this and suggests that the United States is paying attention to Africa, where China has been a great benefactor, will benefit American diplomacy at the UN.
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Return from career diplomacy
African diplomats and leaders view Thomas-Greenfield as an envoy who has always been determined to get into the field as much as possible.
“She got to know Liberia, not just the capital, but also rural Liberia,” former Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf said by phone. – As Undersecretary for African Affairs, she was able to mobilize US support for Liberia during the 2014 Ebola outbreak.
The Thomas-Greenfield nomination will also send a message to career U.S. foreign service diplomats, who were largely removed from high-level positions during the Trump administration.
Pompeo tried to rehire Thomas-Greenfield when he took over as Trump’s top diplomat in April 2018, but she refused, according to a person familiar with her thinking at the time, who asked not to be identified.
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In a November article for Foreign Affairs magazine, which he co-wrote with William Burns, Thomas-Greenfield, who served for a time as director general of the foreign service, lamented the “damage” to the State Department and asked for an investment promise. . people from the department.
“His appointment sends an important message to the external service that one of his own, and a person of color, can become a member of the government,” said Wendy Sherman, former Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs to President Barack Obama, who served as closely with Thomas-Greenfield, including in his recent role at Albright Stonebridge Group LLC, a consulting group founded by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.
Thomas-Greenfield is “very capable of giving a press conference and spreading a public narrative, but he doesn’t want to be the brightest place in the room,” Sherman said.
