New US envoy expected to arrive on Nov 26

The US diplomat Karen Hideko Sasahara who has been appointed the new US Ambassador to Kuwait expected to arrive in Kuwait on November 26.

The US Senate last month approved Karen Sasahara’s nomination to be US Ambassador to Kuwait by unanimous consent. President Joe Biden had nominated Sasahara to the post last year, and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted in April to advance the nomination for approval.

Karen Sasahara has served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for North Africa since November 2020; prior to that she served as Chargé d’Affaires, a.i. at the U.S. Embassy in Amman from March 2019 to August 2020. She served as Consul General in Jerusalem from August 2018 to March 2019, reports Al-Qabas daily.

Before that, she was Senior Advisor/Division Chief in the Bureau for Intelligence and Research Office for the Analysis of Terrorism, Narcotics, and Crime. Prior to that, she served as an assessor on the Board of Examiners from 2015-2017, as Deputy Chief of Mission in Sana’a, Yemen from July 2013 to June 2015, and as Foreign Policy Advisor to the Commanding General of Special Operations Command Central at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida from 2012-2013.

Ms. Sasahara has spent the majority of her Foreign Service career in Middle Eastern posts or in assignments in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs.