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Robert Stephen Ford

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President
  
Spouse(s)
  
Alison Barkley

Preceded by
  
Name
  
Robert Ford


President
  
Role
  
Preceded by
  
Richard W. Erdman

Succeeded by
  
Robert Stephen Ford httpsuploadwikimediaorgwikipediacommonsthu

Education
  
Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University

Amb. Robert Ford on Turkish Foreign Policy toward Syria


Robert Stephen Ford (born 1958) is a retired American diplomat who served as the United States Ambassador to Algeria from 2006 to 2008 and the United States Ambassador to Syria from 2010 to 2014.

Contents

Robert Stephen Ford Robert S Ford Middle East Institute

Personal life and education

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Ford is originally from Denver, Colorado, but is more recently a resident of Maryland.

Robert Stephen Ford Former US Ambassador to Syria Robert Ford I could no longer

In addition to English, Ford speaks German, Turkish, French, and Arabic.

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A senior advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq once described Ford as being "regarded as one of the best Arabists in the State Department".

Ford is married to Alison Barkley, who is a fellow diplomat.

Earlier career

A career member of the United States Foreign Service, he entered the service in 1985 and has been stationed in İzmir, Cairo, Algiers and Yaoundé.

Ford served as Deputy Chief of Mission in Bahrain from 2001 until 2004, and Political Counselor to the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad from 2004 until 2006.

Algeria

He was nominated for the position of U.S. Ambassador to Algeria by U.S. President George W. Bush on April 13, 2006. The nomination was sent to the U.S. Senate on April 24 and confirmed on May 27. Ford was sworn in on August 11. He served in the Algiers post until June 26, 2008.

Syria

In 2010, U. S. President Barack Obama nominated Ford as the first U.S. Ambassador to Syria in five years (pending U.S. Senate approval). In December 2010, after the U.S. Senate had failed to act on the nomination, Obama used a recess appointment to secure Ford the position. The Senate then confirmed Ford by unanimous consent on October 3, 2011. As a result, Ford no longer was serving under a recess appointment and therefore could have held the position until Obama's term ends in January 2017.

On October 24, 2011, Ford was recalled from Syria due to what the U.S. State Department described as "credible threats" to his safety. Ford had attracted the ire of pro-Assad Syrians due to his strong support of the Syrian uprising. According to American officials, Ford had been attacked by an armed pro-government mob, and Syrian state television had begun running reports blaming him for the formation of death squads similar to those in Iraq. This led to fears that supporters of the Syrian government might try to kill him.

In August 2013, it was reported by The New York Times that U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry had recommended that Ford serve as the next U.S. Ambassador to Egypt, following the incumbent ambassador, Anne W. Patterson, being nominated to serve as the Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs – the head of the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs within the U.S. Department of State, which oversees the Middle East.

On February 4, 2014, officials of the U.S. State Department said that Ford was retiring and on February 28 announced his departure.

The U.S. States Department announced the appointment of Daniel Rubinstein as U.S. special envoy for Syria on March 14.

In 2014 and 2015, Ford said he could "no longer defend" the Obama Administration's Syria policy, claiming that if the Administration armed the moderate rebels, the al-Qaida groups would have been "unable to compete". He later walked back these comments and shifted his criticism towards the rebel groups for cooperating with jihadists.

Actions in Syria

He visited Hama, where he was cheered by protesters.

He visited a mass grave at Jisr ash-Shugur. He met with Hassan Abdul-Azim, and was attacked with eggs and tomatoes by government supporters. During an interview with the Russian state-run television network Russia Today, former CIA intelligence officer Michael Scheuer alleged that prior to Ford's removal he was traveling across the country inciting groups to overthrow the government.

Honors

Ford is a recipient of several Department of State awards, including the 2005 James Clement Dunn Award for Excellence for outstanding work at the mid-level in the Foreign Service as well as three Superior Honor Awards and two Meritorious Honor Awards.

In 2012, Ford was awarded the Profile in Courage Award by the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation for his work as the U.S. ambassador in Syria amidst "repeated threats to his life" where he was doing what was characterized as "traveling around Syria to encourage and support peaceful protesters targeted by Assad's brutal crackdown".

References

Robert Stephen Ford Wikipedia