Richard Norland, the United States Ambassador to the Republic of Uzbekistan, is a career Foreign Service Officer. Prior to his nomination, he served as Deputy Chief of Mission at the American Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan (2005-2007). He has also served as Deputy Chief of Mission at the American Embassy in Riga, Latvia (2003-2005), and as Political Officer in Mazar-e-Sharif, Afghanistan (October 2002-January 2003) where he worked with U.S. Army Civil Affairs teams to promote political and economic reconstruction in Afghanistan.
Ambassador Norland provided advice on the Northern Ireland peace process as Director for European Affairs at the National Security Council (1999-2001) and as Political Counselor at the American Embassy in Dublin, Ireland (1995-98). He served as a peacekeeping monitor in the Republic of Georgia with the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (1993) and visited Chechnya in a similar capacity in 1995.
Ambassador Norland has also served as Political Officer at the American Embassy in Moscow, USSR (1988-1990), as Chief of the U.S. Information Office in Tromso, Norway (1986-88) and as Senior Arctic Official coordinating the U.S. chairmanship of the Arctic Council (1998-99). His first tour was at the American Embassy in Manama, Bahrain (1981-82).
Ambassador Norland joined the Foreign Service in 1980. He graduated from Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service in 1977. He has a Masters of International Public Policy degree from the Johns Hopkins University, School of Advanced International Studies (1992) and a Masters of National Security Strategy degree from the National War College (2002). He speaks French, Russian, Norwegian and Latvian.
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