Deputy Chief of Mission Biography

Christine Elder

Christine Elder       
Deputy Chief of Mission
U.S. Embassy Maputo, Mozambique

Christine Elder has worked in the United States government for 22 years, and is a career member of the Senior Foreign Service.

After two years on the Department of Commerce team negotiating the North American Free Trade Agreement, she joined the Department of State in 1992.  First in the Civil Service, then in the Foreign Service, she has held policy and managerial positions in geographic and functional bureaus, as well as overseas.  She has worked in the State Department’s Bureaus of African, Near Eastern, as well as European and Eurasian Affairs.  She has also held positions in the Secretary of State’s Executive Secretariat, the Bureau of International Information Programs, and Bureau of Energy, Economic, and Business Affairs.
 
Before coming to Mozambique, she served as a Public Diplomacy Deputy Coordinator (Deputy Assistant Secretary-equivalent) for Regional Affairs in the State Department’s Bureau of International Information Programs.  As the U.S. Deputy Chief of Mission in Maputo, she manages an embassy of over 400 employees, including 107 American staff, representing six U.S. government agencies.  Ms. Elder’s other overseas assignments were to Bonn, Budapest, and Berlin.
 
A native of Chicago and Kentucky, she holds degrees from the University of Kentucky and The George Washington University.  She speaks German and Portuguese.