A retired career Foreign Service Officer, rank of Minister-Counselor, Ambassador Judith
Cefkin’s 35-year diplomatic career provided her a rich body of experience in building cross-
cultural cooperation and in leading diverse teams.

From 2015 to 2018, she served as the U.S. Ambassador to Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Tonga, and
Tuvalu. In that role, she traveled tens of thousands of miles throughout the Pacific Island region
to build cooperation on approaches to shared environmental challenges, including climate change
and the preservation of ocean resources.

Other leadership positions included service as Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassies in
Thailand and Bosnia-Herzegovina, as State’s Senior Advisor for Burma, and as Director of the
Office of Nordic-Baltic Affairs. Ambassador Cefkin also served in Mexico, France, and the
Philippines, and in multiple Washington assignments.

In her work, Ambassador Cefkin has relished the opportunity to promote the United States’
values-based diplomacy, including support for democracy, good-governance, rule-of-law, and
tolerance. A veteran crisis-manager, she has been active in shaping the U.S. response to
numerous emergencies ranging from natural disasters to political unrest, terrorist attacks,
hostage-takings, and threatened military conflict. She speaks French and Thai, and has a
working knowledge of Spanish and Bosnian.

Prior to her State Department career, Ambassador Cefkin worked in media, as a television news
producer in Houston, Texas and Denver, Colorado.

In retirement, Ambassador Cefkin serves as a Vice President and Member of the Board of
Directors of the Washington Institute of Foreign Affairs, as well as on the Steering Committee of
National Security Leaders for America, and on the Executive Committee of the Far East
Luncheon Group.

Ambassador Cefkin holds a B.A. in Government from Smith College and an M.Sc. in
International Relations from the London School of Economics and Political Science. She is
married to Paul L. Boyd, also a retired senior Foreign Service Officer.