US diplomats leave Europe for Asia
By Lisbeth Kirk
Russia is set to lose the greatest amount of US diplomats as Washington shifts its diplomatic focus away from Europe to Asia to reflect an emerging new world order.
According to the Associated Press news agency, the US will cut ten posts in Russia while Germany will lose seven and countries such as Belgium, Poland, Italy and Spain will lose two or three each.
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In total, some 38 posts are to be axed in Europe.
By contrast China, India and Latin America are to see more US diplomatic representation.
Fifteen extra posts are being created for US diplomats in China and 12 in India. The two countries account for well over a third of the estimated 74 new US diplomatic positions being contemplated for around the world.
The director-general of the US foreign service, Robert Pearson, who retired this week after a 30-year diplomatic career, told AP that demographics were a major element in most of the personnel changes.
The combined populations of North America and Europe would constitute no more than ten percent of the world population by the middle of the century, he pointed out.
The move had already been announced in January in a speech by secretary of state Condoleezza Rice at Georgetown University.
"In the 21st century, emerging nations like India and China and Brazil and Egypt and Indonesia and South Africa are increasingly shaping the course of history," she said.
"Our current global posture does not really reflect that fact. For instance, we have nearly the same number of state department personnel in Germany, a country of 82 million people that we have in India, a country of 1 billion people."