List of ambassadors of the United States to Guinea-Bissau
The United States ambassador to Guinea-Bissau is the official representative of the president of the United States to the head of state of Guinea-Bissau. The U.S. ambassador to Senegal is concurrently commissioned to Senegal and Guinea-Bissau.
| Ambassador of the United States to Guinea-Bissau | |
|---|---|
 Seal of the United States Department of State | |
 | |
| Nominator | The President of the United States |
| Appointer | The President with Senate advice and consent |
| Inaugural holder | Dean Curran as Chargé d'Affaires ad interim |
| Formation | June 30, 1976 |
| Website | U.S. Embassy - Dakar |
Until 1974, Guinea-Bissau had been a colony of the Portuguese Empire as Portuguese Guinea. After a period of revolutionary warfare, Guinea-Bissau unilaterally declared its independence on September 24, 1973. Following the April 1974 Carnation Revolution in Portugal, it granted independence to Guinea-Bissau on September 10, 1974. The United States recognized the Republic of Guinea-Bissau on the same day. The U.S. Embassy Bissau was established on June 30, 1976, with Dean Curran as Chargé d'Affaires ad interim.[1]
The first three ambassadors to Guinea-Bissau were concurrently commissioned to Cape Verde while resident in Bissau. From 1983 until 1998, U.S. ambassadors were solely commissioned to Guinea-Bissau.[2] In 1998 the U.S. embassy in Bissau was closed,[3] and there has been no U.S. embassy in Bissau since then. Since 2002, the U.S. ambassador to Senegal has also been commissioned as the ambassador to Guinea-Bissau, while resident in Dakar.
Ambassadors and chiefs of mission
edit| Name | Title | Appointed | Presented credentials | Terminated mission | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Melissa F. Wells[4] - Career FSO | Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary | September 16, 1976 | November 29, 1976 | March 29, 1977 | |
| Edward Marks[4] - Career FSO[5] | September 16, 1977 | October 31, 1977 | July 11, 1980 | ||
| Peter Jon de Vos[4] - Career FSO | August 27, 1980 | September 22, 1980 | March 30, 1983 | ||
| Wesley Egan - Career FSO | March 18, 1983 | May 12, 1983 | January 7, 1985 | ||
| Barbara C. Maslak | Chargé d'Affaires ad interim | January 1985 | Unknown | August 1986 | |
| John Dale Blacken - Career FSO | Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary | June 16, 1986 | August 27, 1986 | September 29, 1989 | |
| William Ludwig Jacobsen - Career FSO | October 10, 1989 | November 13, 1989 | August 25, 1992 | ||
| Roger A. McGuire - Career FSO | June 15, 1992 | October 14, 1992 | August 28, 1995 | ||
| Peggy Blackford - Career FSO | October 3, 1995 | November 4, 1995 | June 14, 1998 | ||
| Embassy suspended operations from 1998 to 2002. | |||||
| Richard Allan Roth[6] - Career FSO | Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary | November 15, 2002 | February 13, 2004 | Left Dakar, August 4, 2005 | |
| Janice L. Jacobs[6] - Career FSO | February 21, 2006 | May 9, 2006 | Left Dakar, July 15, 2007 | ||
| Marcia Bernicat[6] - Career FSO | June 16, 2008 | November 6, 2008 | July 15, 2011 | ||
| Robert T. Yamate | Chargé d'Affaires ad interim | July 15, 2011 | Unknown | August 2011 | |
| Lewis A. Lukens[6] – Career FSO | Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary | July 11, 2011 | October 19, 2011 | June 4, 2014 | |
| James P. Zumwalt – Career FSO | February 3, 2015 | March 10, 2015 | January 19, 2017 | ||
| Tulinabo S. Mushingi – Career FSO | May 19, 2017 | August 4, 2017 | February 1, 2022 | ||
| Michael A. Raynor – Career FSO | December 18, 2021 | April 20, 2022 | Incumbent | ||
Notes
edit- ^ "Guinea-Bissau". United States Department of State. Retrieved 2011-08-13.
- ^ "Chiefs of Mission for Guinea-Bissau". United States Department of State. Retrieved 2011-08-13.
- ^ "Peggy Blackford". United States Department of State. Retrieved 2011-08-13.
- ^ a b c Also accredited to Cape Verde; resident at Bissau.
- ^ "The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training Foreign Affairs Oral History Project AMBASSADOR EDWARD MARKS" (PDF). Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. 12 August 1996. Archived (PDF) from the original on 27 June 2024. Retrieved 26 July 2024.
- ^ a b c d Also accredited to Senegal; resident at Dakar.
