User:Losipov/Michael S. Owen

Michael S. Owen is an American diplomat who served as the United States Ambassador to Sierra Leone from 2014 to 2017.

Early life and education
Owen graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University with a Bachelor of Arts.

Career
Previously, Ambassador Owen served as the Director of the Office of Regional and Security Affairs in the State Department’s Bureau of African Affairs from 2010 to 2013. His work in the field in Africa includes assignments to U.S. Embassies in Uganda as Deputy Chief of Mission, in Kenya as Economic Counselor, and early in his career, in Swaziland as Political-Economic Officer. Additionally, Mr. Hoover has served in Shanghai, China; Taipei, Taiwan; and Paris, France.

Ambassador Hoover is the winner of two global State Department awards: The Herbert Salzman Award for Excellence in International Economic Performance in 2008 for his reporting and commercial advocacy in support of African efforts to enhance connectivity to the worldwide web, and the Director General’s Award for Reporting (co-winner, 1998) for his reporting and analysis of trade issues in Taiwan that contributed to the island’s successful accession to the World Trade Organization.

Ambassador to Sierra Leone
On July 9, 2013, President Barack Obama nominated Hoover to be the next United States Ambassador to Sierra Leone. Hearings were held on his nomination before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on September 24, 2013. On October 31, 2013, the committee favorably reported his nomination to the Senate floor.