Alexander A. Arvizu is a United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 diplomat. He currently serves as the United States Ambassador to Albania

United States Ambassador to Albania

This is a list of Ambassadors of the United States to Albania.Albania had been under the domination of the Ottoman Empire since the 14th century but gained a shaky independence in 1912 after an uprising against the Turks...

.

Early life

Arvizu was born on U.S. Army base

Kadena Air Base

, is a United States Air Force base in the towns of Kadena and Chatan and the city of Okinawa, in Okinawa Prefecture, Japan. Kadena Air Base is the hub of U.S. airpower in the Pacific, and home to the USAF's 18th Wing and a variety of associate units.-Units:The 18th Wing is the host unit at Kadena...

 in Japan

Japan

Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

 and is a first-generation American. His father is originally from Dolores Hidalgo

Dolores Hidalgo

Dolores Hidalgo Dolores Hidalgo Dolores Hidalgo (in full, Dolores Hidalgo Cuna de la Independencia Nacional is the name of a city and the surrounding municipality in the north-central part of the Mexican state of Guanajuato....

, Mexico

Mexico

The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...

 and mother was from Kyoto

Kyoto

is a city in the central part of the island of Honshū, Japan. It has a population close to 1.5 million. Formerly the imperial capital of Japan, it is now the capital of Kyoto Prefecture, as well as a major part of the Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto metropolitan area.-History:...

, Japan. Arvizu grew up in Colorado Springs, Colorado

Colorado Springs, Colorado

Colorado Springs is a Home Rule Municipality that is the county seat and most populous city of El Paso County, Colorado, United States. Colorado Springs is located in South-Central Colorado, in the southern portion of the state. It is situated on Fountain Creek and is located south of the Colorado...

, where his family settled after return to the United States. In 1980, He graduated with a Bachelor's degree from Georgetown University

Georgetown University

Georgetown University is a private, Jesuit, research university whose main campus is in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic university in the United States...

 in 1980. He has studied several Asian languages such as Japanese

Japanese language

is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...

, Korean

Korean language

Korean is the official language of the country Korea, in both South and North. It is also one of the two official languages in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture in People's Republic of China. There are about 78 million Korean speakers worldwide. In the 15th century, a national writing...

, Thai

Thai language

Thai , also known as Central Thai and Siamese, is the national and official language of Thailand and the native language of the Thai people, Thailand's dominant ethnic group. Thai is a member of the Tai group of the Tai–Kadai language family. Historical linguists have been unable to definitively...

 and Khmer

Khmer language

Khmer , or Cambodian, is the language of the Khmer people and the official language of Cambodia. It is the second most widely spoken Austroasiatic language , with speakers in the tens of millions. Khmer has been considerably influenced by Sanskrit and Pali, especially in the royal and religious...

.

Political career

Arvizu joined the foreign service in 1981. He held various State Department positions overseas and had been domestically assigned to positions related to U.S. foreign policy in East Asia and the Pacific. While in Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

, he served as Deputy Director of the State Department's Office of Japanese Affairs and then Director for Asian Affairs in the United States National Security Council

United States National Security Council

The White House National Security Council in the United States is the principal forum used by the President of the United States for considering national security and foreign policy matters with his senior national security advisors and Cabinet officials and is part of the Executive Office of the...

 in the second Clinton Administration. Among his overseas positions were Deputy Chief of Missions

Deputy Chief of Mission

A Deputy Chief of Mission , is the number-two diplomat assigned to an embassy or other diplomatic mission. He or she is usually considered the second-in-command or top lieutenant to the Head of Mission...

 in US Embassy in Phnom Penh

United States Ambassador to Cambodia

This is a list of Ambassadors of the United States to Cambodia.Until 1953 Cambodia had been French protectorate as a part of French Indochina, but became independent on November 9, 1953. The United States had appointed its first envoy to Cambodia, Donald R. Heath, in 1950...

, Cambodia

Cambodia

Cambodia , officially known as the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia...

 in 2000-2003 and US Embassy in Bangkok

United States Ambassador to Thailand

This is a list of Ambassadors of the United States to Thailand.Thailand has had continuous bilateral relations with the United States since 1882. Relations were interrupted during World War II when Bangkok was occupied by Japanese forces. Normal relations were resumed after the war in 1945.The...

, Thailand

Thailand

Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...

 in 2004-2007. In addition to that, he served two tours in Seoul

Seoul

Seoul , officially the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea. A megacity with a population of over 10 million, it is the largest city proper in the OECD developed world...

, South Korea

South Korea

The Republic of Korea , , is a sovereign state in East Asia, located on the southern portion of the Korean Peninsula. It is neighbored by the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the East China Sea and Republic of China to the south...

 and one tour in Osaka-Kobe, Japan. From 2003 through 2004, Ambassador Arvizu was a member of the 46th Senior Seminar, a leadership program for senior government officers. After returning from Thailand, he served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary in charge of Regional Security for Japan and Korea from 2007 through 2009. He then worked as the Director of Entry-Level Assignments in the Bureau of Human Resources.

On July 1, 2010 Arvizu was appointed U.S. Ambassador to Albania

Albania

Albania , officially known as the Republic of Albania , is a country in Southeastern Europe, in the Balkans region. It is bordered by Montenegro to the northwest, Kosovo to the northeast, the Republic of Macedonia to the east and Greece to the south and southeast. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea...

 by President Barack Obama

Barack Obama

Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...

. He was sworn in as the Ambassador to Albania on November 10, 2010.