Department of State Nomination of Thomas R. Pickering To Be Assistant Secretary for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs.

The President today announced that he will nominate Thomas R. Pickering, of Rutherford, N.J., to be Assistant Secretary of State for Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs. He would replace Patsy Mink, who has resigned.

Pickering was born November 5, 1931, in New Jersey. He received an A.B. from Bowdoin College in 1953 and M.A. degrees from Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in 1954 and the University of Melbourne, Australia, in 1956. He served in the U.S. Navy from 1956 to 1959.

Pickering joined the Foreign Service in 1959 and served as an intelligence research specialist and as a political officer in Geneva. In 1964-65 he took Swahili language training, and from 1965 to 1967, he was principal officer in Zanzibar.

Pickering was deputy chief of mission in Dar es Salaam from 1967 to 1969. From 1969 to 1973, he was Deputy Director of the Bureau of Politico-Military Affairs, and from 1973 to 1974, he was Special Assistant to the Secretary of State and Executive Secretary of the Department. Since 1974 he has been Ambassador to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.