Nomination of Robert L. Barry for the Rank of Ambassador While Serving as United States Representative to the Conference on Confidence and Security Building Measures and Disarmament in Europe

The President today announced his intention to nominate Robert L. Barry, of New Hampshire, a career member of the Senior Foreign Service, Class of Career Minister, for the rank of Ambassador during the tenure of his service as United States Representative to the Conference on Confidence and Security Building Measures and Disarmament in Europe. He would succeed James E. Goodby.

Mr. Barry served in the United States Navy as lieutenant in 1957-1960. He entered the Foreign Service in 1962 and was vice consul in Zagreb in 1963-1965. In 1965-1967 he was in the Department as international relations officer in the Office of Soviet Union Affairs. He studied the Russian language at Munich (Garmisch) in 1967-1968. He was consular officer, then political officer in Moscow (1968-1970), political officer at the United States Mission to the United Nations in New York, NY (1970-1971), and deputy principal officer in Leningrad (1971-1973). He was on detail to the International Communication Agency as Director of U.S.S.R. Division of the Voice of America in 1973-1975. Mr. Barry returned to the Department as Deputy Director of the Office of Soviet Union Affairs (1975-1977), Director of the Office of United Nations Political Affairs (1977-1978), Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs (1978-1979), and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs (1979-1981). He was appointed Ambassador to Bulgaria in 1981 and served in Sofia until 1984, when he became a John Sloan Dickey fellow (Dartmouth College) and Distinguished Visitor of the W. Averell Harriman Institute for Advanced Study of the Soviet Union (Columbia University).

He graduated from Dartmouth College (B.A., 1956) and Columbia University (M.A., 1962). He attended Oxford University (England) in 1956-1957. His foreign languages are Russian, Serbo-Croatian, Bulgarian, and French. He is married to the former Margaret Crim, and they have two children. He was born August 28, 1934, in Pittsburgh, PA.