The American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) yesterday announced that its new deputy director, Karin M. Lang, officially took office on Friday last week.
The AIT is the US’ representative office in Taipei and de facto embassy in the absence of official diplomatic ties.
The AIT in a statement said that Lang assumed the role of AIT deputy director, replacing former AIT deputy director Jeremy Cornforth, who left his post earlier this year.
Photo: Screen grab from AIT’s Web site
Lang is a senior career diplomat with the US Department of State, holding the rank of minister-counselor, it said.
Lang has more than 30 years of experience, most recently serving as coordinator for Cuban affairs in the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs from 2022 to last year, it said.
Prior to that, she worked as minister-counselor for the US Bureau of Consular Affairs and consul general at the US embassy in Tokyo from 2019 to 2022, and worked domestically in the years leading up to that assignment, it said.
Lang is fluent in Spanish and Chinese, and served in Taiwan earlier in her career, it added.
She also served in economic and consular assignments in Havana; Bangkok; Guangzhou, China; and Mexico City, in addition to policy roles within the US Department of State’s Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, it said.
Domestically, Lang has held posts such as director of the Office of Policy Coordination and Public Affairs in the US Bureau of Consular Affairs and director of the executive secretariat staff in the office of the US secretary of state, it said.
“Having served here in Taiwan earlier in my career, I’ve seen firsthand the strength of the US-Taiwan relationship and of Taiwan’s vibrant democracy. I look forward to continuing our close strategic and economic collaboration, particularly in the cutting-edge technologies where Taiwan is a global leader,” the statement cited Lang as saying.
In 2015, she received the department’s Mary A. Ryan Award for Outstanding Public Service, the AIT said.
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