Minnesotan headed to post as ambassador to Eritrea
MINNEAPOLIS, July 05, 2004 (AP) — Scott DeLisi could have sold fruit. But he says the career he chose instead — foreign service, and now the ambassadorship to Eritrea — has been a lot more interesting.
DeLisi joins an elite list of Minnesotans to move into the ranks of ambassador. In addition to well-known politicians Walter Mondale, who served in Japan, and Karl Rolvaag, who served in Iceland, just six other Minnesotans have been appointed to ambassadorships since 1949. DeLisi was nominated by President Bush in January and confirmed by the Senate in May.
Growing up in South St. Paul in the 1950s, DeLisi had no concept of people or politics in the Horn of Africa, where the country of Eritrea would be formed. He almost followed his father’s footsteps into selling fruits and vegetables, said the “Minnesota values” he learned from his parents have helped him adapt to difficult assignments in Sri Lanka, Botswana and Pakistan. Most recently he was director of the State Department’s Office of Southern African Affairs.
Along the way, DeLisi said, he has lost friends in the bombing of the Beirut Embassy in 1983, braved an attempted bombing at his own posting at the U.S. consulate in Bombay and raised three children while moving from place to place nearly every three years.
“Before I left Minnesota … I didn’t know what I was getting into,” DeLisi said.
Although he said he was intrigued by foreign service as an undergraduate, he never followed through with the interest. Then, after working in the produce industry for several years, DeLisi returned to law school and was lured to the foreign service by an advertisement in the Wall Street Journal. Now, he said, he cannot imagine any other career.
“How fascinating to be at the heart of what’s going on,” DeLisi said. “You realize that you are at risk, but you have to do this. Someone has to do it.”
DeLisi said his No. 1 priority will be to curb human rights abuses. Human Rights Watch says Eritrea has a “woeful human rights record,” and international investment has been dismal and economic growth stunted.
When DeLisi arrives next month in the capital city of Asmara, he’ll find a country whose 13-year independence has been plagued by border disputes, regional conflicts and economic hardships. Even now, the nation of 4 million people is in the thick of a dispute with Ethiopia, which still has troops along the border, although the countries ended a two-year war in 2000. A drought this spring is also causing major famine.
Experts on the region insist that a border agreement is essential to progress. More than 58,000 Eritreans are displaced because of the border dispute, said Hellen Tesfamariam, who sits on the board of the Eritrean Development Foundation.
In 2002, an independent U.N. mission established a border compromise, which DeLisi said is supported by the U.S. government. But Eritrea and Ethiopia have yet to ratify the agreement.
DeLisi will also face political pressures to help facilitate the country’s continued support in the war on terror. Eritrea borders Sudan, Ethiopia and Djibouti — unstable countries that are presumed to have terrorists filtering through them. Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., who met with DeLisi after his nomination, called the country “a key ally in the war on terror.”
As DeLisi and his wife, Laija, learn Tigrinya — the language of the East African nation — and prepare to move to his sixth post in 23 years of foreign service, members of the estimated 4,000-strong Eritrean diaspora in the Twin Cities are rejoicing.
“We have already started talking about the new U.S. ambassador to Eritrea,” said Wolday Debremichael, an Eritrean national active in organizing Twin Cities migrants from his homeland. “We are so excited … Just a Minnesotan to us is so wonderful.”