Luis E. Arreaga, the new Ambassador of the United States of America to the Republic of Iceland, presented his credentials to Icelandic President Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson on September 20, 2010.
Arreaga was nominated by President Barack Obama as Ambassador to the Republic of Iceland on April 22, 2010. He was confirmed by the US Senate on August 5, 2010, and sworn in on September 10, 2010, a press release states.
Ambassador Arreaga is a career member of the US Senior Foreign Service with the rank of Minister-Counselor. Before his nomination as Ambassador to the Republic of Iceland, he led State Department efforts to recruit and hire the largest increase in Foreign Service personnel in US State Department history.
He previously served as Deputy Chief of Mission at the United States Embassy in Panama, US Consul General in Vancouver, Canada and as director of the Executive Secretariat Staff at the US Department of State in Washington, D.C.
He has also served as Deputy Director of the State Department’s Operations Center and Special Assistant to the Under Secretary for Political Affairs.
Other overseas postings include United States Mission to the United Nations in Geneva, the United States Embassy in Spain, and the Agency for International Development Missions in Peru, El Salvador, and Honduras.
Luis Arreaga was born and raised in Guatemala before immigrating to the United States. He is a graduate of the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee where he received a PhD in economics and a Masters Degree in Management. He is married to Mary F. Kelsey and they have three children.
Click here to read about Arreaga praising the Icelandic rescue service.
