Bahrain confirms Jewish woman to be US ambassador

0 Comments | AFP, June, 2008

MANAMA (AFP) — Bahrain's Foreign Minister Sheikh Khaled bin Ahmad al-Khalifa on Sunday confirmed and defended his government's plans to appoint a Jewish woman, Huda Nunu, as ambassador to the United States.

"Nunu was chosen because she is a Bahraini like her father," the minister said, as quoted by the state-run Bahrain News Agency (BNA).

He confirmed that his government had informed Washington of its intention to appoint Nunu to the post and was awaiting its response before naming her officially.

At the end of May a senior Bahraini official told AFP, on condition of anonymity, that Nunu was to be named ambassador to Washington and stressed the move -- the first for an Arab country -- was "not a public relations exercise."

He said King Hamad had...