Ambassador

U.S. Ambassador to Angola, Dan W. Mozena

Dan Mozena
United States Ambassador, Republic of Angola
Term of Appointment: 08/15/2007 to present

Since presenting his credentials to Angolan President dos Santos on January 9, 2008, Ambassador Dan Mozena has worked to advance US interests by promoting an Angola that is peaceful, secure, prosperous, healthy and democratic.  To that end, he has helped Angola halve the death rate of children from malaria, check the spread of HIV/AIDS, strengthen emerging democratic institutions, diversify the economy, foster military professionalism, and clear minefields.  Under his stewardship, relations between the United States and Angola continue to improve, to the mutual benefit of both.

Prior to service in Angola, Ambassador Mozena was Director for the Office of Southern African Affairs, where he provided leadership to the US relationship with Angola, among other responsibilities. 

Ambassador Mozena, a member of the Senior Foreign Service, has had a range of experience in Africa.  From 2001 to 2004, Mozena was Deputy Chief of Mission in Lusaka, Zambia, where he had begun his Foreign Service career in 1982.  In what proved to be his most rewarding Foreign Service assignment, Mozena served as Officer-in-Charge for South Africa and as Deputy Director for Southern African Affairs during South Africa’s transition from apartheid to democracy.  Mozena assisted with then-President Mandela’s historic state visit to Washington.  Mozena was also posted to then-Zaire, where he and his wife had earlier served as Peace Corps Volunteers, helping local farmers develop better ways to raise chickens.

Ambassador Mozena was born and raised on a family dairy farm in northeast Iowa and spent the first decades of his life milking cows, slopping hogs, and doing the daily chores that are part of life on a family farm.  His academic life began in a one-room country school, which had a total of 12 students spread over eight grades.  He graduated from Iowa State University (Political Science and History), and later from graduate school at the University of Wisconsin, Madison (Public Administration and Political Science). 

Ambassador Mozena’s wife of 38 years, Grace, is a retired elementary school teacher with professional interests focused in elementary education and teaching English as a second language.  The Mozena’s are proud parents of two adult children.  Their daughter Anne currently resides with them in Angola; their son Mark is in graduate school pursuing a doctorate in astrophysics. 

July 27, 2009