AFSA NEWS 62 SEPTEMBER 2023 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL She has served as agricultural attaché in Ukraine (with regional coverage of Moldova), Burma/Myanmar, and the Dominican Republic (with regional coverage of Haiti and Jamaica). In each market, she sought to gain or maintain access for U.S. agricultural products, promote them to regional consumers in coordination with U.S. industry groups, provide market intelligence on local conditions, and help increase food security through a variety of capacity building programs. Since joining the federal workforce in 2006, Ms. Ahramjian has also worked at USDA’s National Organic Program, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, and the National Institutes of Health. Originally from Wilmington, Del., she received a B.S. in animal science from the University of Delaware and an M.S. in biotechnology from Georgetown University. She currently resides in Washington, D.C. JOHN K. NALAND RETIREE VICE PRESIDENT John Naland’s 29-year Foreign Service career included service in Colombia, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Mexico (as principal officer in Matamoros), and Iraq (as leader of the provincial reconstruction team in Basra). Washington assignments included the Secretary’s Policy Planning Staff, the White House Situation Room, and the Bureau of Human Resources (as director of the Office of Retirement). Mr. Naland was AFSA State vice president from 1999 to 2001 and served two terms as AFSA president, from 2001 to 2003 and from 2007 to 2009. He retired from the Foreign Service in 2015 and is in his fourth term as AFSA Retiree VP. He is also president of the Foreign Service Youth Foundation and coordinator of the Foreign Affairs Retirees of Northern Virginia. Mr. Naland is co-author of the fourth edition of Career Diplomacy: Life and Work in the U.S. Foreign Service (Georgetown University Press, 2021). A former U.S. Army cavalry officer who served in West Germany during the Cold War, he is a graduate of the Army War College. Born in Kansas, he grew up in New Orleans and graduated from Tulane University. He is married and has two daughters. GREGORY FLOYD STATE REPRESENTATIVE Greg Floyd has worked with the State Department since 2005, serving in Nassau (political officer), Shanghai (consular officer), Bridgetown (deputy political / economic / commercial chief), New Delhi (American Citizen Services chief and regional ACS coordinator), Vienna (consul general), Kabul (consul general), Doha (AAU consul general), and Vancouver (consular chief). He received the State Department’s Heroism Award and the Mary A. Ryan Award for Public Service as a result of his work to protect U.S. citizens in Afghanistan and Qatar after the closure of U.S. Embassy Kabul in 2021. Before his diplomatic career, he represented public entities in labor, employment, and constitutional law matters. He was also a lecturer at Fresno State University, teaching courses related to labor and employment law. During his tenure on the AFSA Governing Board, he looks forward to working cooperatively with AFSA members and the State Department to help facilitate positive change, particularly with regard to the protection and development of specialists. Mr. Floyd is the first board member to serve as full-time State representative focusing primarily on FS specialist issues, a position created and approved by the State Department in 2023. LYNETTE BEHNKE STATE REPRESENTATIVE Lynette Behnke joined the Foreign Service in May 2006. She has been head of the unit for the Republic of Korea and Mongolia in the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs since July 2022. From August 2020 to June 2022, she served as U.S. Embassy Kyiv’s deputy political counselor. In this role, she managed the section’s evacuation from Ukraine and the process of rebuilding the team as the embassy resumed in-country operations. Prior to Kyiv, she worked on financial sanctions and counterterrorist financing at U.S. Embassy London. Her overseas tours also include Hungary and Haiti. Ms. Behnke has served as a Transatlantic Diplomatic Fellow at the United Kingdom Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Europe director at the National Security Council, and NATO desk officer. Originally from California, she holds a bachelor’s degree in international relations and French from Tulane University in New Orleans. She is married with two children. KIMBERLY HARRINGTON STATE REPRESENTATIVE Kim Harrington is currently director for Israel and Palestinian affairs at the National Security Council. Previously, she was acting deputy assistant secretary in the Bureau of Energy Resources. In her most recent overseas posting, she served as political and economic counselor at U.S. Embassy Kampala. She was deputy economic counselor in Bogotá from 2014 to 2018
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