The Foreign Service Journal, December 2022

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | DECEMBER 2022 51 Susan Johnson, in her role as AFSA president, addresses the crowd at the “Rally to Serve America” in April 2011 in Washington, D.C., a demonstration she led in support of the professional integrity of foreign affairs agency personnel. Ms. Johnson visited foreign affairs retiree groups around the country and advocated for them as a vital AFSA constituency. She assembled 15 former AFSA presidents as a brain trust to provide insights and institutional memory to the association, and always lent AFSA’s support—as well as her own—to sister organizations, including the Diplomacy Center Foundation for the National Museum of American Diplomacy and the American Academy of Diplomacy’s 2011 report on diplomatic professional education and training. Susan R. Johnson retired from the Senior Foreign Service in 2015 after a 35-year career and currently serves as presi- dent of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. Prior to holding the AFSA presidency, she served in Bosnia as deputy high representative and supervisor of Brcko district, in Baghdad as senior adviser to the Iraqi foreign ministry, and in Romania and Mauritius as deputy chief of mission and chargé d’affaires. Earlier postings include Moscow, Havana, Islamabad, the U.S. Mission to the United Nations in New York, and the National Endowment for Democracy. She also served as International Executive Service Corps country director for Central Asia based in Kazakhstan. She is the recipient of several Superior and Meritorious Honor Awards and the 2001 Deputy Chief of Mission of the Year Award, and is a former Pearson Fellow and an alumna of the Senior Seminar. Before entering the Foreign Service, she worked in the private sector. Ms. Johnson holds a B.A. in history from Principia College and an M.A. in international relations from the Johns Hopkins School of International Studies. She is married to Ambassador Riaz M. Khan, a retired Pakistani diplomat and former foreign secretary of Pakistan. She has served on the boards of numerous organiza- tions, including the Diplomacy Center Foundation and DACOR. AFSA Special Achievement Award Sharon L. Papp Upholding Justice for Members O ver the course of her three decades of service as AFSA general coun- sel, Sharon L. Papp has made innumerable contributions to AFSA, its constituencies, and the whole of the Foreign Service community. Ms. Papp and her team in the AFSA Labor Management Office assist more than 1,000 members per year from all of the foreign affairs agencies with grievances, investigations, proposals for dis- ciplinary action, appeals of the revocation of their security clear- ance, and Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) complaints. Since joining AFSA in 1992, Ms. Papp has personally assisted thousands of members, often taking on the most difficult cases. She ensures that agencies abide by the rules and that members receive due process and fair treatment. In doing so, she has saved numerous careers and ensured the integrity of the Foreign Service as an institution. In a significant 2020 victory, Ms. Papp assisted a dozen mem- bers who were charged with security violations after the State Department retroactively classified emails sent from Secretary of Sharon L. Papp. AFSA/DONNAAYERST