President Joe Biden on Tuesday nominated a senior career diplomat to be U.S. ambassador to the Marshall Islands, a strategic Pacific territory that has become a focus for competition with China.
The nominee, Laura Stone, is currently deputy coordinator at the State Department's Office of COVID Response and previously served as deputy assistant secretary for India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Maldives.
A Chinese speaker, Stone also worked previously as coordinator of efforts to counter Chinese malign economic influence and as acting deputy assistant secretary for China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Mongolia. The Marshall Islands is one of three Pacific island nations covered by so-called Compacts of Free Association with Washington, under which the U.S. retains responsibility for their defense and provides economic assistance, while gaining exclusive access to huge strategic swathes of the Pacific.
Renewing the pacts become a key part of U.S. efforts to push back against China's bid to expand its influence in the Pacific, but according to regional news reports,
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