Bush wants 1 100 new diplomats

2008-02-04 00:29

Washington - President George W Bush wants to hire nearly 1 100 new diplomats to address severe staffing shortages and put the State Department on track to meet an ambitious call to double its size over the next decade, The Associated Press has learned.

The additional positions are part of an $8.2bn request for State Department operations for the 2009 budget year that Bush will submit to Congress on Monday, according to documents described by officials.

That request would be $690m - or 9.1% - above the current level for department operations, the officials said.

They spoke on condition of anonymity ahead of the public release of the spending plan for the budget year that begins October 1.

Other significant proposed increases include a 41% rise in spending for new embassy construction - from $670m to $948m - and a nearly 20% boost for worldwide security spending, from $968m to $1.16bn.

Critical staff shortage

The spending request is subject to Congressional approval.

The State Department is facing a critical shortage of diplomats and many embassies are operating at only 70% of their desired staffing levels.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has lobbied hard for the new hires, making several appearances before a White House budget appeals committee to fight efforts to trim the proposal, officials said.

The jobs are part of Rice's efforts to promote what she calls "transformational diplomacy" by reorganising State Department and embassy staffing.

The department's last major hiring drive occurred between 2001 and 2004 when former Secretary of State Colin Powell launched the Diplomatic Readiness Initiative that boosted staffing by 1&mnbsp;158 positions over those three years.

- AP