US names Eurasia energy envoy

Hurriyet Daily News with wires

Morningstar will provide "strategic advice" to U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on the development, transit and distribution of energy resources in Eurasia, said State Department spokesman Robert Wood. "Ambassador Morningstar and his staff will support the United States' energy goals in the Eurasian region," said Wood. "He will work on key energy issues relating to Europe, Russia, Ukraine, Turkey, Central Asia and the Caucasus."

Special envoy
A former ambassador to the European Union between 1999 and 2001, Morningstar was a special adviser to former President Bill Clinton on Caspian basin energy diplomacy, reported AFP. He is currently a public policy lecturer at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government. Morningstar joins a string of other senior U.S. diplomats appointed special envoys in the Obama administration, covering topics from the Middle East to climate change and Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Central Asia and the Caucasus have taken on new energy significance in recent years as Russia, the European Union and the United States scramble for Caspian basin resources.