Robert Finn is a former lecturer on Turkish literature at Princeton University's Department of Near Eastern Studies and Ertegun Professor of Turkic Studies. His distinguished foreign service career includes posts at U.S. missions in Turkey and as ambassador to Afghanistan and Tajikistan. Finn was sworn in on March 22, 2002 as the U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan.
Finn, a career member of the Senior Foreign Service, is from New York. From 1998 until July 2001, he served as the United States Ambassador to Tajikistan. Prior to that, he served as Deputy Chief of Mission at the American Embassies in Croatia (1995-1998) and Azerbaijan (1992-1995). He opened the Embassy in Baku in 1992. In 1991, he served as Director of the American Embassy Office in Diyarbakir, Turkey, during the initial months of Operation Provide Comfort and was a Deputy Coordinator of the Kuwait Task Force during the Gulf War. He also served as Deputy Principal Officer of the American Consulate General in Lahore, Pakistan, from 1984-1986. He has had several different tours in Ankara, Izmir, and Istanbul, Turkey.
Finn has a B.A. in American Literature and European History with honors from St. John's University, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Near Eastern Studies from Princeton University. He also has an M.A. in Near Eastern Studies from New York University. He served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Turkey from 1967-1969 and was a Fulbright Scholar at the Turkiyat Institute of Istanbul University from 1976-1977. His publications encompass a book, The Early Turkish Novel, 1872-1900, and poems, articles and translations in English and Turkish. His languages include Turkish, Azerbaijani, Urdu, Tajik, Persian, French, German, and Ottoman.
