<div><p>US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Monday defended the choice of Christopher Hill as the next ambassador to Iraq, saying Republican criticism of him was "unfounded."</p><p>Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham last week urged President Barack Obama to reconsider his choice after saying Hill lacked Middle East experience and left a "controversial legacy" in North Korea diplomacy.</p><p>"Both of those criticisms are unjustified, unfounded," Clinton told reporters at the State Department.</p><p>"Chris Hill is a distinguished, experienced diplomat who has served in some very difficult positions on behalf of our country," the chief US diplomat said.</p><p>"Another very distinguished, experienced diplomat, John Negroponte, was our ambassador in Iraq. He did not have Middle East or Arabic language skills when he was sent to Iraq," said Clinton who recalled Negroponte had Republican backing.</p><p>Hill is "not only well qualified in terms of running a large embassy, helping to deal with the myriad of issues that will arise as we conduct our withdrawal, but will have around him, as any ambassador does, people who have particular skills and expertise," she said.</p><p>Obama announced his choice of Hill as ambassador to Iraq on February 27 and the nomination requires Senate approval.</p><p>Unlike his predecessor Ryan Crocker -- who spent most of his career in the Middle East and is a fluent Arabic speaker -- Hill has spent most of his career in Europe and Asia.</p><p>On North Korea, Clinton added that Hill carried out his duties with "great persistence and success despite some difficult challenges."</p><p>"This is a hard set of challenges to meet, and it is our perspective that he made a lot of lemonade out of some pretty bad lemons. And he was able to get the North Koreans on record as agreeing to certain obligations," Clinton said.</p><p>"We now have to follow through on those obligations."</p><p>In October last year, Hill returned from Pyongyang with what the State Department said were oral commitments to inspections and other methods aimed at verifying nuclear disarmament.</p><p>In return, the president George W. Bush's administration struck North Korea from a blacklist of countries allegedly supporting terrorism but Pyongyang later balked at international demands to put the commitments in writing.</p><p>Last week, White House and State Department spokesmen gave a strong defense of Hill as the choice for ambassador to Baghdad.</p><img src="http://admatch-syndication.mochila.com/images/ad.gif?aid=45115918&bid=informcom" /></div><div id="copyright"><div>

Copyright 2009  <a href="http://www.afp.com/english/links/?pid=copyright">AFP American Edition</a></div></div>