United States Department of State in the context of "Foreign Service Institute"

Africa has a large quantity of natural resources, including diamonds, sugar, salt, gold, iron, cobalt, uranium, copper, bauxite, silver, petroleum, natural gas and cocoa beans, but also tropical timber and tropical fruit.

Recently discovered oil reserves have increased the importance of the commodity in African economies. Nigeria, Angola, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Algeria, Libya, Egypt, and South Sudan are among the largest oil producers in Africa. The United States and European countries took most of the Democratic Republic of the Congo's (DRC) oil production. Oil is provided by both continental and offshore productions. Sudan's oil exports in 2010 are estimated by the United States Department of State at US$9 billion.

Commonwealth is a term used by two unincorporated territories of the United States in their full official names. These are the Northern Mariana Islands, whose full name is Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and Puerto Rico, which is named Commonwealth of Puerto Rico in English and Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico in Spanish, translating to "Free Associated State of Puerto Rico." The term was also used by the Philippines during most of its period under U.S. sovereignty, when it was officially called the Commonwealth of the Philippines.

The definition of commonwealth according to 2013 United States Department of State policy, as codified in the department's Foreign Affairs Manual, reads: "The term 'Commonwealth' does not describe or provide for any specific political status or relationship. It has, for example, been applied to both states and territories. When used in connection with areas under U.S. sovereignty that are not states, the term broadly describes an area that is self-governing under a constitution of its adoption and whose right of self-government will not be unilaterally withdrawn by the U.S. Congress."

The officially stated goals of the foreign policy of the United States of America, including all the bureaus and offices in the United States Department of State, as mentioned in the Foreign Policy Agenda of the Department of State, are "to build and sustain a more democratic, secure, and prosperous world for the benefit of the American people and the international community". Liberalism has been a key component of US foreign policy since its independence from Britain. Since the end of World War II, the United States has had a grand strategy which has been characterized as being oriented around primacy, "deep engagement", and/or liberal hegemony. This strategy entails that the United States maintains military predominance; builds and maintains an extensive network of allies (exemplified by NATO, bilateral alliances and foreign US military bases); integrates other states into US-designed international institutions (such as the IMF, WTO/GATT, and World Bank); and limits the spread of nuclear weapons.

The United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs states as some of its jurisdictional goals: "export controls, including nonproliferation of nuclear technology and nuclear hardware; measures to foster commercial interaction with foreign nations and to safeguard American business abroad; international commodity agreements; international education; protection of American citizens abroad; and expulsion". U.S. foreign policy and foreign aid have been the subject of much debate and criticism, both domestically and abroad.

Human rights in Mauritania are generally seen as poor according to international observers, including Freedom House, the United States Department of State, and Amnesty International.

In 2022, Freedom House rated Mauritania's human rights at 35 out 100 (partly free).

The Foreign Affairs Manual (FAM) is published by the United States Department of State and can be accessed on the department's website. It contains the functional statements, organizational responsibilities, and authorities of each of the major components of the department. Together, the manual comprise the basic organizational directive of the department.

The Muslim minority of Greece is the only explicitly recognized minority in Greece. It numbered 97,605 (0.91% of the population) according to the 1991 census, and unofficial estimates ranged up to 140,000 people or 1.24% of the total population, according to the United States Department of State.

Like other parts of the southern Balkans that experienced centuries of Ottoman rule, the Muslim minority of mainly Western Thrace in Northern Greece consists of several ethnic groups, some being Turkish speaking and some Bulgarian-speaking Pomaks, while others descend from Ottoman-era Greek converts to Islam and also Muslim Romas. While the legal status of the Muslim minority in Greece is enshrined in international law, namely the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne, which also governs the status of the "Greek inhabitants of Constantinople" (the only group of the indigenous Greek population in Turkey that was exempt from forced expulsion under the Convention Concerning the Exchange of Greek and Turkish Populations, along with that of the islands of Imbros and Tenedos under Article 14 of the Treaty), precise definitions pertaining thereto and scope of applicability thereof remain contested between the two countries.

Starting in the mid-1970s and 1980s, the international propagation of Salafism and Wahhabism within Sunni Islam and throughout the Muslim world, favored by the conservative oil-exporting Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and other Gulf monarchies, achieved a "preeminent position of strength in the global expression of Islam." The Saudi interpretation of Islam not only includes Salafism and Wahhabism but also Islamist and revivalist interpretations of Islam, and a "hybrid" of the two interpretations (until the 1990s).

The impetus for the international propagation of Salafism and Wahhabism was, according to political scientist Alex Alexiev, "the largest worldwide propaganda campaign ever mounted", David A. Kaplan described it as "dwarfing the Soviets' propaganda efforts at the height of the Cold War" funded by petroleum exports. Others such as Peter Mandaville, former advisor in the Secretary of State's Office of Religion & Global Affairs at the U.S. Department of State, have cautioned against such hyperbolic assertions, pointing out the unreliability of inconsistent data estimates based on "non-specific hearsay".

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is a de jure agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government. USAID was the world's largest foreign aid agency, but it received major cutbacks in 2025, with its remaining functions being transferred to the United States Department of State.

USAID was established in 1961 to compete with the Soviet Union during the Cold War through the use of soft power. In 2025, the Trump administration ended 83% of overall projects. However, USAID had been reorganized by the United States Congress as an independent agency in 1998 and can only be closed down by an act of Congress. As such, it legally still exists.

Adlai Ewing Stevenson II (/ˈædleɪ/; February 5, 1900 – July 14, 1965) was an American politician and diplomat who was the United States ambassador to the United Nations from 1961 until his death in 1965. He previously served as the 31st governor of Illinois from 1949 to 1953 and was the Democratic Party nominee for president of the United States in 1952 and 1956, losing both elections to Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Stevenson was the grandson of Adlai Stevenson, the 23rd vice president of the United States. He was raised in Bloomington, Illinois. After a short stint in the U.S. Navy at the end of World War I, he became a lawyer. He served in many positions in the federal government during the Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry Truman presidential administrations, including in the Department of the Navy, and the State Department during World War II. In 1945, he served on the committee that created the United Nations, and was a member of the initial U.S. delegations to the UN.