Yousef Al Otaiba
| Yousef Al Otaiba | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| UAE Ambassador to the United States | |
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Assumed office July 28, 2008 |
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| President | HH Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan |
| Preceded by | Saqr Ghobash |
| Personal details | |
| Born | January 19, 1974 |
| Spouse(s) | Abeer Al Otaiba |
| Relations | Aunt Moza Saeed Al Otaiba |
| Children | Samia Al Otaiba and one son |
| Parents | Mana Al Otaiba |
Yousef Al Otaiba (Arabic: يوسف العتيبة) is the current United Arab Emirates ambassador to the United States. Previously Al Otaiba served as non-resident ambassador to Mexico. His father is Petroleum magnate Mana Al Otaiba, who served as the president of OPEC a record six times. On June 2, 2017 hackers released email exchanges between the Emirati ambassador to the US and top foreign policy figures (GlobalLeaks).
Otaiba was born 1974 in Abu Dhabi into a wealthy merchant family. His father was the UAE's first Minister of Petroleum, Mana Saeed Al Otaiba, one of the country's key non-royal founding members as well as a close confidant to the late UAE founder and President Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan (1918–2004). His father had at least 12 children with 4 wives, including Otaiba's Egyptian mother. Otaiba was raised in Cairo by his mother, from whom he is the only child. Although he got a first-rate liberal arts high school education (at the time the premier Cairo American College), and, while there, introduced himself to Frank G. Wisner, then the US ambassador to Egypt, Otaiba likes to reflect on his "modest upbringing".
After completing high school in 1991, Yousef studied international relations at Georgetown University, it was Wisner, one of Otaiba’s mentors, who encouraged the young Al Otaiba to go to Washington, D.C.. The UAE embassy claims that Otaiba obtained a degree in international relations from Georgetown University. However in 2017, The Intercept reported Georgetown University's office of the registrar claims he never graduated.
Otaiba subsequently spent the next three years working for the automotive division of his family's firm, the Al Otaiba Group. His father's firm lost of the prestigious General Motors/Cadillac agency in Abu Dhabi after a bitter 11-year dispute over non-performance. Otaiba was then selected to attend the International Fellow at the Industrial College of the Armed Forces (ICAF) at the National Defense University in Washington, in preparation for an assignment to join the immediate staff of then UAE Armed Forces Chief of Staff Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, a position he assumed upon graduating from ICAF in 2000. The former CENTCOM Commander, General Anthony Zinni was another of Otaiba’s mentors.
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