Richard Miles was born in 1937 in Little Rock, Arkansas. He grew up in rural and small-town Indiana. After serving in the Marine Corps from 1954 to 1957, he obtained degrees from Bakersfield College, the University of California at Berkeley and Indiana University. He is also a graduate of the U.S. Army Russian Institute, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany.

Ambassador Miles worked for the South Carolina Voter Education Project from 1964 to 1967 in the field of voter registration and political leadership training.

He entered the Foreign Service in 1967 and has served abroad in Oslo, Moscow, Belgrade, as Consul General in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg), and as Principal Officer of the U.S. Embassy Office in Berlin.

Ambassador Miles served as Ambassador to Azerbaijan from 1992 to 1993, as Chief of Mission to Belgrade from 1996 to 1999, and as Ambassador to Bulgaria from 1999 to 2001.

In the State Department, he also worked in the Offices for Soviet and East European and Yugoslav Affairs and in the Politico-Military Bureau.

Ambassador Miles worked for Senator Ernest F. Hollings (D-SC) on an American Political Science Fellowship in 1983-1984, and in 1987-1988 he was a fellow at Harvard University's Center for International Affairs.

Ambassador Miles has been awarded the State Department's Meritorious Honor Award and Group Superior Honor Award (twice). In 1992 he was awarded a Presidential Meritorious Service Award and a national award for reporting.

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