AMBASSADOR KURT TONG

Ambassador Kurt Tong is an American Diplomat and currently a partner at The Asia Group, a strategic advisory group offering services to the world’s leading companies and organizations seeking to excel across Asia where he leads the firm’s work in Japan and the broader East Asia region.

Ambassador Tong served thirty years as a career Foreign Service Officer and member of the Senior Foreign Service. Prior to joining The Asia Group in 2019, he served as Consul General and Chief of Mission in Hong Kong and Macau. From 2014-2016, he resided as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Economic and Business Affairs at the State Department. From 2011-2014, Ambassador Tong was the Deputy Chief of Mission and Chargé d'Affaires at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo where he played a key role in setting the stage for Japan’s entry in to the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Prior to these positions, Ambassador Tong served as Ambassador for Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) in 2011 and as Director of Korean Affairs in the State Department’s Bureau of East Asia and Pacific Affairs. He was one of the original architects of the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement during the Bush and Obama administrations, including while serving as Director for Asian Economic Affairs at the White House National Security Council from 2006 to 2008.

Earlier in his career, Ambassador Tong served as economic minister-counselor in Seoul, counselor for environment, science and health at the U.S. embassy in Beijing, deputy treasury attaché in Tokyo, and as an economic officer in Manila.

Ambassador Tong holds a B.A. from The Princeton School of Public and International Affairs and studied economics at the U.S. Foreign Service Institute. He has also studied at the Beijing Institute of Education, Inter-University Program for Chinese Language Studies in Taipei, Inter-University Center for Japanese Language Studies in Tokyo, and the International Christian University in Tokyo. He is fluent in both Japanese and Mandarin Chinese.