Rudolf V. Perina

Rudolf V. Perina
Official portrait, 1998
Personal details
Born
Rudolf Vilém Peřina

(1945-01-03)January 3, 1945
Tábor, Czechoslovakia
DiedJune 14, 2018(2018-06-14) (aged 73)
Vienna, Virginia, United States
Spouse
Ethel Ott Hetherington
(after 1972)
ChildrenKaja
Alexandra
Alma materUniversity of Chicago
Columbia University

Rudolf Vilem Perina (Czech: Rudolf Vilém Peřina; January 3, 1945 – June 14, 2018) was an American diplomat who specialized for more than three decades in European East–West relations during and after the Cold War, and on the Dayton Accords following the dissolution of the Former Republic of Yugoslavia. This includes participating in the 1988 Moscow summit meeting between President Reagan and General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev, during the former's first visit to the USSR. He also served as ambassador to the Republic of Moldova, U.S. Special Negotiator for Eurasian Conflicts in the former Soviet Union (an ambassador-level position), Deputy Assistant Secretary for European and Canadian Affairs in the State Department, director of European and Soviet Affairs for the U.S. National Security Council, and was on the policy planning staff of the State Department under Colin Powell before and after the invasion of Iraq.

Following his retirement from the foreign service, Perina served as chargé d’affaires at U.S. embassies, including those in Chișinău, Moldova (2006), Yerevan, Armenia (2007), Reykjavík, Iceland (2010), Prague, Czech Republic (2013), and Bratislava, Slovakia (2015).