Indian-American Paul Kapur Takes Charge as US Assistant Secretary of State for South & Central Asia

Indian-American security expert Paul Kapur was officially sworn in as the Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs in the Trump administration yesterday. He was among 107 nominees approved by the Senate and will now lead America’s diplomatic engagement with key South and Central Asian nations, including India. Kapur succeeds Donald Lu, who served as Assistant Secretary from September 2021 to January 2025. He previously served in the State Department’s Policy Planning Staff, where he worked on issues related to South and Central Asia, Indo-Pacific strategy, and India-US relations between 2020 and 2021. Earlier, during his Senate confirmation hearing in June this year, Mr Kapur said his career has come full circle as he never imagined that his career would someday return him to the place where he was born.