Still no US ambassador to Belgium after one year of Trump

Belgium and the European Union remain without an American ambassador, a whole year after US president Donald Trump was sworn into office.

On 20 January last year, three ambassadors based in Brussels - to Belgium, Nato and the EU - left their jobs. Trump appointed a new US ambassador to Nato in August - former US senator Kay Bailey Hutchison - but the other two positions remain unfilled.

"There is no standard deadline for the appointment of a new ambassador," the US embassy told La Libre Belgique newspaper. "The decision remains at the discretion of the president."

The appointment process can be tricky. The appointment must be confirmed by the Senate, and that may not always be guaranteed. Although there is no American ambassador, diplomatic relations continue between the two countries, overseen by Matthew Lussenhop, chargé d’affaires.

"It's quite unusual," said Amine Ait-Chaalal, professor of international relations at the Catholic University of Louvain (UCL). "From a symbolic and political point of view, the ambassador is at the highest level of the diplomatic hierarchy. The chargé d'affaires does not have the political and diplomatic weight of an ambassador."

Last June, the Trump administration announced that businesswoman and attorney Jamie McCourt, a former co-owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team, would become the new US ambassador to Belgium. But in August there was a change of plan and McCourt was posted to Paris instead.

The former ambassador, Denise Bauer, served in the position from 2013-2017, nominated by former president Barack Obama.