Francis Stephen Ruddy (born September 15, 1937, [1] Jackson Heights, Queens, died May 7, 2014 Washington, DC) was the US ambassador to Equatorial Guinea (1984-1988), [2] a university professor, writer, General Counsel for the Department of Energy, and editor. [3]
Ruddy attended Xavier High School, Holy Cross College (A.B., 1959), served in the USMC, and received his Ph.D. in International Law from Cambridge University (1969). [3] He also received a LL.B. in 1965 from Loyola University and a LL.M. in 1967 from New York University. [1]
Ruddy was Of Counsel to ExxonMobil since 1978; Deputy General Counsel and Congressional Liaison for the United States Information Agency (USIA) from 1973 until 1974. In 1981, Ronald Reagan announced he would nominate Ruddy to be Assistant Administrator of the Agency for International Development, African Branch, United States International Development Cooperation Agency. [1]
The Iran-Contra affair, often referred to as the Iran-Contra scandal, or simply Iran-Contra, was a political scandal in the United States that occurred during the second term of the Reagan administration. Between 1981 and 1986, senior administration officials secretly facilitated the sale of arms to Iran, which was the subject of an arms embargo. The administration hoped to use the proceeds of the arms sale to fund the Contras, a right-wing rebel group, in Nicaragua. Under the Boland Amendment, further funding of the Contras by government appropriations had been prohibited by Congress, but the loophole was to use non-appropriated funds.
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