Richard Llewellyn Williams, is a former career member of the Senior Foreign Service who, over three decades as a career U.S. diplomat, opened the Consulate General of the United States, Guangzhou, the first American consulate in mainland China since the 1940s, served as the first U.S. Ambassador to the Mongolian People's Republic from 1988 to 1990 and then was named Consul General in Hong Kong from 1990 to 1993. Williams was also director of Chinese affairs at the U.S. State Department during the Tiananmen crisis.

The Consulate General of United States, Guangzhou is one of seven American diplomatic and consular posts in China. It is one of America's earliest diplomatic posts in the Far East. The consulate serves the South China region, covering the provinces of Guangdong, Hainan and Fujian, and the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, an area which, according to the latest census in 2020, has a resident population of over 220 million. The consulate general is also the only U.S. mission in mainland China to process American adoptions and immigrant visas, making it one of the U.S. Department of State’s busiest consular-related posts.