President Bill Clinton named Krueger as Ambassador to Burundi, which had been beset with violence in recent years and whose ethnic make-up was the same as that of adjoining Rwanda, whose Hutu and Tutsi groups had started a bloody civil war only months before Krueger began his service in May 1994. His family was initially not allowed to join him in Burundi due to the threat of violence. He served in Burundi until 1995, when his convoy was ambushed in Cibitoke province. He was traveling on a bare highway in Cibitoke, when gunmen with AK-47s attacked the motorcade, before being diverted by Diplomatic Security Service agents Chris Reilly and Larry Salmon.