CORVALLIS — An Oregon man has been posthumously awarded one of the nation’s highest civilian honors after he was killed in Iraq.

Paul Converse died March 24 after an attack on the American-protected Green Zone in Baghdad.

The 56-year-old Converse was working for the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction as a forensic auditor to help prevent corruption.

President Bush awarded Converse the State Department’s Thomas Jefferson Star for Foreign Service for his work — one of the few such awards handed out in the past 30 years.

Converse was a graduate of Corvallis High School and Oregon State University.

— From wire reports