For Immediate Release

Contact:

Alysson Oakley, U.S.-Indonesia Society, 202-232-1400 or aoakley@usindo.org
Sharon Witherell, Institute of International Education, 212-984-5380 or switherell@iie.org
Derek Ferrar East-West Center, 808-944-7204 or ferrard@eastwestcenter.org
Paul F. Hassen, APLU, 202-478-6073 or phassen@aplu.org

Travel and dialogue program is designed to deepen public understanding of the two countries and their relationship

HONOLULU (June 17, 2010)

HONOLULU (June 1, 2010) -- A group of 20 undergraduate scholars from Burma, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand will be visiting the Big Island June 2-8 as part of an innovative environmental leadership program designed to foster a greater understanding of sustainability in the U.S. and aid in the development of more resilient communities in their home countries.

HONOLULU (June 10, 2010) – An estimated 800 Asia Pacific and U.S. scholars, officials, educators, business leaders and other professionals – most of them alumni of East-west Center programs – will gather in Honolulu July 2-5 for the Center’s 50th Anniversary International Conference at the Hawai‘i Convention Center.

The gathering will provide an opportunity for alumni from more than 35 countries who have participated in Center programs over the last five decades to reunite, renew friendships, and reminisce.

HONOLULU (May 25, 2010) -- A group of 20 undergraduate scholars from Burma, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand are currently at the East-West Center in Honolulu participating in an innovative environmental leadership program designed to foster a greater understanding of sustainability in the U.S. and aid in the development of more resilient communities in their home countries.

Media Contacts:

Derek Ferrar
East-West Center
Hong Kong Mobile: (+852) 6256-5774
Email: ferrard@eastwestcenter.org

Ms. Kylie Chan
HKU Journalism and Media Studies Centre
Mobile: + (852) 2219-4416
Email : kyliec@hku.hk

Media Contacts:

Derek Ferrar
East-West Center
Hong Kong Mobile: (+852) 6256-5774
Email: ferrard@eastwestcenter.org

Ms. Kylie Chan
HKU Journalism and Media Studies Centre
Mobile: + (852) 2219-4416
Email : kyliec@hku.hk

Leading Chinese Journalist Hu Shuli to Make First Public Comments since Leaving Caijing

Highly Anticipated Speech Will Be Streamed Live at EWC50.org/mediaconference2010 April 27 at 11:45 a.m., Hong Kong time

Free public discussion on March 30 will focus on the
rising importance of cities in setting policy on global issues

HONOLULU (March 22, 2010) – Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hannemann and four metropolitan leaders from Asia will present a free public forum on the growing global role of cities Tues. March 30 at the East-West Center. The forum, titled “Cities Rising: The International Role of the Metropolis Today,” will start at 5:30 p.m. at the Center’s Hawai‘i Imin International Conference Center (Jefferson Hall, 1777 East-West Road.)

HONOLULU (March 25) – The East-West Center Participants Association is hosting its 2010 cultural celebration, East-West Fest, on Saturday, April 10th from 1:00 pm to 6:00 pm at the Center's Hawaii Imin International Conference Center (Jefferson Hall) on the East-West Center campus.

Admission is free and open to the public. Parking will be available on the UH Manoa campus.

This year's fest, themed Connecting Diversities, will also celebrate the East West Center’s 50th anniversary. Students from throughout the Asia Pacific region – many dressed in colorful national attire – will present cultural performances, activities and displays. Highlights of the performance lineup include dances, songs from Bangladesh, USA, China, The Philippines, Indonesia, Taiwan, Nepal, Italy, Iran, Pacific Islands, Timor-Leste, Vietnam, and many more.

Media Contacts:

Derek Ferrar
East-West Center
Hong Kong Mobile: (+852) 6256-5774
Email: ferrard@eastwestcenter.org

Ms. Kylie Chan
HKU Journalism and Media Studies Centre
Mobile: + (852) 2219-4416
Email : kyliec@hku.hk

HONG KONG (April 23, 2010) – More than 250 journalists and media experts from across the Asia Pacific region and the U.S. will gather in Hong Kong April 25-28 to discuss the latest news and media-industry issues in the region.

HONOLULU (March 25) – Metropolitan leaders and experts from a variety of Asian and U.S. cities are gathering at the East-West Center March 29-31 for a seminar on critical urbanization issues facing Asia’s cities. Attendance at the meeting is closed. Among the attendees are the governor of Jakarta; vice-mayor of Shenzhen; deputy mayor of Taipei; urban affairs advisor, Government of Karnataka (Bangalore); directors of city planning from Denver, Colorado; Miami, Florida; San Francisco, California; and Seattle, Washington; along with other officials and specialists from Pakistan, the Philippines, Vietnam, India, Los Angeles, New York and more.

Conference on “Reporting New Realities in Asia and the Pacific” to be held in Hong Kong April 25-28

Shifting power dynamics and changing economic landscapes. China’s growing impact and Obama’s developing foreign policies. Challenges in security, climate and health . Emerging media models. Journalists today are faced with an astonishing range of new realities to report, and nowhere are these more evident than in the world’s most dynamic region -- the Asia Pacific.

HONOLULU (March 9, 2010) – East-West Center Senior Fellow and prominent energy market analyst Fereidun Fesharaki has established a fund to help Iranian and other participants attend the East-West Center’s Asia Pacific Leadership Program.

Under an agreement recently signed with the Center, Dr. Fesharaki has pledged to donate his full monthly take home EWC salary, which will exceed the $25,000 necessary to establish a scholarship fund. The Fesharaki Scholarship Fund will be used to fund awards of at least $1,000 each year for one or more students, with a preference for (but not limited to) Iranian students from Iran or elsewhere outside the United States. Awards will be granted based on financial need, leadership experience, educational achievement, and funding availability.

HONOLULU (Dec. 18) – The application deadline for the East-West Center's 2010-11 Asia Pacific Leadership Program (APLP) – considered the premier leadership education program in the Asia Pacific region – is Jan. 31, 2010.

Entering its tenth year, the APLP is a graduate certificate program combining the development of regional expertise with the enhancement of individual leadership capacity. Based at the Center in Honolulu, Hawaii, the program has created a network of dynamic leaders in 48 countries. All participants receive a fee-waiver valued at approximately $15,000.

HONOLULU (Feb. 18, 2010) – The East-West Center has received a grant of $225,000 from the United Nations Democracy Fund to help strengthen Pakistan’s recently restored democracy. The project will reinforce electoral and parliamentary processes and enhance civil society’s capacity to promote accountability and transparency.

“Pakistan is a Muslim country of 164 million people, and a nuclear power,” said project leader Shabbir Cheema, Director of the East-West Center’s Asia-Pacific Governance and Democracy Initiative. “But a weak Parliament, lack of trust in electoral processes and weak civil society institutions have constrained the deepening and consolidation of democracy in the country.”

Two-week professional workshop in Indonesia during May will focus on “Internal Conflicts in the Asia Pacific Region”

HONOLULU (Nov. 19) – Applications are being accepted through Jan. 1 for the third annual Summer Institute in International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and Human Rights. Organized by the Asian International Justice Initiative – a collaboration between the East-West Center and the University of California-Berkeley War Crimes Studies Center

Trio of independent workshops will focus on population aging, health-care financing and communicating with policymakers

HONOLULU (Dec. 1) – Applications are being accepted through December 31 for the East-West Center’s 2010 Summer Seminar on Population. Held annually since 1970, the Summer Seminar provides a forum for learning and discussion on a wide range of population and health issues. Former participants work in government, nongovernmental (NGO), and academic institutions throughout the Asia-Pacific region and around the world.

Full information on the Summer Seminar workshops, instructions for applicants, and application forms can be obtained from the Summer Seminar website at http://www.eastwestcenter.org/summerseminar .

President Lyndon Baines Johnson’s Daughters Among the Honored Guests

Multi-article Journal Cover Story Highlights Economics, Security, and Foreign Affairs in Southeast Asia

WASHINGTON, D.C. (Oct. 27) — The Fall 2009 edition of Global Asia , the East Asia Foundation’s journal on international affairs, has just been released, highlighting the multi-article cover story “In the National Interest: Economics, Security and Foreign Affairs in Southeast Asia.”

HONOLULU (Nov. 14) – President Barack Obama’s selection of Honolulu as the site for the annual APEC Leaders Meeting in November 2011 means that Honolulu will both open the U.S. year of hosting APEC with an agenda-setting conference, as well as close the year with the huge Ministerial and Leaders meetings.

President Obama announced Hawai‘i’s winning bid today at this year’s APEC Leaders Meeting, currently being held in Singapore. Honolulu had already been selected to host the first event, an academic and government officials’ conference and an informal senior officials meeting to be held at the East-West Center in December 2010. Several other smaller ministerial and senior official meetings will be held in other U.S. cities.

REPORTING NEW REALITIES IN ASIA AND THE PACIFIC
Hong Kong
April 25-28, 2010
EastWestCenter.org/mediaconference

An East-West Center 50th Anniversary Event

As part of the East-West Center's 50th anniversary events, the Center's Asia Pacific Center for Journalists and local co-sponsor the University of Hong Kong Journalism and Media Studies Centre have announced plans for the EWC’s the  at the East-West Center's second biennial international media conference .

HONOLULU (Aug. 21) – Dr. Satu Limaye, director of the East-West Center’s Washington office, was selected by Indonesia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Office of the Special Staff for the President as the sole U.S. representative to the recent Presidential Friends of Indonesia Conference (PFoI). Distinguished guests from 13 countries participated in the program including top government officials, journalists, academics, entrepreneurs, and artists. During the conference, from August 13-19, participants witnessed first-hand Indonesia’s progress and development.  

HONOLULU (Sep. 1) – The East-West Center (EWC) was awarded a three-year grant for $1,398,380 from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to investigate the impact of development-based environmental change on avian flu transmission.  The project, “CNH: Coupled Natural-Human Systems and Emerging Infectious Diseases," will examine the interaction of urbanization, agricultural change, and habitat alteration with outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in poultry in Vietnam.

HONOLULU (Sept. 8) – East-West Center Senior Fellow and energy expert Fereidun Fesharaki will discuss the “Outlook for Global Energy Markets after the Great Recession: With Perspectives on China and Iran” at a public forum co-sponsored by the East-West Center in Washington and the Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS) on Wednesday, Sept. 16 at 3 PM. 

HONOLULU (August 20, 2009) – Many developing nations are now using microfinance as a means to reduce poverty.  On Tuesday, September 1, the East-West Center (EWC) will host a public forum on “Microfinance as a Tool for Community Development” in the EWC Gallery featuring presentations by the following international development experts:

HONOLULU (July 23, 2009) – The implications of the current global economic crisis for the Asia Pacific region will be the topic of a luncheon forum hosted by the East-West Center on Monday, Aug. 3.  The luncheon at the EWC’s Hawaii Imin International Conference Center (Jefferson Hall) is open to the public and will feature a panel discussion by leading experts from the Asia Pacific region, including:

• Barbara Weisel, Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Southeast Asia and the Pacific. Weisel is the lead negotiator for the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership initiative and the U.S. Free Trade Agreement negotiations with Malaysia and Thailand. 

HONOLULU (August 6) – East-West Center Senior Fellow Dr. Fereidun Fesharaki has been appointed to the Board of Directors of the Dubai Mercantile Exchange Limited (DME). The DME is the premier international energy futures and commodities exchange in the Middle East, providing a financially secure, well-regulated transparent trading environment.

HONOLULU (July 22) -- East-West Center President Charles E. Morrison and Director of Education Terance W. Bigalke will be among the delegates of a U.S. higher education leaders’ mission to Indonesia July 26-31. Mission organizers have said that the delegation’s scheduled visit will not be altered by the recent hotel bombings in Jakarta.

HONOLULU (June 23) - More than 20 graduates of an East-West Center-administered scholarship program for accomplished young scholars from Pacific island nations are back in Hawai‘i this week to attend a special seminar on addressing issues and envisioning futures in the region.

The former students are all graduates of the United States-South Pacific Scholarship Program (USSP), which is funded by Department of State and administered by the East-West Center. Among the attendees are graduates who are now working in public health, communications, finance, planning, education, government, scientific research and more. Participants have travelled from as far away as the UK, Norway and across the Pacific to attend the seminar.

HONOLULU (June 25) – The Mayor of Hiroshima, the Honorable Tadatoshi Akiba, will commemorate 50 years of the sister-city relationship between Hiroshima and Honolulu at a special luncheon presentation on Wednesday, July 8.

In addition to the mayor’s presentation, there will be Japanese musical entertainment and a special photo exhibit centering on Sadako Sasaki, the young Hiroshima atomic bombing victim who famously folded 1,000 cranes for peace before she died from radiation-induced leukemia.

HONOLULU (June 10) – The East-West Center has received a two-year grant of $94,747 from the Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership to support the Japan-United States Journalist Exchange .

This 12-day exchange program, co-sponsored by the East-West Center and Nihon Shinbun Kyokai (NSK), sends six to seven Japanese journalists to the United States and an equal number of U.S. journalists to Japan to broaden the journalists’ knowledge of the relationship and challenges faced between the two countries.

HONOLULU (May 29) - A group of 20 undergraduate scholars from Malaysia, Singapore, Fiji and Papua New Guinea are currently in Hawai‘i participating in an innovative environmental leadership development program. The program is designed to foster a greater understanding of the U.S. environmental movement and aid in the development of sustainable pathways to environmental stewardship.

HONOLULU (April 16) -- This year’s annual, student-organized Indonesian Conference and Cultural Event (ICCE 2009) will be held on Friday April 24, from 2 - 9 p.m. at the East-West Center’s Hawaii Imin International Conference Center. Admission to the conference and cultural celebration is free and open to the public.

The topic for this year is ‘A Decade of Reform 1998-2009’; looking at changes after the end of the Soeharto regime in 1998. The underlying force guiding these changes has been a spirit of reformation promising democracy, equity and justice among Indonesia’s people. However, after a decade of reform, Indonesia’s ability to provide equal democratic rights and access to every citizen has still been questioned.

Flooded houses. Inundated farmland. A collapsed seawall. Mud-filled roads. Contaminated taro patches. These were among the graphic images of devastating high-tide coastal inundation events in the Pacific that were presented at the annual Pacific Partners meeting of the Pacific Risk Management ‘Ohana (PRiMO), held in Tumon, Guam, on the 18th and 19th of March, 2009.

HONOLULU (April 8) – Weekly video updates about the Khmer Rouge trial proceedings currently underway in Cambodia can now be viewed online at forum.eastwestcenter.org/Khmer-Rouge-Trials .

The films – produced for a prime-time Cambodian television audience, with English subtitles added – endeavor to explain the complex legal proceedings in an accessible and informative manner through the use of trial footage, expert commentary and interviews. Also available on the “Time for Justice, Cambodia” site are written reports on the tribunal sessions prepared by legal monitors from the Asian International Justice Initiative, or AIJI .

HONOLULU (March 17) -- In its continued support of the East-West Center, the Freeman Foundation has awarded a $140,000 grant to the Asian Studies Development Program (ASDP). This is the fourth grant that the Freeman Foundation has awarded to the ASDP, totaling over $2.7 million, since 1996.

The ASDP is a joint effort of the East-West Center and the University of Hawai‘i “to educate educators--that is, to promote literacy on Asian cultures and contemporary issues, and to prepare American educators to bring Asia into the classroom,” states ASDP Co-Director Roger Ames.

HONOLULU (Feb. 10) -- More than 175 graduate students from 63 universities in 27 nations are set to gather this week at the Hawai‘i Imin International Conference Center in Honolulu to present their research at the East-West Center’s 8th annual International Graduate Student Conference. The interdisciplinary gathering, planned and organized by EWC students, is the largest of its kind worldwide. All conference sessions are free and open to the public, with the exception of meals and receptions.

 

HONOLULU (Feb. 27)  In 2010, the East-West Center (EWC) will celebrate its 50th anniversary as a national institution created by the U.S. Congress to promote better relations and understanding among the peoples and nations of Asia, the Pacific, and the United States through cooperative research, education, and exchange activities.  

As part of the 50 ^th anniversary celebrations, a series of special events will be held throughout the year, including lectures, publications, and a large international conference in Honolulu during the first week of July, 2010.

To commemorate this milestone, the EWC plans to create a special promotional logo for all EWC materials and activities associated with the Center’s 50 ^th anniversary. 

HONOLULU (Feb. 27) -- A delegation of election observers coordinated by the East-West Center in Honolulu has begun arriving in the Federated States of Micronesia to act as official monitors for the FSM national congressional and Chuuk state elections on March 3. Some 20 observers from a variety of countries in the Asia Pacific region will be participating in the monitoring project, which will focus on learning about local election processes and promoting their integrity and legitimacy.

Among the observers is expected to be U.S. congressional Rep. Eni F. H. Faleomavaega of American Samoa, along with a number of other prominent scholars and diplomats. Teams of observers and translators will be stationed at a number of key polling and vote tabulating locations in Pohnpei, Chuuk and Yap.

HONOLULU (Feb. 6) – The application deadline for the East-West Center's new Norway-Pacific Islands Scholarship Program (NPISP)— created for students from the Solomon Islands or Vanuatu to pursue a master’s degree in anthropology, Pacific islands studies, or political science at the University of Hawai‘i at Manoa— is March 15, 2009. Study will begin in August 2009.  Scholarship provisions include tuition, residence hall fees, book allowance, living stipend, health insurance, and round-trip airfare. 

Application forms and detailed program information are available at: http:// EastWestCenter.org/studentprograms .

HONOLULU (Dec. 11, 2008) – The East-West Center (EWC) received a grant of $414,952 from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health & Human Development to support on-going research in Japan on family change. The multi-year study, “Innovations in Early Life Course Transitions,” focuses on the interplay of structural societal change, individual behavior and attitudes, and the emergence of an altered family institution in Japanese society.

HONOLULU (Dec. 23) – East-West Center Senior Fellow Fereidun Fesharaki has been appointed by U.S. Secretary of Energy Samuel Bodman to serve on the National Petroleum Council (NPC). The Council is a self-funded advisory body to the Secretary of Energy whose members represent all sectors of the oil and natural gas industries and related interests.