March 2010

• Senior Fellow Imtiaz Ali (2009-2010) gave a lecture for a week-long USIP training course on Foundations of Conflict Analysis that was taught at the Univeristy of Maryland as part of its Rapid Analytical Support and Expeditionary Response (RASER) program.  Ali spoke on "Security Threats in the Afghanistan-Pakistan Border Region: Analytical and Policy Considerations."
• Senior Visiting Scholar Ambassador Jayantha Dhanapala was the keynote speaker for "The Contribution of Nuclear Weapon-Free Zones to the Global Nuclear Nonproliferation and Disarmament Regime," conference hosted jointly by USIP and the George Washington University Elliott School.  Watch his speech.
• Senior Fellow George Lopez (2009-2010) published an OpEd in the Huffington Post, "With Sanctions Against Iran, Congress Should Defer to the President."  He also gave presentations at the University of Bridgeport on "Sanctions and Peace in the Middle East- Lessons Learned," and "Challenges of Building Peace Studies Amidst War and Terrorism."
• Senior Fellow Andries Odendaal (2009-2010) gave a lunch presentation at the UN on "The Three Legs of Local Peacebuilding."  The talk was organized by the UN Interagency Framework Team for Preventitive Action and hosted by UNDP's Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery.  Odendaal also participated in a training for high level African government officials organized by UNITAR in Addis Abbaba, Ethiopia, on conflict management and peace-building.
• Senior Fellow Sammy Smooha (2009-2010)  took part in a conference held a the University of Maryland on "Israel as a Jewish State."  The conference was sponsored by the Gildhorn Institute for Israel Studies, which is headed by former Senior Fellow Yoram Peri (2001-2002).
• Returning from a month long research trip to Sierra Leone, Senior Fellow Marc Sommers (2009-2010) presented his findings as part of a panel at the Brookings Institute on innovations in education in Africa.
• In a new USIP In the Field Feature, "Peru's Simmering Conflict in the Amazon," Senior Fellow Patricia Vasquez (2009-2010) writes about how Peru's expanding oil and gas industries are causing problems for the country's indigenous populations in the Amazon Region. 
• Senior Fellow Robin Wright (2009-2010) spoke at the USIP event, "Women Transforming Iran," and was a guest on CNN's American Monring, discussing the Middle East peace talks and Arab-Israeli relations.
• Senior Fellow Michael Gordon (2008-2009) participated in the Security Policy Forum at the Elliott School for International Relations, sponsored by The Institute for Security and Conflict Studies, in cooperation with the Institute for Middle East Studies and the Institute for Public Diplomacy and Global Communcation, presenting on "The Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan: The Journalistic Challenges."
• Iraq Fellow Ra'id Juhi al-Saedi (2008) visited the Jackson Center for two days of discussion surrounding his work as the Chief Investigative Judge of the iraqi High Tribunal.  Read more.
• Senior Fellow Barbara Slavin (2007-2008) published an article in Foreign Policy, "Obama's Middle East Democracy Problem."
• Senior Fellow Donald Steinberg (2004-2005) was appointed to the United Nations Civil Society Advisory Group on Women, Peace and Security.
• Senior Fellow Marvin Weinbaum (1996-1997), currently a Scholar-in-Residence at the Middle East Institute, testified at a hearing of the Middle East and South Asia Subcommittee of the House Foriegn Affairs Committee on the topic of "Bad Company: Lashkar E-Taiba and the Growing Ambition of IC MIlitancy in Pakistan."

February 2010

• Senior Fellow Imtiaz Ali (2009-2010) participated in the Peter Jennings Project for Journalists and the Constitution by the National Constitution Center.  Read more.
• Senior Fellow Judy Asuni (2009-2010) testified for the House Foreign Relations staff on the Niger Delta and amnesty.
• Senior Fellows George Lopez (2009-2010) and Robin Wright (2009-2010) took part in a panel discussion at USIP on "Regime and Opposition in Iran: Preparing for a New Confrontation."
• Senior Fellow George Lopez (2009-2010), together with eminent fellow-conflict resolution experts Chester Crocker and I. William Zartman, participated in a course at the USIP Academy on Mediating Violent Conflict.
• Senior Fellow Andries Odendaal (2009-2010) participated in a seminar held outside Nairobi, Kenya, on Building Infrastructures for Peace.  The conference was organized by UNDP's Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery (BCPR).
• Senior Fellow Emmanuel Teitelbaum (2009-2010) presented his book manuscript at two workshops in February.  The workshops, both titled "Managing Dissent: Government Responses to Industrial Protest in Post-Reform South Asia," were held at Harvard University and the George Washington University.
• Senior Fellow Robin Wright (2009-2010) appeared on CNN's Anderson Cooper: 360 Degrees for the segment, "Targeting thte Taliban."
• Columbia University Press published a book by Senior Fellow Ceslav Ciobanu (2003-2004), Frozen and Forgotten Conflicts in the Post-Soviet States: Genesis, Political Economy, and Prospects for Solution, which is based on work done during his fellowship at USIP.  Ciobanu spoke on the topic of his book at a panel at George Washington University's Elliott School on "Whither Moldova: Democratic Breakthrough or Permanent Crisis?"
• Senior Fellow Avner Cohen (2007-2008), currently a public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center, published an OpEd in Haaretz, "Iranian Threat to Destroy Israel doesn't hold up."
• Senior Fellow Robert Maguire (2008-2009) participated in the USIP event, "Haiti: Six Weeks Later," looking at Haiti since the January earthquake.  He co-authored OpEds in The Christian Science Monitor and The Globe and Mail with Robert Muggah entitled "Five Smart Ways to Rebuild Haiti," and "Now is the Time to Fix the Inequalities in Haiti."  Maguire also appeared on the Charlie Rose Show on February 22nd.
• Senior Fellow Leonard Rubenstein (2008-2009), currently a Visiting Scholar at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School fo Public Health, co-authored, with Stephen N. Xenakis at OpEd in the New York Times, "Doctors Without Morals."

January 2010

• In connection with the projects of Senior Fellows Judith Asuni (2009-2010) and Patricia Vasquez (2009-2010) on natural resources management and conflict, the Jennings Randolph Program and the Center on Sustainable Economies hosted a panel discussion on "Natural Resources: Plunder or Peace?" with Paul Colier (Director, Centre of African Economies, Oxford University) and Nancy Birdsall (President, Center for Global Development).  Raymond Gilpin, Director of USIP's Center on Sustainable Economies, moderated.
• Senior Fellow Imtiaz Ali's (2009-2010) article "Karachi Becoming a Taliban Safe Haven?" was published in the January issue (Vol. 3, Issue 1) of the CTC Sentinal, a publication of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.
• Senior Fellow Judith Asuni (2009-2010) spoke at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York City as a part of the Roundtable Series on the United States' Strategic African Partners: Prospects for Sucess: Amnesty in the Niger Delta.  She also served on a briefing team for Senate and House staffers on Nigeria, specifically focusing on the situation in the Niger Delta.
• Senior Fellow George Lopez's (2009-2010) article, "Sanctioning Iran Further Won't Work" was published in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.  The article draws on Lopez's December 15th testimony to the House Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign affairs where he discussed sanctions on Iran.  He was also interviewed on the Voice of America's Persian News Network program Straight Talk, which is translated into Farsi and broadcast in Iran.
• Senior Fellow Marc Sommers (2009-2010) participated in a panel on "The Other Side of Gender: Masculinity Issues in Violence Conflict" presented by USIP's Gender and Peacebuilding Initiative.
• Senior Fellow Robin Wright (2009-2010) published an article in Time, "Iran's Regime and Opposition Brace for the Next Round" and an OpEd in the Los Angeles Times, "An Opposition Manifesto in Iran: Groups Protesting Aginst the Current Regime Reveal What They Want a New Iranian Government to Look Like."  Wright interviewed Abdulkarim Soroush, father of Iran's reform movement, for an OpEd in the Christian Science Monitor entitled, "Abdolkarim Soroush: The Goals of Iran's Green Movement."  This interview was the basis for an article in the Huffington Post.  She appeared on ABC News to discuss the attack against the CIA base in Afghanistan.  Additionally, Wright's blog on Iran is now listed on the New York Times website (list of blogs is on the lower right).  View here.
• Army Fellow Col. Matt Venhaus (2009-2010) and Senior Fellow Marc Sommers (2009-2010) participated on the USIP panel "Youth, Violence and Extremism: Debunking Conventional Wisdoms."  Col. Venhaus spoke on the radicalization of youth in the Midle East, and Sommers on policy and program strategies for post war youth, with insights from Rwanda.  In connection with this panel discussion, Col. Venhaus appeared on C-SPAN's Washington Jounral program to discuss youth, violence and extremism.  Watch here.
• In wake of the disastrous earthquake in Haiti, former Senior Fellow and current Chairman of the USIP Haiti Working Group Robert Maguire (2008-2009) was cited, published and spoke in a number of venues.  Maguire was a guest on Chicago Public Radio for the segment "Crisis in Haiti: Rebuilding Institutions and Civil Society"; his comments appeared on the New York Times Blog "Room for Debate;" and he took part in a panel convened to address the earthquake emergency in Haiti.  The event was co-sponsored by, and held at, the Inter-American Dialogue, and included Ambassador Albert Ramdin, Assistant Secretary General, Organization of American States and Dora Currea, Caribbean Country Manager, Inter-American Development Bank.  NPR picked up Maguire's comments on the need for the international development community to depart from older ways of providing development support to Haiti, particularly the focus on urban-based projects at the expense of rural development.
• Senior Fellow Betty Bigombe (2006-2007) has been awarded the Geuzen medal for 2010 from the Geuzenverzet trust.  The trust honors individuals or organizations which seek to promote democracy and oppose dictatorship, discrimination and racism.  In recognizing her work, the Geuzenverzet trust said that as lead mediator in the northern Uganda conflict, Bigombe "has tirelessly played the role of peace advocate and adviser to the warring factions."  Read more about the trust's award to Bigombe.
• Senior Fellow Charles Call (2008-2009) published an OpEd in the Miami Herald, "Haiti's Recovery: Agree on a Shared Vision for the Future."
• An article co-authored by Senior Fellow Leonard Rubenstein (2008-2009) and USIP Research Assistant Melanie Bittle during Rubenstein's fellowship appeared in a special issue of the Lancet devoted to Violent Conflict and Health, "Responbility for Protection of Medical Workers and Facilities in Armed Conflict," (The Lancet, Volume 375, Issue 9711, Pages 329-340).
• Senior Fellow Donald Steinberg (2004-2005) gave testimony for the House of Commons International Development Committee.  Read his presentation, "The International Role in Promoting Democratic Governance and Economic Recovery in Zimbabwe."
• The International Center for Transitional Justice has announced that as of March 2, 2010, former Senior Fellow David Tolbert (2008-2009) will become president of the ICTJ on March 2, 2010.  Since finishing his senior fellowship, Tolbert has been serving as Registrar for the United Nations' Special Tribunal for Lebanon based in The Hague.
• Senior Fellow Radwan Ziadeh (2007-2008), now a Reagan-Fascall Demoracy Fellow at the National Endowment for Democracy, gave a presentation at NED on "Syria's Democratic Past: Lessons for the Future."