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 (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.”

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 (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 (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.

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 .

Applications Currently Being Accepted

HONOLULU (Dec.15) -- The East-West Center has been awarded a three-year grant totaling $275,000 from the Henry Luce Foundation to provide renewed support for the Korea-United States Journalists Exchange program.

HONOLULU (Nov. 14) – As part of its biennial alumni conference, being held this year in Bali, Indonesia, the East-West Center honored several alumni at a luncheon today for their outstanding personal accomplishments and service toward the Center’s mission of helping to promote better relations and understanding among the peoples of Asia, the Pacific and the United States.

Three individuals received the Center’s biennial Distinguished Alumni Award:

 

HONOLULU (Oct. 20) – Groups of educators from Islamic boarding schools in Indonesia will be spending the next two weeks visiting schools in 11 U.S. states as part of an East-West Center program designed to foster mutual understanding between the United States and Indonesia, the most populous Muslim-majority nation in the world.

HONOLULU (Sept. 19) – Former Deputy Prime Minister of Australia Kim Beazley will speak on “Political Change and Alliance Continuity in U.S.-Australia Relations” at an Australian American Leadership Dialogue luncheon address on Wed., Sept. 24., at the East-West Center’s Hawai‘i Imin International Conference Center (Jefferson Hall, 1777 East-West Road).

Ten months ago, the Australian Labor Party under Kevin Rudd defeated the decade-long conservative coalition government of John Howard.  This November, the U.S. election will bring in a new American president.  These political transitions bring a new era to U.S.-Australian relations.

HONOLULU (Aug. 29) – Four leading China-based journalists will speak on the impact and aftermath of the Olympics on China at an East-West Center luncheon on Friday, Sept. 5., at the Center’s Hawai‘i Imin International Conference Center (Jefferson Hall, 1777 East-West Road).
Speaking at the event will be:

HONOLULU (July 7) – The East-West Center (EWC) received a grant of 450 million Korean won (approximately $435,840 U.S. dollars) as part of an agreement to conduct collaborative research activities with the Korea Energy Economics Institute (KEEI), South Korea’s national think-tank on energy policy.

The joint project, “Energy Security in the North Pacific,” stems from the Korean government’s newly launched program to strengthen Korea-U.S. relations and establish a partnership on energy diplomacy.  The collaboration between the EWC and KEEI supports that goal by improving the networking and research cooperation between the two countries, assisting in the development of an Asia Pacific energy security framework, and contributing to the design of Korea’s energy security strategy.

SINGAPORE (May 30) -- Inflation in the Asia Pacific is set to rise sharply this year in the face of increased oil and commodity prices, contributing to a substantial downward revision in the overall economic growth forecast for the region, according to a report released today by the Pacific Economic Cooperation Council (PECC).

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Media Contact:
Derek Ferrar
Media Relations Specialist
East-West Center
808-944-7204
ferrard@eastwestcenter.org

HONOLULU (April 30) -- Zacarias Albano da Costa, Foreign Affairs Minister of Timor-Leste (East Timor), will participate in a free public panel discussion at the East-West Center on the morning of Monday, May 5, along with U.S. Ambassador to Timor-Leste Hans G. Klemm, and Constâncio C. Pinto, acting Chargé d'Affaires of Timor-Leste’s embassy in the U.S.

Contacts:

Jefferson Fellowships:
Ann Hartman, Jefferson Fellowships Coordinator
Tel: (808) 944-7600
Email: jefferson@eastwestcenter.org

Hong Kong Fellowships:
Marilyn Li, Seminars Specialist
Tel: (808) 944-7258
Email: seminars@eastwestcenter.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
 
Media Contact:
Derek Ferrar
Media Relations Specialist
Phone: (808) 944-7204
Email: ferrard@EastWestCenter.org
 

HONOLULU (March 19) – The East-West Center’s Board of Governors has re-elected one of its members, the Hon. Tun Daim Zainuddin, to another three-year term. At a meeting on Feb. 29, the board members unanimously elected Daim to his third term on the board, which will extend until March 2011.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Media Contact:
Derek Ferrar
Media Relations Specialist
East-West Center
Phone: (808) 944-7204
Email: ferrard@EastWestCenter.org

American and Asian Journalists to Focus on Issues
in the U.S. and among Asia’s Muslims

HONOLULU (Dec. 19, 2007) -- The East-West Center is accepting fellowship applications from Asian and American journalists who want to learn more about the United States and Muslims in Asia.

The Senior Journalists Seminar, a travel-and-dialogue program, will take American journalists to Kolkata (Calcutta), India and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

HONOLULU (Nov. 7) – The East-West Center (EWC) is now accepting applications for two journalism travel-study fellowships—the Spring 2008 Jefferson Fellowships for Journalists and the 4th Korea-United States Journalists Exchange.

The Spring 2008 Jefferson Fellowships program will take place May 3-25, 2008, and is open to journalists from the United States, Asia, and the Pacific islands. The theme for this program is “Beyond the Boomtowns: Development Challenges in The Other China.” Fellows will travel to Honolulu, Hawaii; and Beijing, Chongqing and Chengdu, China. The China study tour will include overland travel through smaller cities and rural areas. Fellows will visit regions that reflect different stages of China’s economic and political development.

For more information, contact:
Karen Knudsen, Director
Office of External Affairs
Phone: Office: (808) 944-7195
Email: KnudsenK@EastWestCenter.org

October 19, 2007

WHO:    Davin Aoyagi and Maria Walczuk, Hawaii High School Students who analyzed the Khmer Rouge War Crimes Tribunal on a recent EWC program in Cambodia

DATE:     Sunday, October 21, 2007

TIME:     2:00 - 4:00 PM

WHO:    Shari Villarosa, U.S. Charge D'Affairs in Burma
 
DATE:   Wednesday, October 10, 2007
 
TIME:    11:30 a.m.   News conference in the East-West Center Gallery, Burns Hall 1601 East-West Road

12:00 noon:   Public talk in EWC Burns Hall, room 3015, 1601 East-West Road

           
World attention has been riveted on Burma (Myanmar) in recent weeks as thousands of citizens led by monks peacefully marched through Rangoon and other cities throughout the country. The marches ended with a heavy-handed response from the government. Shari Villarosa, the leading United States diplomat in Burma, will give a public talk at the East-West Center on Wednesday, October 10 at 12:00 noon at the EWC Burns Hall, room 3015.

HONOLULU (September 11) – The first planning workshop for an ecological approach to combating emerging infectious diseases (EID) in Southeast Asia will take place September 12-13, 2007 at the Melia Hotel in Hanoi. The East-West Center’s Director of Research, Nancy Lewis, and Senior Fellow Jefferson Fox are teaming up with leading public health researchers from Vietnam’s government and universities together with University of Hawai’i specialists to find ways to prevent and control EID in the region.

Background:

HONOLULU (September 5) – India’s consul general in San Francisco, (Ambassador) B.S. Prakash will address the changing profile of India and the impact on its relationship with the United States at a luncheon gathering at the East-West Center Monday, September 10.

The luncheon will begin at noon with registration commencing at 11:30 a.m. The venue is the Garden Level of the East-West Center’s Imin International Conference Center (1777 East-West Road). The luncheon is open to the public at a cost of $22 per person. RSVP deadline is Thursday, September 6. Limited parking is available on the lawn between Lincoln Hall and the Imin Center for a cost of $3.

The luncheon forum is sponsored by the East-West Center, Pacific and Asian Affairs Council, Friends of the East-West Center, and the University of Hawai‘i Center for South Asian Studies.

Dr. Allen Clark
Senior Fellow, Research Program
East-West Center

Tuesday, September 11, 2007
7:15 a.m. to 8:15 a.m.
Bank of Hawai‘i Main Branch Executive Dining Room 6th floor  

• The presentation is open to news coverage.

  To attend,or arrange for an interview, contact Karen Knudsen, Director of External Affairs, East-West Center at 944-7195 or knudsenk@eastwestcenter.org

• Attendance is by invitation. Bank of Hawaii sponsors the East-West Center AsiaPacific Breakfast Briefings.  Attendees are members of the EWC Foundation and other invited business and community leaders.

HONOLULU (August 21) – The East-West Center (EWC) was awarded a contract for $98,679 under a USAID Cooperative Agreement with Family Health International, to provide technical support for Vietnam’s HIV national estimates and projections project for 2007 and to extend the on-going Analysis and Advocacy (A2) project to Haiphong.
 
"The East-West Center’s collaboration with A2 project partners in Vietnam over the past two years has led to positive changes in the Ho Chi Minh City action plan for AIDS, which in turn strengthened the local response.  The team is now looking to streamline the process in order to replicate it in other sites,” according to Tim Brown, East-West Center Senior Fellow, and member of the team heading up the project.

HONOLULU (June 26) – Director of the East-West Center’s Research Program Nancy Lewis has been elected vice president of the prestigious Pacific Science Association (PSA) at its recently concluded conference in Okinawa, Japan. Serving as an officer in the influential science group is not new to Lewis. She most recently represented the PSA as its secretary-general and treasurer.

Founded in 1920, the PSA is the oldest interdisciplinary science organization in the Asia Pacific region. With its secretariat headquartered at Honolulu’s Bishop Museum, the group facilitates international research and collaboration throughout the region. It focuses on key regional issues and problems to engage science in the service of human needs and to improve the quality of life of the region’s people and of the natural world upon which they depend.

The East-West Center is hosting two events of timely interest Friday, May 25 at the Hawaii Imin International Conference Center, 1771 East-West Road.

•    Noon to 1:30 (Program to begin at 12:30 p.m.)

“Building Understanding Between the United States and the Asian Muslim World” featuring journalists from the United States and Asian nations with substantial Muslim populations. The program will feature reflections and insights by seasoned journalists stemming from their participation in the EWC’s Senior Journalists Seminar, a travel-study-dialogue program that offers the journalists a chance to engage their peers on issues dividing the United States and the Asian Muslim nations, especially since 9 /11.
 
•    5:30 p.m. to 7:00 p.m.

HONOLULU (May 14) – Participants in the East-West Center’s  Senior Journalists Seminar representing the United States and Asian countries with substantial Muslim populations will speak at noon on Friday, May 25, at the EWC’s Hawaii Imin International Conference Center (Jefferson Hall, 1777 East-West Road). Cost for the luncheon is $20 for co-sponsor members and $22 for the general public.

The seminar program affords senior U.S. and Asian journalists the opportunity to engage their peers on issues that have hurt relations between these Asian countries and the U.S., especially since 9 / 11. The Asian Muslim journalists travel to the U.S. mainland for a slice of American life, while their U.S. counterparts travel to Asia.

HONOLULU (May 2, 2011) – The U.S. discovery and killing of Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan has resulted in intensified focus on the crucial but troubled relationship between the two nations.
East-West Center research fellow Dr. Shabbir Cheema is available to comment on such issues as possible impact of the Bin Laden operation on U.S.-Pakistan relations going forward, as well as reactions within Pakistan itself. Dr. Cheema, who is originally from Pakistan and previously directed governance programs at the United Nations, is an expert on Pakistani political affairs and international relations.
His contact information is :
Shabbir Cheema , East-West Center Senior Fellow and Director of Asia Pacific Governance and Democracy Initiatives
Email : cheemas@eastwestcenter.org
Phone : 808 944-7427

High-level speakers offer differing views at U.S. Asia Pacific Council conference

WASHINGTON, D.C. (May 26, 2011) -- The pending Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, could serve as a vital stepping stone to a broader regional trade agreement, said key Asia-Pacific trade ministers who addressed the 8th annual U.S. Asia Pacific Council Conference on May 23. But they warned that the TPP will not realize this potential if trading nations abandon all efforts to conclude the World Trade Organization’s long-stalled Doha Round of negotiations.

In contrast, U.S. trade policymakers who addressed the conference were skeptical about the viability of the Doha process but quite bullish on the TPP.

HONOLULU (April 18, 2011) — Thirteen journalists from Pakistan and America are currently visiting each other’s countries as part of the East-West Center’s inaugural Pakistan-U.S. Journalists Exchange.
At the East-West Center in Honolulu, Hawaii, the journalists participated in focused discussions on the complex U.S.-Pakistan relationship and issues facing the media in both countries. The Pakistani participants then travelled to Washington, D.C., New York City, and Columbia, Missouri, while the Americans visited Islamabad and Lahore, Pakistan.
They will meet again in Honolulu to exchange notes and impressions, and will participate in a public panel discussion on U.S. engagement in Pakistan on April 21.
The participants in the fellowship are:
Pakistan:

HONOLULU (April 8, 2011) -- Climate change experts will gather in Taipei, Taiwan, April 11-13 for an international conference on managing climate change risk in Asian coastal cities. Conference registration is open to the media and members of the public. For more information, click here .
The Second International Conference on Cities at Risk: Building Adaptive Capacities for Managing Climate Change Risks in Asian Coastal Cities (CAR II), will be held at Taipei’s Academy of Sciences. The conference is a part of an ongoing multi-year effort titled “Cities at Risk,” which aims to reduce risks and vulnerabilities of Asian coastal cities due to climate change and urban growth.
Among the topics to be addressed are: