“I am a Pacific Islander too,” President says

HONOLULU (Nov. 18, 2011) -- Heads of State and special envoys from eleven Pacific island nations met with President Obama, Secretary of State Clinton and other top U.S. and international officials in a special series of meetings organized by the East-West Center in parallel with the recently completed APEC leaders’ week in Honolulu, Hawai‘i.

Cook Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, and Tonga were represented. The Honorable Peter O’Neil, Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, was selected as the delegation’s Chairman, with Niue’s Premier, Hon. Toke Talagi, serving as Vice Chairman.

HONOLULU (Aug. 28, 2012) – A group of scholars, officials, educators and business leaders from more than 20 areas all over Asia, the Pacific and the U.S. will gather at Peking University in Beijing Sept. 1-3 for an East-West Center international conference on the theme of "Community Building and Leadership in Asia Pacific."

The conference will feature more than 75 substantive presentations and panels on current regional topics, including international relations, economics, environment, education, arts and culture, health, and much more.

The Honorable Hao Ping, an East-West Center alumnus and Vice Minister of the Ministry of Education, People’s Republic of China, will offer a welcoming address at the conference’s opening ceremony, and the Honorable Gary Locke, United States Ambassador to the PRC, will give a keynote address.

The 5th annual Summer Institute in International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and Human Rights will take place from 16 to 26 July 2012 in Singapore and focus on the topic of business and human rights.

The Summer Institute is a regionally based workshop held in partnership with organizations in Southeast Asia to consider key IHL and human rights issues, past and present, facing the region. Established in 2008 by the Asian International Justice Initiative, a collaborative project between the East-West Center and the War Crimes Studies Center, the Summer Institute is designed for participants working across a broad range of fields and disciplines within the Asia Pacific region or whose work has an Asia Pacific focus. Previous Summer Institute sessions have attracted lawyers, journalists, government officials, and NGO workers from more than 15 countries.

HONOLULU (Oct. 24, 2012) – For two days this week, senior American and Australian policymakers, entrepreneurs, journalists and academics met at the East-West Center for the annual Honolulu session of the Australian American Leadership Dialogue.

A bipartisan private initiative, the dialogue brings together thinkers, business people, journalists and policymakers from both countries to engage in frank and thorough exploration of matters of mutual interest, especially issues on which Australia and the United States can provide critically needed leadership by working together and cooperatively with other partners.

(Click here to read an account of the meeting by participant Joanne Wallis of Australian National University.)

Two-week New Generation Seminar for rising young leaders from the U.S. and Asia Pacific will focus on middle class issues

HONOLULU (Oct. 25, 2012) -- Eleven young leaders from nine countries have arrived at the East-West Center to begin this year’s New Generation Seminar. The group will travel together to four different U.S. cities to meet with experts on the seminar theme: “The Making of the Middle Class: Successes of the Past, Challenges for the Future.”

After gathering at the EWC in Honolulu for briefings and discussions, the group will travel to Madison and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and Washington, DC for field study. The program is supported by funding from the Freeman Foundation.

Participants in this year’s New Generation Seminar include:

HONOLULU (Nov. 14, 2012) – The priority application deadline for the East-West Center's 2013-14 Asia Pacific Leadership Program – considered the premier leadership education program in the Asia Pacific region – is Dec 1, 2012.

From August – December 2013, up to APLP 40 Fellows from around the globe will join regional specialists and leadership educators in a dynamic learning community at the East-West Center in Honolulu, Hawaii for this graduate certificate program combining the development of regional expertise with the enhancement of individual leadership capacity. All participants receive a fee-waiver fellowship valued at approximately $15,000.

HONOLULU (Feb. 4, 2013) ­–The East-West Center, in cooperation with the U.S. Department of State and the Government of American Samoa, is currently hosting a Future Leaders of the Pacific conference in Pago Pago to address critical issues facing the Pacific Islands region. The February 4-7 gathering has convened about 25 young professionals from across Oceania, along with regional leaders and academic specialists, to focus on trends, issues, and opportunities for collective regional action.

Young leaders from 10 Pacific nations participating in program supported by Taiwan’s Foreign Ministry

HONOLULU (Sept. 10, 2013) -- The East-West Center has welcomed the first group of participants to the Pacific Islands Leadership Program with Taiwan, a new initiative designed to enhance leadership capacity in the Pacific islands region and build a network of young leaders who will contribute to lasting people-to-people relationships across the Pacific, Asia, and United States.

HONOLULU (Oct. 31, 2013) -- The East-West Center has received  funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to promote public understanding and dialogue about the Khmer Rouge Tribunal in Cambodia through the continuation of activities to monitor, analyze, and disseminate information about the tribunal proceedings.

HONOLULU (Nov. 18, 2013) – The East-West Center’s Board of Governors has elected two new international members: Indian business leader Ratan N. Tata, who is returning to the board after serving several terms between 1993 and 2004, and first-time EWC board member Takeshi Niinami, CEO of Japan’s Lawson, Inc.

Newly elected boardmembers Ratan Tata (left) and Takeshi NiinamiEWC Board of Governors Chair Brian Tsujimura and the other board members, along with Center President Charles E. Morrison, extended a warm welcome to the new members, who were elected to three-year terms, and expressed their sincere gratitude to outgoing member Tarun Das.

HONOLULU (Dec. 3, 2013) -- Five high school students and one teacher from Burma who were recent participants in the Southeast Asia Youth Leadership Program at the East-West Center have won a grant of $7,000 in a project proposal competition sponsored by the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs, which funds the SEAYLP program.

The EWC program alumni received their award for a proposal to educate the public in the city of Mandalay about environmental issues – with a special focus on outreach to adolescents – and to decrease the amount of litter in the community through clean-ups and placement of recycling bins.

Female Entrepreneurs and Executives from 12 Asia Pacific Nations
Exchange Ideas with Hawai‘i Businesswomen and Students

HONOLULU (July 21, 2014) – A group of women entrepreneurs and senior executives from 12 Asia Pacific countries are currently in Hawai‘i to exchange ideas with local women leaders and students on leadership skills and the global gender gap in innovation and entrepreneurship, in an East-West Center professional exchange presented in partnership with UH Manoa’s Shidler College of Business.

The 13 participants in EWC’s two-week 2014 Changing Faces Women’s Leadership Seminar are focusing on the theme of “Women as Innovators and Entrepreneurs: Generating Job Creation and Strengthening Communities.”  

Young leaders from 13 Pacific nations participating
in program supported by Taiwan’s Foreign Ministry

HONOLULU (Sept. 9, 2013) -- The East-West Center has welcomed 26 participants from 13 island nations to the 2014 Pacific Islands Leadership Program with Taiwan.

HONOLULU - (Aug 16, 2017) -- The East-West Center has welcomed 27 emerging leaders from 10 Pacific island nations to this year’s Pacific Islands Leadership Program with Taiwan, or PILP. The participants will spend close to two months in Honolulu, engaging in experiential learning exercises on such topics as applied leadership skills, future scenario planning, social entrepreneurship and risk analysis, climate change and environmental stewardship, international relations, and public health. Then they will travel to Taipei for a month of field study in at the Taiwan Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Institute of Diplomacy and International Affairs.

HONOLULU (Jan. 16, 2018) -- The East-West Center and United States Department of State are currently conducting a three-day regional conference for young leaders from Pacific Islands nations from January 16 to 18, 2018.

The more than 30 delegates are a diverse group of young professionals from Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Tonga, Tuvalu, Samoa, Cook Islands, Niue, the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of Marshall Islands, Palau, Australia, New Zealand, American Samoa, and Hawai’i. They were chosen from a competitive pool of over 700 applicants to participate in the conference.

HONOLULU (July 24, 2018) – Hundreds of scholars, officials, educators and business leaders from dozens of countries will be attending the East-West Center/EWC Association’s major international alumni conference, to be held August 23-25, 2018, at the Lotte Hotel Seoul.

HONOLULU (April 10, 2019) -- Several former participants in East-West Center programs have been featured in recent editions of Forbes’ “30 Under 30” list for young entrepreneurs in Asia who are “leveraging business tools to solve the region's problems.”

Delegations from the Federated States of Micronesia, Marshall Islands, and Palau
help chart course for a new era of the Pacific Islands Development Program