April 2015

■ LUXURY LIVING AND TRAVEL & HOTELS SPECIAL SECTIONS INSIDE

A World of News and Perspective

HOTELS T R A V E L &

■ A Special Section of The Washington Diplomat

Fever

CHERRY BLOSSOM ■ APRIL 2015

■ WWW.WASHDIPLOMAT.COM

■ VOLUME 22, NUMBER 4

■ April 2015

Pink Flowers Heat Up

Post-Winter Washington

by Stephanie Kanowitz

T

Nathalie Cely Suárez arrived in Washington after Ecuador and the U.S. had kicked out each other’s ambassadors.

But after three years of rocky relations, Ecuador’s tech-savvy envoy is leaving, satisfied she helped bring bilateral ties back from the abyss. PAGE 6

UNITED STATES

Armenia Prods U.S. To Acknowledge Genocide Anniversary From San Francisco to South Dakota, Armenians are leaving no stone unturned in their effort to convince Americans to recognize the 100th anniversary of what they say was the systematic murder of 1.5 million of their forefathers. PAGE 8

culture

this winter may

PEOPLE OF WORLD INFLUENCE

SOUTH AMERICA

Ecuador Envoy Leaves After Three Years of Tumultuous Relations

he snow totals

have been

unimpressive compared to previous seasons, but

the winter felt long, and few Washington residents

and visitors will be sad to

see it go. A sure sign that single-digit temperatures are behind us, at least for

19

The Washington Diplomat

Donohue:

a while, is the bloom of the Japanese Yoshino cherry trees along the Tidal Basin.

April 2015

April 2015

Continued on next page

TRAVEL & HOTELS

The Washington Diplomat

SRI LANKA’S

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Unapologetic Advocate for U.S. Business

FRESH START

As head of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce for the past 18 years, Thomas J. Donohue makes no bones about defending American business interests. His aggressive approach to influencing policy has ruffled political feathers, but it’s also helped transform the chamber from a middling, moribund institution into a

Ten years after Mahinda Rajapaksa became its president and six years after the end of a devastating civil war that killed as many as 100,000 people, Sri Lanka finally has a new leader, a new ambassador in Washington and a new outlook on reconciling with its past — and with the international community. PAGE 11

global powerhouse. PAGE 4

DIPLOMATIC SPOUSES

Benin Wife Takes Aim at Tobacco Use Yolonda Richardson, the American wife of Benin’s envoy, has held top positions at Africare and other development groups. She’s now busy with her latest project: a campaign

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The Washington Diplomat

April 2015

CONTENTS tHE WasHINgtON DIPLOmat

14 Digital diplomacy

[ news ] 4

6

ECUADOR ENVOY LEAVES After over three years of riding out the storm of EcuadorU.S. acrimony, Ambassador nathalie Cely Suárez is leaving Washington satisfied that she helped bring bilateral ties back from the abyss.

8

11

Cherry blossoms

Mexican art

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32

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[ hotels & travel ] 19

22

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TRAVEL ESCAPE The Travel & Adventure Show recently came to town to offer Washingtonians a respite from the cold — and a place to dream about their next escape.

DIGITAL DIPLOMACY 25

COVER: Ambassador’s photo taken at the Embassy of Sri Lanka

by Lawrence Ruggeri.

30

34

GUTE GOOD now in its 11th year, “gute aussichten: new german photography 2014/2015,” an annual exhibition of germany’s top photography competition, seems as fresh and forward-looking as ever.

36

FILM REVIEWS The gripping hungarian drama “White god” depicts a mixed-breed dog as the main character, but this allegory on social oppressiion is not your typical cuddly fido flick.

37

FILM INTERVIEWS hungary’s Kornél mundruczó turned to a dog to create a pointed social commentary about the xenophobic conservatism sweeping both hungary and Europe.

[ luxury living ]

38

CINEMA LISTING

PARTY LIKE A PRO

40

EVENTS LISTING

Lynda Webster, whose portfolio includes more than 600 events, talks about what it takes to plan the perfect event.

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DIPLOMATIC SPOTLIGHT

44

APPOINTMENTS

44

WORLD HOLIDAYS

45

CLASSIFIEDS

46

REAL ESTATE CLASSIFIEDS

OBAMA INSIGHTS Three major documents shed important light on President Obama’s vision of the world and what he hopes to accomplish the rest of his term.

MEXICO’S 25 The mexican Cultural Institute is bursting with artistic events — and talent — to commemorate its 25th anniversary.

RED-HOT PINKNESS A sure sign that single-digit temperatures are finally behind us is the bloom of the Japanese yoshino cherry trees along the Tidal Basin, heralding the start of cherry blossom fever in Washington.

COVER PROFILE: SRI LANKA

Can you hear me now? filipinos can, thanks to a new app devised by the Philippine Embassy to help diaspora communities keep in touch with home.

33

MEDICAL

DIPLOMATIC SPOUSES yolonda richardson met her husband, Benin Ambassador Omar Arouna, when she was his boss at Africare, one of many top positions she’s held in the development arena.

If you aren’t convinced that regular exercise is one of the best things for just about every aspect of your health, two studies validate what doctors have been saying for years.

Sri Lankan Ambassador Prasad Kariyawasam says his new government is determined to show the world that the country is making peace with its past.

14

BOOK REVIEW Since leaving what many saw as a mediocre presidency, Dwight D. Eisenhower’s stock has risen steadily over the past half century, to the point where he is now often regarded as one of America’s finest presidents.

THE GENOCIDE LOBBY Armenia’s formidable grassroots advocacy movement is going into overdrive to get Americans to recognize the 100th anniversary of Turkish atrocities that Armenians say amount to genocide.

33

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PEOPLE OF WORLD INFLUENCE Under Tom Donohue’s leadership, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has forged a reputation as a confrontational — but “ethical” and with “good manners,” as Donohue puts it — force to be reckoned with in Washington.

April 2015

SISTERLY LOVE

[ culture ]

Sister Cities International has grown into a global venture that epitomizes the concept of citizen diplomacy, with more than 2,100 partnerships in 145 countries.

P.O. Box 1345 • silver spring, mD 20915-1345 • Phone: (301) 933-3552 • fax: (301) 949-0065 • e-mail: news@washdiplomat.com • web: www.washdiplomat.com Publisher/Editor-in-Chief victor Shiblie Director of Operations fuad Shiblie Managing Editor Anna gawel News Editor Larry Luxner Contributing Writers michael Coleman, rachel hunt, Stephanie Kanowitz, molly mcCluskey, Ky n. nguyen, Kate Oczypok, gail Scott, Dave Seminara, gina Shaw, John Shaw, gary Tischler, Lisa Troshinsky, Karin zeitvogel Photographer Lawrence ruggeri Account Managers rod Carrasco, Chris Smith Graphic Designer Cari henderson The Washington Diplomat is published monthly by The Washington Diplomat, Inc. The newspaper is distributed free of charge at several locations throughout the Washington, D.C. area. We do offer subscriptions for home delivery. Subscription rates are $29 for 12 issues and $49 for 24 issues. Call Fuad shiblie for past issues. if your organization employs many people from the international community you may qualify for free bulk delivery. To see if you qualify you must contact Fuad shiblie.

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April 2015

The Washington Diplomat Page 3

PEOPLE OF WORLD INFLUENCE

Thomas J. Donohue

Chamber of Commerce Icon Makes No Bones About Defending Business

by Michael Coleman

T

he walls of Thomas J. Donohue’s office at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce headquarters reveal some things about the man.

A tastefully framed, pretty pastel abstract painted by his wife, Liz, symbolizes a commitment to family.

A large-scale photograph of the Grand Teton mountain range in Wyoming shows that even a big city power player like Donohue needs an occasional escape from the urban grind. And then there is the meticulous color drawing of Little Raven, a legendary southern Arapaho Indian chief who transformed himself from a fierce warrior into an exalted Native American peacemaker.

What does that represent?

“I share his values of peace and consensus, but if you have to take a scalp once in a while…” Donohue says, grinning and arching his eyebrows for effect.

As the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s CEO and president for the past 18 years, Donohue knows a thing or two about taking political scalps.After all, the chamber spent a whopping $125 million lobbying for pro-business positions in 2014, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.That kind of political investment enables the 102-year-old organization to make life uncomfortable for politicians who don’t carry its water in Congress.

Indeed, the chamber has forged a reputation as a confrontational — but “ethical” and with “good manners,” as Donohue puts it — force to be reckoned with in Washington.

“

Today, the U.S. Chamber of Com­ merce’s International Affairs Division employs 70 policy experts and lobbyists in Washington and maintains offices in Belgium, Brazil, China, Ghana, India and South Korea.The American Chambers of Commerce Abroad, part of the U.S. Chamber Federation, includes more than 116 American Chambers of Commerce in 103 countries around the world.

“It is fundamental to everything we believe,” Donohue said of the International Affairs Division in an interview from his office at the chamber’s headquarters located just across Lafayette Park from the White House.

“It’s one of our gems. We have people of extraordinary skill there and it drives a lot of investment and support for the chamber.”

Before his arrival at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Donohue spent 13 years as president and CEO of the American Trucking Associations, the national organization of the trucking industry. Earlier in his career, he was deputy assistant postmaster general of the United States and vice president of development at Fairfield University in Connecticut.

During his Diplomat interview, Donohue, who commands a nearly $5 million annual salary, outlined his organi-

You can’t sell [free-trade agreements] on facts in Washington because facts are an annoyance, because it interrupts the political convictions….

But you can sell it on facts all around America. It’s efficiency, jobs, efficiency, jobs, efficiency, jobs.

”

— Thomas J. Donohue, president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce “We are the best at putting together coalitions of individuals, organizations, state and local chamber associations, companies, to come together to get something done, not only here in Washington but around the country and around the world,” he said.

While Donohue’s aggressive approach to influencing policy has ruffled some feathers at times, it has also helped transform the chamber from a middling, moribund institution into a global powerhouse that speaks for over 3 million businesses.

4

zation’s positions on immigration, climate change and multiple pending international trade deals, vigorously defending each one.

The chamber is pushing hard for implementation of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), a regional and regulatory investment treaty involving 12 countries throughout the Asia-Pacific region. The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) is a proposed free-trade agreement between the United States and the 28-member European Union. However, the U.S. pres-

The Washington Diplomat

Photo: Ian Wagreich / U.S. Chamber of Commerce

ident cannot realistically negotiate either without Trade Promotion Authority, which allows Congress to give an up-ordown vote on trade pacts, without any amendments. TPA, or so-called fast-track authority, is considered essential to preventing highly complex trade deals from getting bogged down on the Hill.

Donohue said Trade Promotion Authority is critical to completing landmark agreements with America’s AsiaPacific and EU allies, who might otherwise be reluctant to go through lengthy, delicate negotiations knowing U.S. lawmakers could tinker with the final product.

“If you don’t have it, you’re not going to be able to close these other deals,” Donohue said. “Who the hell would want to negotiate an agreement that 435 members of the House and 100 members of the Senate are going to edit?

Forget it.”

Donohue said Obama didn’t make trade promotion an issue in his first term “because he had to run for office” and worried about losing liberal votes. But the president and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce are now on the same page, according to Donohue.

“When he started the next term he

was saying, ‘This is what we need to do — let’s go get those trade deals,’” Donohue said.“He’s got to get more vigorous with his own crowd but there are plenty of votes here.”

Obama’s “own crowd” would be Democrats on the left, especially those favored by labor unions who assert that the deals sell American jobs overseas for a fraction of the wages U.S. companies would have to pay at home. Critics of the sweeping trade pacts — two of the biggest in history — also argue that they’ve been hammered out in secret and would erode critical environmental, labor and consumer protections, while enriching corporate interests.

Richard Trumka, president of the AFLCIO, said in late February that fast-track trade authority is a bad deal for American workers.

“The undemocratic fast-track process … paves the way for fewer jobs and lower wages,”Trumka said.

The AFL-CIO’s website contends that “the global corporate agenda has infused trade policy with its demands for deregulation, privatization, tax breaks and other financial advantages for big business while shrinking the social safety net in the name of ‘labor flexibility.’”

April 2015

In a Los Angeles Times op-ed,Trumka argued that fast-track trade deals are murky and need to be opened up to debate.

“If you haven’t heard much about the TPP, that’s part of the problem,” he wrote. “It would be the largest trade deal in history — involving countries stretching from Chile to Japan, representing 792 million people and about 40 percent of the world economy. The Trans-Pacific Partnership won’t deliver jobs or curb China’s power. Yet it’s been devised in secret, with a disproportionate amount of advice coming from corporations and Wall Street.”

As a result,Trumka argues that the benefits of free trade no longer trickle down to the average worker but congregate at the top. He pointed out that the TPP, for instance, gives global corporations the right to bypass national legal systems through an international tribunal, and it does not address the issue of currency manipulation, which undermines the competitiveness of U.S. products.

Asked about criticism that trade deals will sell out American jobs, Donohue scoffed.

“That’s absolute bunk,” he asserted, before conceding that, yes, American manufacturing jobs have been on the wane for years now.

“There are a lot fewer manufacturing jobs,” he said.“Why is that?” Donohue said that in the past decade or so, 45 percent to 50 percent of all U.S. manufacturing jobs “have gone away” — but not to other nations.

“And they’re never coming back!” he said.

“They went to a country called productivity: information technology, robotics, process engineering, supply-chain management.”

He dismissed those “who are saying we’re losing jobs to trade.”

“What the heck — we are the most efficient producers in the world,” he said. “How do you get more jobs? By attracting those European companies who want to come here and put their factories here because energy is a quarter of the cost. You get more jobs by getting contracts around the world to sell them stuff. You hire engineers, designers and technical people to put the goods together. You hire people to transport it.That’s the jobs story.”

He characterized Trumka, his longtime public policy opponent, as “a good man” but one who can’t accept that the old way of doing business in America is just that — old.

“They have a very hard time understanding that,” Donohue said of Trumka’s 12.5-millionmember labor group.

Donohue suggested that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s message sells better in cities and towns across America than in Washington, D.C., where deeply entrenched special interests on the left have already made up their minds about the deals.

“You can’t sell this thing on facts in Washing­ ton because facts are an annoyance, because it interrupts the political convictions,” he argued.

“But you can sell it on facts all around America.

It’s efficiency, jobs, efficiency, jobs, efficiency, jobs.”

Donohue predicted that Trade Promotion Authority would pass by a wide enough margin to allow some nervous members of Congress to “take a walk” prior to the vote. He also predicted that the Pacific Rim trade agreement would gain approval and pointed out that “it is a lot closer than most people think.”

“When you mention the Pacific agreement to the body politic they think, ‘It’s over there … near Japan or Singapore,’ but it’s all up the coast,” he said of the expansive pact. “It starts down in South America and comes up the Pacific Coast; it’s Mexico, and the United States and Canada.”

TPP, Donohue said, gives us “a great opportunity to influence the rules under which trade with the Pacific is going to be written because if we’re not there, Canada and others will … go over there and make that deal.”

Donohue also argued for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership.

“We need this agreement big time because April 2015

the European economy is asleep,” Donohue said. “If there is economic growth there, it’s as thin as a piece of paper. Our largest export partner is Europe. If we could get them rocking and rolling again…”

Donohue declared that all of the related jobs projections — whether gains or losses — that experts predict the trade deals will result in are immaterial.

Photo: AgnosticPreachersKid / Wikimedia Commons

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce was founded in 1912.

“Forget all the numbers everyone is talking about — a million jobs here and a million jobs there,” he said.“Forget ’em! Just figure out we’re going make lots more stuff, we’re going to send stuff overseas, and we’re going to buy stuff and bring it over here and get good prices for our consumers.We’re going to get advantages to sell our services around the world.

“The bottom line is we’re going to perk up the economy,” he said.

Although the chamber aligns closely with Republicans in Congress on trade, the situation is reversed when you start talking immigration policy. The group has argued vigorously for immigration reform, including a path to citizenship for some 11 million illegal immigrants.

Conservative Republicans in Congress, and especially members of the tea party, consistently oppose legislation that allows undocumented workers to “go to the front of the line” ahead of millions immigrants seeking citizenship through appropriate channels.

Donohue has said that an immigration system in which “more than 11 million undocumented immigrants are living and working in our communities in de facto amnesty is indefensible.” The chamber backed a bill in the last Congress that would have allowed undocumented workers to remain in the United States legally if they passed a criminal background check and paid fines.

As he put it in a Nov. 2014 op-ed in the Wash­ ington Times: “Welcoming immigrants is good for our economy and our society,” Dono­hue wrote. “Immigrants do not typically compete with Americans for jobs. The reality is that they create more jobs through entrepreneurship, economic activity and tax revenues.”

In his Diplomat interview, Donohue said America desperately needs a comprehensive immigration bill.

“So many people have lost sight of the fact that that’s how we built this country,” he said, stressing that an expansion of H-1B visas would allow more bright young students who study at American universities to remain in the U.S. after they graduate.

“We want to keep them if they can do the right jobs for us, but we’re training these computer engineers and chemists and then we say go home? C’mon!” he exclaimed.

On the other end of the employment spectrum, low-skilled workers are needed, too.

“We need people in the recreational industry, in seasonal industries like skiing and all that stuff,” Donohue said. “We need people to work in the health care systems. Who is going to take care of all these retirement homes and nursing homes and all these hospitals as the population ages? Why are we kidding ourselves? We need skilled workers in many parts of our economy that will help us create more jobs for people here.”

“

Donohue, who monitors political calculations on the Hill closely, said Republicans need to get their act together on immigration if they hope to recapture the White House in 2016.

And he suggested the chamber will continue to prod them to do so.

“The bottom line is if you’re the Republicans, I don’t think you want to go run for president without some sort of immigration plan,” he said.

“We’re hoping and we’re encouraging and we’re pressing. I think we’re going to get there.”

Another issue that has put the chamber in the crosshairs of American political discourse is climate change, yet another subject with global implications. Some high-profile American companies, such as Apple, Intel and Nike, have publicly distanced themselves from the chamber over its war against Obama’s new Environmental Protection Agency rules limiting carbon emissions by U.S. companies. Critics contend the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s official position is that climate change doesn’t exist, ignoring overwhelming scientific proof that man-made carbon emissions are wreaking havoc on the planet’s weather patterns and breaking all kinds of records in recent years. Donohue says the chamber does believe that climate change exists; he just questions what the United States can do about it.

“The bottom line is climate change is a fact,” Donohue told us.“It has always been a fact and has been a fact in all of our history.You remember what was going on out in the plains in the early part of the century — the dust bowls etc.

— that was all climate change.

“Sometimes it gets warmer and sometimes it gets colder,” he continued, gesturing toward the snowy Washington winter outside. “I don’t think it’s getting warmer right now. We don’t deny that running engines and using coal or any of that causes a certain amount of warming. But you have to ask yourself a fundamental question: If China or India or Africa doesn’t do some very significant things [to cut carbon emis-

”

“

”

“

”

“

”

“

sions], does anybody think that anything we might do is going to change any of that in a measurable way?”

Donohue contends that American enterprise is already moving toward carbon-emission reductions.

“We use half the hydrocarbons we used to use to move trucks and cars and drive factories and create electricity than we did to do the same amount of things 15 years ago,” he said, neglecting to mention that government regulations in part contributed to that phenomenon.

“We’re doing it and we’ll do more of it. But if you look at what’s coming out of the EPA now, one deal after another assumes that if we do all of that stuff we’re going to save the world. I suggest we ought to look at it in a little broader context and make sure that we save our economy, save our jobs and use a little common sense.

There will always be climate change as long as this planet exists.”

As the Diplomat interview came to a close, we asked Donohue what else was on his mind.

He thought for a moment, then replied with a rather ominous warning.

“The thing everybody ought to keep in mind is one simple thing,” he said. “If you look at everything that is going on in the world right now, there are more hotspots than we have ever had before and many of them are not managed or controlled by nation-states.

“They are controlled by all types of groups and split-offs and more and more believe that violence is the way to advance their cause,” he said.“Obviously we’re concerned for our national security, obviously concerned for global stability, but I would suggest if you look at all of those things, the reality is there is no way they are all going to cool off, and the more of them that go south, the worse it’s going to be for trade, investment and the economy.”

Michael Coleman (@michaelcoleman) is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.

”

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Diplomacy

Washington, D.C.

Ecuador’s Outgoing Envoy: Ties ‘Far Better Than When I Arrived’

by Larry Luxner

Ecuadorian Ambassador Nathalie Cely Suárez on the July 2013 cover of The Washington Diplomat.

A

fter three years and four months as Ecuador’s ambassador to the United States, Nathalie Cely Suárez is leaving Washington at the end of March — satisfied that she helped bring bilateral ties back from the abyss.

“Our relations are vibrant, with lots of potential,” she said, optimistically. “We are at a level we haven’t experienced in a long time. I’m really glad we’ve overcome the hurdles.”

Overcome may be a bit of a stretch, but those hurdles were pretty high when Cely, 49, arrived here in January 2012 at the behest of Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa.

Correa, a leftist who’s been in power since January 2007, is a popular figure back home but a perennial thorn in Washington’s side. Despite periodic hiccups in the bilateral relationship, the United States has learned to live with the fiery Ecuadorian leader, who’s been accused of authoritarianism but has also dramatically slashed poverty and unemployment in his nation of 15 million.

Cely has also ridden out the storm, becoming a popular, outspoken ambassador despite Quito’s lessthan-friendly ties with Washington.

She maintains an active Twitter account with 61,000 followers and hasn’t been shy about defending Correa’s government to local think tanks and media (she was profiled on the July 2013 cover ofThe Washington Diplomat).

Despite the friction, Namm’s counterpart in Washington lavishes praise on a diplomat who was openly accused by her president of meddling in Ecuador’s internal affairs — but who has also earned plaudits for his approachable style.

“Adam Namm is a great ambassador. He’s a very candid person, and he’s part of the rebuilding of this trust. It wasn’t easy for me in the beginning, nor for him,” Cely said.

“Little by little, Ambassador Namm has built a very important relationship in Ecuador.”

Namm, who plays in a blues band, had his work cut out for him after a series of expulsions in 2011. The fracas started when Heather Hodges, the U.S. ambassador to Quito, was expelled after WikiLeaks released a secret diplomatic cable in which Hodges accused Correa of appointing an official to command Ecuador’s national police force even though he knew that official was corrupt. In response, Ecuador’s man here, Luis Gallegos, was declared persona non grata by the State Department and given 72 hours to leave the country.

“The United States did not have an ambassador in Ecuador for a year, and we didn’t have one here,” Cely told

“

Our relations are vibrant, with lots of potential….

We are at a level we haven’t experienced in a long time.

I’m really glad we’ve overcome the hurdles.

”

— Nathalie Cely Suárez, ambassador of Ecuador to the United States Correa himself is a fervent proponent of social media. He recently grabbed headlines for taking his online haters to task, publicly naming and shaming people who’d written abusive comments about him on Facebook and Twitter — i.e. trolling the trolls.

Correa has come under frequent criticism for clamping down on free speech. One of his detractors is Adam Namm, the U.S. ambassador in Quito, who says his government has restricted press freedoms, limited private media ownership and silenced the opposition.

6

The Washington Diplomat one recent Sunday during an interview at her official residence on Bancroft Place.

Despite the eventual return of ambassadors to both capitals, WikiLeaks remains a sore spot in bilateral ties.The anti-secrecy group’s founder, Julian Assange, has been holed up at Ecuador’s embassy in London for nearly three years now to avoid extradition to Sweden.

Prosecutors want to question him about allegations of rape and sexual molestation, but he fears the case is a ruse to really extradite him to the United States. In 2013, Ecuador grant-

The Washington Diplomat

Photo: Lawrence Ruggeri

ed Assange political asylum, though a round-the-clock police detail stands ready to arrest him if he steps foot outside the embassy. Last month, Swedish prosecutors offered to travel to London to interview Assange, potentially breaking the logjam, though as of press time lawyers had not yet agreed to a meeting.

Besides the ongoing dispute over Assange, Cely said Ecuador was still seething over what it saw as U.S. complicity in a 2008 Colombian government incursion — using missiles with GPS technology — into Ecuadorean territory. Twenty members of the Colombian guerrilla group FARC were killed in the raid, which produced evidence of FARC’s dealings with the governments of both Ecuador and Venezuela.

“That created a lot of distrust,” she said. “From our point of view, there was no justification whatsoever for that attack.”

Yet in the years since then, tensions have cooled down, to the point where, in Cely’s own words,“Ecuador has found its dignity again” and doesn’t feel the need to thumb its nose at Uncle Sam.

“We are now in a different moment, and little by little our government has made efforts to look into the future, rather than in the past,” the ambassador said, noting that more than a million Ecuadoreans currently live in the United States.

Cely, who was born and raised in the Pacific fishing port of Portoviejo, became a high school exchange student in Macedonia, Ohio, in 1983.

She returned to U.S. shores nearly two decades later to finish her education, eventually graduating from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Gov­ ernment with a master’s in public administration. An economist by training, Cely previously served as Ecuador’s coordinating minister of production, employment and competitiveness, and worked on various initiatives to bolster education, health and housing.

The ambassador and her husband, Iván Hernandez, an Ecuador advisor at the World Bank who attended the University of North Carolina, have two sons; one studies at Penn State and the other at the George Wash­ ington University.

Despite her obvious affection for April 2015

the United States, Cely still bristles when Americans lump Ecuador’s Correa with Venezuela’s late Hugo Chávez, Bolivia’s Evo Morales, Cuba’s Fidel Castro and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega.

“It’s an oversimplification of Latin America to put all the ‘bad leftist’ countries in the same basket,” she said.“We have our own economic model, and even though we dearly respect other countries in South America and of course throughout the world, each country is entitled to shape their own future for their own citizens.”

She added that even though Ecuador shares some values with these left-leaning countries — all of which belong to ALBA, a Caracasbased regional alternative to the U.S.-dominated Organization of American States — the reality is much more complex.

“I would argue that the economic model Ecuador has implemented is way different than those other countries,” said Cely, who served on former President Jamil Mahuad’s economic team while it was in the process of dollarizing Ecuador’s economy.“We have experienced 10 years of sound growth. The country has modernized in a way that hasn’t happened in centuries.”

Indeed, Ecuador expects to see GDP growth of up to 4 percent and inflation of only 3.2 percent in 2015 — a far cry from 1999, when Ecuador’s economy contracted by 7 percent and inflation topped 60 percent.The following year, then-President Mahuad replaced the worthless sucre with the U.S. dollar as Ecuador’s official currency.

“Oil has played an important role in Ecuador’s economy since the 1960s, but the growth we have experienced in the last 10 years is not related to petroleum,” Cely explained. “More than 50 percent of our revenues used to come from oil; now it’s just one-

Photo: Fabio Pozzebom/Agência Brasil (ABr)/CCA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

The presidents of South American countries meet in Rio de Janeiro in 2006: From left are Rafael Correa of Ecuador, Evo Morales of Bolivia, Luís Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil, Michelle Bachelet of Chile, Hugo Chávez of Venezuela and Nicanor Duarte of Paraguay. Ecuadorian Ambassador Nathalie Cely Suárez says it is “an oversimplification of Latin America to put all the ‘bad leftist’ countries in the same basket.”

fourth.”

In fact, Ecuador — the smallest of OPEC’s 12 member countries — is far less dependent on oil revenues than Venezuela, where food shortages and political unrest are on the rise despite that country’s vast petroleum wealth.

While Venezuela’s Chávez squandered his country’s petrodollar bonanza when times were good, leaving his successor, Nicolás Maduro, to scramble for handouts now that world oil prices have fallen by more than half, Correa — an economist educated in the

United States and Belgium — wisely cut his country’s budget by 4 percent to about $35 billion, secured a $7.5 billion loan from China to maintain public spending and announced a tax reform that could generate $200 million a year.

“Now our growth has come more from sound internal demand,” said the ambassador.

“We have one of the lowest unemployment rates in Latin America, at less than 4 percent, and total U.S.-Ecuador bilateral trade is more than $19 billion.

“What’s different about our socialism is that the well-being of our citizens is at the center.

We’re trying to find a better balance between markets and the private sector,” Cely said.“That doesn’t mean we don’t believe the private sector is the true engine of growth. Ecuador, in fact, has shown the largest increase in Latin America, according to the Global Competitiveness Report.”

Cely is also quite proud of the fact that AmericasBarometer — a study funded by USAID — ranked Ecuador at the top of South American countries in the percentage of citizens who trust their nation’s judicial system.

AmericasBarometer also ranked Ecuador second-best in its evaluation of public safety management and said it was one of only two countries where a majority of citizens approved of the performance of their national police in ensuring security. In addition, Cely noted, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration last year ranked Ecuador as the Western Hemisphere’s second-most productive country in drug seizures.

Yes, times have certainly changed for this oil-exporting country known to the world for Galápagos tortoises,Amazon rainforests, snowcapped volcanoes and Mitad del Mundo, the monument that marks the spot where the Equator crosses the Pan-American Highway.

Tourism is also booming, thanks partially to Ecuador’s use of the dollar as well as the country’s relatively low incidence of violent crime.

Ecuador now receives 1.5 million tourists a year (including 260,000 Americans), up from less than 700,000 in 2008. One in four of those tourists visits the Galápagos Islands.

To boost those numbers, Ecuador recently paid a whopping $3.8 million for a TV commercial that aired at halftime during the 2015

See Ecuador, page 15

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April 2015

The Washington Diplomat Page 7

Politics

United States

On 100th Anniversary, Armenians Urge Americans to Recognize Genocide

by Larry Luxner

N

o more than a few hundred of South Dakota’s 853,000 residents can trace their roots to Armenia, but that didn’t stop lawmakers in Pierre earlier this year from trying to commemorate the Armenian genocide.

That made the Mount Rushmore State the 43rd in the nation to take such action, despite pushback from Turks opposed to the measure.

The South Dakota House resolution (which was later rejected by the state’s Senate) would’ve designated 2015 the “Year of Remembrance” for the 1915-23 genocide, called on Turkey to acknowledge the facts surrounding the tragedy and encouraged the South Dakota school system to incorporate lessons about the genocide into the state’s official curriculum.

Only seven other states — Alabama, Indiana, Iowa, Mississippi,Texas and West Virginia and Wyoming — have so far not symbolically recognized the mass atrocities that Armenians say amounted to genocide. The Turkish government admits the killings happened but calls them an ugly consequence of war in the declining days of the Ottoman Empire, not a concerted, premeditated attempt to wipe out an entire people.Armenians, however, don’t buy that the forced expulsion and widespread killing of their forefathers was simply a chaotic blip in history.

“

Photo: Justin Kaladjian / Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA)

said the diplomat,“will contribute to the elimination of those consequences the Armenian people have been suffering for the last century.”

Activists aim to have all 50 states acknowledge that suffering by April 24, 2015, when Armenians across the United States and throughout the world mark the 100th anniversary of what they say was the systematic murder of some 1.5 million Armenians at the hands of Ottoman Turks. According to Armenians — who follow Orthodox Christianity — April 24 was the day Muslim Turks began rounding up Armenian doctors, lawyers,

The recognition of the Armenian genocide is not a subject for political bargaining or political manipulation. It is a matter of historical justice.

— Hrachia Tashchian deputy chief of mission at the Embassy of Armenia

“The Armenian genocide is not an allegation or a personal opinion,”declared Hrachia Tashchian, deputy chief of mission at the Armenian Embassy in Washington. “It is a widely documented fact supported by a vast amount of historical evidence.

“The genocide of 1915 had a number of grave consequences for the Armenian people, including dispossession of the homeland and destruction of Armenian heritage,” he added. Acknowledging it,

8

”

intellectuals and others they saw as a threat to the empire.

“The recognition of the Armenian genocide is not a subject for political bargaining or political manipulation. It is a matter of historical justice,” Tashchian told us, noting that besides the 43 U.S. states that have passed supporting resolutions, 21 countries and several international bodies including the Euro­pean Parliament in Brussels have done so as well.

The Washington Diplomat

Protesters demonstrate in front of the Turkish Embassy in Washington on April 24, 2014, the 99th anniversary of the beginning of the Ottoman slaughter of an estimated 1.5 million ethnic Armenians.

But the tragedy has taken on deeply political overtones, as Armenians embark on an extensive grassroots push to get Americans to recognize a bitter historical dispute that has relatively little to do with them.The campaign is emblematic of the Armenian community’s larger success as one of most formidable lobby groups in the United States.

For years, Armenian-Americans have been trying to get Congress to officially recognize the genocide, and they’ve won the backing of powerful supporters like Sens. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and Robert Menendez (D-N.J.). But they’ve failed to convince the White House to wade into a diplomatically sensitive dispute that could jeopardize relations with Turkey, a key security and economic ally.

So Armenian activists have also set their sights on influencing public opinion at the local level, and that’s where state “friendship” resolutions come in.

Although toothless, these resolutions confer a strange kind of legitimacy that Armenia — and rivals like Turkey and Azerbaijan — covet and collect in their tit-for-tat historical and territorial battles.

Local D.C. commemorations of the 100th anniversary begin April 22 with an observance at the Cannon House Office Building, though the main events will take place two days later in the Armenian capital of Yerevan.

On May 7, an ecumenical service is

planned at the Washington National Cathedral. Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan is expected to attend, along with members of Congress, foreign diplomats and other dignitaries.

Then on May 8,“A Journey Through 100 Years of Armenian Music” will be held at the Music Center at Strathmore in Bethesda, Md.The Armenian Philharmonic Orchestra will perform a variety of pieces, from the traditional melodies of Komitas to contemporary works composed especially for the genocide’s centennial.

Finally, a divine liturgy will take place May 9 at the 3,000-seat Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.That night, the commemoration concludes with a $100-per-plate reception and banquet at Washington’s Marriott Marquis Hotel.

Yet the cash-strapped Armenian government in Yerevan has little to do with this effort. Rather, the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) — a relatively obscure lobby shop off Washing­ ton’s Dupont Circle — has taken the lead.

Aram Hamparian, ANCA’s executive director, said his organization has just over 50 chapters and survives on donations from the 100,000 or so Americans of Armenian descent who are politically active.

“The vast majority of stuff we do is done by volunteers on a grassroots level, April 2015

but we do have three people in our D.C. office who are registered lobbyists, including me,” Hamparian told us. “The only reason we’re relevant at all in this city is that there are tens of thousands of Armenians who vote and who care about these issues.”

What’s remarkable is that the entire ArmenianAmerican community numbers no more than 1.5 million out of a total U.S. population of 318 million. That pales in comparison to Mexicans (31.8 million), Jews (6.2 million), Puerto Ricans (4.6 million), Chinese (3.8 million), Filipinos (3.4 million) and Salvadorans (1.7 million) Yet the political influence of the Armenians, like the Jews, is far greater than their numbers alone would suggest — a consequence of both groups’ high levels of education and success in medicine, business and entertainment. Among prominent Armenian-Americans: casino mogul Kirk Kerkorian, homebuilder Kevork Hovnanian, TV reality star Kim Kardashian and columnist David Ignatius of the Washington Post.

Given that half of America’s Armenian population lives in California, it’s little surprise that the latest genocide resolution in Congress emerged from lawmakers in that state. On March 18, the House introduced the nonbinding Armenian Genocide Truth and Justice Resolution, which urges President Obama to “work toward equitable, constructive and durable Armenian-Turkish relations based on the Republic of Turkey’s full acknowledgement of the facts and ongoing consequences of the Armenian Genocide.”

The bipartisan H.R. 154 was spearheaded by Reps. Robert Dold (R-Ill.), Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), David Valadao (R-Calif.) and Frank Pallone (D-N.J.), along with 40 other lawmakers from both sides of the aisle.

At a Capitol Hill press conference to mark the bill’s introduction, Schiff talked about its importance to future generations.

“One hundred years ago, 1.5 million Armenian men, women and children were deliberately murdered in the first genocide of the 20th century. These facts are indisputable,” Schiff said.

“And on this important anniversary and while there are still survivors among us, we in Congress and the president have an opportunity and an obligation to send a strong message that we will never forget those who were lost, and we will call this crime against humanity what it was, genocide.”

But a long line of U.S. presidents, from Bill Clinton to George W. Bush to Barack Obama, have been reluctant to side with Armenia and antagonize Turkey, which in past years has threatened to pull its ambassador from Washington if a genocide resolution were to pass Congress.

Serdar Kiliç, Turkey’s ambassador to the United States, says the “so-called genocide” is a myth peddled by “single-agenda lobbies” seeking to perpetuate Turkey’s negative image in the media.

“They are asking one of the parties to accept that they have committed genocide, but this was a war. An equal number of Turks suffered,” Kiliç told The Diplomat in a cover story that appeared in our March 2015 issue. “This is an issue to be decided by historians, not the U.S. Congress.”

Added Derya Taskin, president of the New York-based nonprofit Turkish Institute for Progress:“Our organization has been looking to create opportunities for Turks and Armenians to come together in a solutions-based dialogue that will lead to peace and reconciliation for the next 100 years. Resolutions like this only serve to deepen the division that has existed for the past century and keep us from coming together to mourn all the losses — Turks, Kurds, Arabs and Armenians — that occurred during this tragic period in our histories.”

ANCA says part of its mission, though, is to ensure that history is not forgotten, even for a conflict that may feel distant to most Americans.

“This is not just an Armenian issue; it’s a human rights issue that for some reason has been forgotten,” said Elen Asatryan, executive director of ANCA’s Western Region, which covers 19 states west of the Mississippi River. “Every ArmenianApril 2015

Photo: Bain News Service / Library of Congress

The Armenian quarter of Adana was left pillaged and destroyed in 1909, during the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire.

American in the U.S. has somehow been affected by the genocide.”

Asatryan said her great-grandmother on her father’s side was the only survivor among seven siblings who were orphaned by the Ottoman Turks in the early days of World War I. Following the war, President Woodrow Wilson set up a massive humanitarian effort — the first of its kind in American history. From 1915 to 1930, she said, a total of $117 million was raised to set up more than 400 orphanages.

“This literally saved the Armenian nation from annihilation,” she said.“This is a very big part of American history.”

ANCA Executive Director Hamparian argues that congressional and state resolutions serve as a moral compass to prevent future genocides, whether in Rwanda, Cambodia, Darfur or Syria.

“In 1939, prior to invading Poland, Hitler told his generals to kill every man, woman and child without reservations,” he said. “When some of his men objected, Hitler said, ‘Who after all speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?’That quote is on the wall of the U.S. Holocaust Museum in Washington.”

When asked about money, Hamparian said ANCA’s budget is “considerably less than $1 million a year,” of which only a few hundred thousand goes to actual lobbying.

In March, the organization convinced officials in Los Angeles not to renew the city’s $850,000 lobbying contract with Gephardt Government Affairs, which is headed by former House Dem­ ocratic Majority Leader Dick Gephardt of Miss­ ouri.The contract was for advocacy work it was conducting on behalf of Los Angeles World Airports.

That’s because Gephardt is a registered foreign agent for Turkey “and Ankara’s point man” in obstructing U.S. condemnation of the Armenian genocide, says ANCA, which notes that his firm signed a lobby contract with the Turkish government that will pay $1.7 million between March and December 2015.

On Feb. 24,ANCA’s Bay Area chapter wrote to Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf demanding that the city’s port end its $160,000 contract with Gephardt for much the same reason.

“Dick Gephardt’s unethical work in denying the Armenian genocide makes his firm persona non grata here in the state of California,” said Nora Hovsepian, chair of ANCA’s Western Region.

California alone is home to an estimated 1 million Americans of Armenian ethnicity.

Glendale, a suburb of Los Angeles, has 95,000 Armenians, with other large communities in Fresno and throughout the Golden State.

In early March, the Los Angeles suburb of Carson was the focus of a heated protest after Mayor Jim Dear asked to erect a monument honoring Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of modern Turkey — and a man the Armenians consider the architect of their downfall.

At a hearing to discuss his proposal, more than 400 Armenians opposed to the Atatürk statue crowded City Hall, including Glendale

Mayor Zareh Sinanyan and other mayors of Armenian heritage. When the Turkish consulgeneral of Los Angeles, Raife Gülru Gezer, got up to defend the idea, opponents turned their backs on her. Dear ultimately backed down, and the city council voted unanimously to reject the measure.

Such fervernt but obscure legislative battles are part of a long-running war for public opinion between Armenia and Turkey (which, incidentally, applauded the South Dakota Senate’s rejection last month of a resolution to recognize the Armenian genocide).

In fact,Turkey isn’t ANCA’s only adversary.The organization has also taken a hard line against Azerbaijan, which has a serious border dispute with Armenia over the Nagorno-Karabakh region.

The two former Soviet republics went to war in 1988, ultimately signing a ceasefire in 1994, though border clashes continue to this day.

To counter Armenia’s well-established lobby

machine, both Turkey and Azerbaijan have turned to high-powered help themselves, spending millions on outside advocacy and PR firms (Turkey alone has spent some $12 million on lobbyists since 2008.)

Several years ago, the Azeri government invited hundreds of U.S. mayors, state representatives and a few members of Congress to Baku — its glitzy capital fronting the Caspian Sea — on an all-expense-paid junket that was widely criticized by Armenians as a transparent attempt to buy the loyalty of state and local governments.

Both Azerbaijan and Turkey have a distinct advantage against Armenia in their courtship of American policymakers: strategic interests. Oilrich Azerbaijan is seen as a moderate Islamic state that can serve as a bulwark to countries like Iran. Turkey, with its population of 75 million and GDP of $820 billion, is a linchpin NATO ally in a turbulent region.

But while Turkey and Azerbaijan have more than enough money and clout to match Armenia’s lobbying efforts, neither can mobilize the kind of diaspora voter base that Armenia has at its disposal. That gives Armenia’s well-organized network of activists an on-the-ground advantage, especially in local capitols.

“Whereas lobbying firms for Turkey and Azerbaijan are done through a foreign government, when it comes to recognition of the Armenian genocide, all the work is carried out

by U.S. citizens,” Asatryan of ANCA-Western Region pointed out.“That plays a very big role in our elected officials not being bullied into going against something that has actually taken place.”

Added Hamparian:“We’ve made a lot of progress, and we have a good moral case. There’s a very strong government in Turkey that exercises a veto over what America can and cannot say.

But this won’t last forever. It takes time and effort, but ultimately, America will come out on the right side of this issue.”

Larry Luxner is news editor of The Washington Diplomat.

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April 2015

COVER PROFILE

Ambassador Prasad Kariyawasam

New Government Promises Fresh Start for War -Weary Sri Lanka

by Larry Luxner

T

en years after Mahinda Rajapaksa became its president and six years after the end of a devastating civil war that killed as many as 100,000 people, Sri Lanka finally has a new leader — Maithripala Sirisena — and a new ambassador in Washington.

Prasad Kariyawasam, a career diplomat with 34 years of experience under his belt, presented his credentials to President Obama last July. And Sirisena, who was Rajapaksa’s health minister before launching a surprise bid to run against his former friend, assumed office as Sri Lanka’s head of state in early January, following an election dominated by accusations of corruption, nepotism and authoritarianism.

“On Jan. 8 of this year, the people of Sri Lanka selected a different leader over the president who defeated terrorism in our country,” said Kariyawasam.

“The manifesto of the new president’s party reflects why the people voted that way: rule of law, promotion of human rights, the enhancement of Sri Lanka’s democratic traditions and the creation of a good governance structure where there are better checks and balances.”

“

Photo: Larry Luxner

However, no mischief took place this time around — a fact the White House did not overlook.

“On behalf of the American people, I congratulate the people of Sri Lanka for the successful and peaceful conclusion of Sri Lanka’s presidential election,” Obama declared the next day. “Beyond the significance of this election to Sri

Reconciliation is important for all Sri Lankans.

We have gone through 30 years of domestic conflict that has frayed feelings among all communities…. While we now have physical peace — and anybody can visit any part of the country — we need to consolidate that and provide people with a real peace dividend.

”

— Prasad Kariyawasam, ambassador of Sri Lanka to the United States More than 81 percent of eligible citizens voted, said the envoy, “including many from the north, at a time when some Tamil extremist groups were calling for a boycott.”

Thanks to his successful courting of the country’s Tamil and Muslim minorities, Sirisena — who like his opponent belongs to Sri Lanka’s Sinhalese-speaking Buddhist majority — won 51.3 percent of the vote, compared to 47.6 percent for Rajapaksa.The inauguration was carried out within 24 hours, explained the ambassador, because “that’s a very crucial period where a sitting president can make mischief by not leaving.”

April 2015

Lanka, it is a symbol of hope for those who support democracy all around the world.”

Added Secretary of State John Kerry: “The United States applauds the Sri Lankan Elections Commissioner, the security forces, Sri Lankan civil society and the candidates themselves for making sure this election was not marred by unrest and for ensuring a significant drop in campaign-related violence.”

Warm, fuzzy words indeed for an administration that until recently could barely hide its frustration with the government in Colombo.

One year ago, the 47-member U.N.

Human Rights Council voted in favor of a U.S.-sponsored resolution urging the body to investigate allegations of war crimes by both the Sri Lankan government and the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels it was fighting — especially atrocities committed during the final stages of the country’s 26-year ethnic conflict that ended in 2009.

The controversial vote followed the release of a U.N. report accusing the Sri Lankan government troops of various abuses, including the intentional shelling of ethnic Tamil civilians, summary executions, rape and the blocking of food and medicine from affected communities. One U.N. estimate says up to 40,000 Tamils may have been killed in the war’s final months, as government troops closed in on the LTTE’s last remaining stronghold. (The report also accuses the LTTE, one of the most brutal terrorist groups in the world, of abuses that could amount to war crimes as well.)

But the 2014 resolution — which expressed “serious concerns” about continuing abductions, torture, extrajudicial killings and intimidation of journalists long after the war ended — was “categorically and reservedly” rejected

by Rajapaksa, whose top envoy to the Human Right Council called it “a grave threat to the sovereignty of U.N. member states.”

In contrast, Sirisena doesn’t deny that abuses took place and has promised to thoroughly investigate all allegations, though, notably, without the help of the

United Nations. The new government immediately launched a lobbying campaign to delay a long-awaited U.N. report on alleged atrocities committed in Sri Lanka during its civil war, pledging cooperation with the inquiry.

Sri Lanka’s appeals worked: In February, the U.N. Human Rights Council agreed to delay the report, which had been due in March, until September.

Now, the Sri Lankan government must prove that it’s serious about pursuing justice.According to the United Nations, the previous commission set up by the government to investigate abuses failed to “satisfy key international standards of independence and impartiality, as it is compromised by its composition and deep-seated conflicts of interests of some of its members.”

Kariyawasam insists things will be different now.

“This government is very serious about finding solutions,” the ambassador told The Washington Diplomat in an hour-long interview at the Sri Lankan Embassy here.“That includes addressing accountability issues, how to handle missing persons and finding solutions for grieving Tamils. A conglomerate of opposition parties with very different ideologies, including the Tamil National Alliance, all came together to create a new government with a new policy.

They have a 100-day program during which there are certain benchmarks they want to achieve. They are on course to achieving them.”

Continued on next page The Washington Diplomat Page 11

Continued from previous page Asked to elaborate, Kariyawasam says he sees no reason why the United Nations needs to launch its own probe. “Our government is committed to setting up credible local mechanisms for accountability to investigate allegations of human rights violations,� he replied.“It is our will that unless those avenues are totally exhausted, there is no role for the U.N. to have its own internal investigation, especially since we’re a democratic nation with a vibrant, transparent and robust judicial system.�

The envoy added: “No other democratic nation has allowed any U.N. investigation. But we are ready to work with the U.N. system to obtain technical support and information about best practices, with a view toward making our system more credible.�

Kariyawasam, 61, is from Galle, a picturesque city on Sri Lanka’s southwestern tip known for its Dutch and Portuguese colonial architecture.

At Richmond College Galle — back when the island was still known as Ceylon — he became a star cricket player and majored in mathematics, but decided to enter the Foreign Service in 1981. “I found public service and diplomacy more interesting than being a mathematician,� he explained.

Kariyawasam is in the United States for the second time around, having been posted to Washington from 1995 to 1998. Later, he was chief envoy to his country’s U.N. missions in New York and Geneva. Right before coming here as ambassador, he spent four and a half years in New Delhi as Sri Lanka’s high commissioner to India, with concurrent accreditation to Afghanistan and Bhutan. Back in Colombo, he served as director of the South Asia Division at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as well as the ministry’s spokesman.

Among other things, Kariyawasam served on

Photo: Artesia Wells / BigStock

An election poster for Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa hangs at a bus station behind tuk tuks (auto rickshaws) in Tangalle, Sri Lanka, on Dec. 15, 2014. Rajapaksa lost the election to Maithripala Sirisena in a surprising upset for the strongman, who had been in power since 2005.

a U.N. expert panel on the relationship between disarmament and development, and he is still an elected member of a specialized U.N. committee to protect the rights of migrant workers. “Reconciliation is important for all Sri Lankans. We have gone through 30 years of domestic conflict that has frayed feelings among all communities,� said Kariyawasam, whose wife, Kanthi, is a biologist at Georgetown University. The couple also has a son and a daughter living in the United States.“While we now have physical peace — and anybody can visit any part of the country — we need to consolidate that and provide people with a real

peace dividend. That should involve economic and social benefits, and the feeling that justice and dignity has been provided to each and every citizen.�

A history buff, the new ambassador recalled that although Sri Lanka won independence from Great Britain in 1948 and became a republic in 1972, the introduction of universal adult suffrage in 1931 makes this West Virginiasize tropical island Asia’s oldest functioning democracy. “Democracy is something natural for Sri Lanka, but there was a feeling in the international community that our democratic tradition was being vitiated,� he said. “That was

reversed by the election of this new government, which has promised to introduce a set of constitutional reforms that will enhance people’s involvement in governance.�

First and foremost, that means abolishing Sri Lanka’s powerful executive system and reintroducing a Westminster-style government in which the prime minister is the chief executive and the president is the ceremonial, titular head of the country. “Sri Lanka adopted a presidential system in 1978, but over the years, it was felt that the 1978 constitution was quasi-authoritarian and did not reflect the will of the people,� said the ambassador.

In 2010, Rajapaksa pushed through the 18th amendment, which strengthened the presidency and removed term limits, allowing him to run for a third six-year term. “That is what this government is going to reverse,� vowed Kariyawasam, though he added that it wouldn’t really matter once a new constitution is ratified and the prime minister, not the president, is in charge. “In addition, this new government has promised to enact legislation establishing an independent judicial commission, an independent police commission, an independent public service commission and a right to information act, among other things,� he said.

By the end of April, parliament will be dissolved, with elections set in June or July — paving the way for a new parliament, under a new constitution. The ambassador said Sirisena hopes to create a “national government� after the election, with the support of both Rajapaksa’s Sri Lanka Freedom Party and the president’s United National Party. “For this reason, he can already count on the necessary two-thirds majority in parliament to enact a constitution,� Kariyawasam explained.

But it remains to be seen whether Sirisena can manage an unwieldy alliance between a

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April 2015

loosely organized opposition and the party it defeated in a stunning upset. Complicating things is the fact that Rajapaksa isn’t completely out of the political picture: A war hero to many, he’s rumored to have set his eyes on a parliamentary seat or even possibly the prime minister post.

A wily political operative himself, Sirisena enjoys a reputation for honesty that attracted many voters. He’s vowed to make a fresh start, one that’s already being felt in Washington.

With the change of government, at least three diplomats at the Sri Lankan Embassy along Wyoming Avenue were sent packing — amidst questions about the ambassador’s predecessor, Jaliya Wickramasuriya, a cousin of Rajapaksa.

Newspapers back in Sri Lanka allege that among other things, Wickramasuriya spent more time promoting his family tea business than carrying out his diplomatic duties.

Wickramasuriya’s replacement has also done away with the traditional Sri Lankan Independence Day festivities at the University of the District of Columbia that featured lengthy dance and artistic performances. In contrast, the most recent National Day event, Feb. 4, consisted of an elegant two-hour reception at the Organization of American States.

Among the guests: D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and Deputy Secretary of State Tony Blinken.

“I’m proud to represent this government, since it reflects the true ideals of the majority of Sri Lankan people,” said Kariyawasam. “This means respecting each other’s culture, valuing individual freedoms and respecting the rights of every individual.”

That may be easier said than done in a multiethnic country of 21 million that is 70 percent Buddhist, 12 percent Hindu, 10 percent Muslim and 7 percent Christian. The Tamils, who practice Hinduism and have their own language, have long chafed under Sinhalese Buddhist rule. The resentment spawned the LTTE insurgency, which gave birth to infamous terrorist tactics such as the suicide vest.

“The LTTE fought the government on the basis of creating a separate state for Tamils in the north and east, but the majority of Sri Lanka’s Tamils do not aspire to have a separate state,” said the ambassador. “There could be extreme groups, however — a small number in Sri Lanka, with larger numbers in Europe, America and India. That influence destabilized my country.”

That may be, but many Tamils still aspire for autonomy. Since the LTTE rebellion was quashed in 2009, they complain that the government hasn’t followed through on its postwar reconciliation promises, including releasing detainees and returning seized land.

The Tamils aren’t the only ones unhappy with the Sinhalese-ruling majority — the country’s Muslims have come under fire by extremist Buddhist groups aligned with the government. The hard-line Buddhist Power Force, known by its Sinhalese initials BBS, is behind a string of anti-Muslim attacks, an irony considering the messages of peace and tolerance that the Buddha espoused. Last summer, a hateful speech by the extremist group’s founder sparked a wave of rioting across southern Sri Lanka that left four people dead, 80 injured and several mosques burned to the ground.

“Every country has extremists,” said Kariyawasam. “We have our share too, but it’s not a constant thing.Today, extremism is almost nonexistent except in the far north.”

He added: “We don’t perceive the situation as a purely ethnic issue, because, for example, the city of Colombo has more Tamils and Muslims than Sinhalese. Since 1983, there has not been any disturbance in Colombo on the basis of ethnicity.”

In a letter to the new president, New Yorkbased Human Rights Watch — which has been monitoring the situation in Sri Lanka for more than 25 years — urged Sirisena to use the “historic opportunity” of his election victory to April 2015

Sri Lanka at a Glance independence: Feb. 4, 1948 (from the U.K.) Location: Southern Asia, island in the Indian Ocean, south of India Capital: Colombo Population: 21.8 million (July 2014 estimate) Life expectancy: 76.3 years religions: Buddhist (official) 69.1 percent, muslim 7.6 percent, hindu 7.1 percent, Christian 6.2 percent, unspecified 10 percent (2001 census provisional data) GDP (purchasing power parity): $134.5 billion (2013 estimate) GDP per-capita: $6,500 (2013 estimate) GDP growth: 6.3 percent (2013 estimate) unemployment: 5.1 percent (2013 estimate) Population below poverty line: 8.9 percent (2010 estimate) exports: Textiles and apparel, tea and spices, rubber manufactures, precious stones, coconut products, fish imports: Petroleum, textiles, machinery and transportation equipment, building materials, mineral products, foodstuffs Source: CIA World Factbook

“address major human rights issues that have been ignored or exacerbated” by Rajapaksa and even leaders before him.

“We welcome some initiatives your government has already undertaken, such as case-bycase reviews of those detained under the Prevention of Terrorism Act, the lifting of restrictions on media reporting, the end of Internet censorship, and the appointment of non-military personnel as governors to the North and East provinces,” said the Feb. 26, 2015, letter to Sirisena from Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch.

“Also important were the removal of NGOs from the oversight of the Ministry of Defense, and your pledge to form commissions to return land in the former war zones to their rightful owners,” Roth added, noting that he hopes Sirisena’s administration shifts away from the “previous government’s unwillingness to tackle issues of accountability.”

In addition to clearing the air on human rights issues, Kariyawasam aims to boost Sri Lanka’s economy by increasing bilateral trade and U.S. investment.

“Our relations with the United States are reaching a high point. Although relations have always been robust, there have been aberrations in the recent past, when we had dissonance in terms of human rights and accountability issues, especially after the conflict ended in 2009,” he said.

Even so, “the United States and Sri Lanka share several values like democracy, respect for human rights and good governance. We are a maritime nation, and the U.S. is the most powerful maritime nation in the world. In the context of Sri Lanka’s geographical location, it’s also natural for the United States and Sri Lanka to work together for international peace and maritime security in the Indian Ocean.”

Since 2010, Sri Lanka’s GDP has risen by 6 percent or more every year; in 2014, the economy expanded by 7.6 percent to about $75.4 billion. Similar growth is projected for 2015.

Even during the war, Sri Lanka’s economy was steadily growing.

Inflation last year was kept to a manageable 3.8 percent, while unemployment stands at only 4.3 percent. And today, the World Bank classifies Sri Lanka as a “lower-middle-income country,” with 2013 per-capita GDP of $3,170.

The United States is Sri Lanka’s largest single customer, absorbing 23 percent of total exports.

About two-thirds of this $2.5 billion in annual trade consists of blue jeans, shirts and other garments, followed by rubber products, gemstones, jewelry, machinery, seafood, spices and tea.

“Sri Lanka should be thought of as a market for the region because we have free trade agreements with India and Pakistan, and a PTA [preferential trade agreement] with Bangladesh,” Kariyawasam said. “We are negotiating an FTA with China, which is already one of the biggest investors in our infrastructure, so Sri Lanka can be a manufacturing hub for U.S. businesses, especially because we have deepwater ports, allowing us to become a major transshipment hub.”

Leading international indicators support the argument that Sri Lanka is becoming a much better place to do business than it used to be.

Foreign direct investment came to around $1.6

billion last year and will likely reach $2 billion in 2015, with Great Britain, China, the United States, Mauritius and Singapore comprising the top sources of FDI. And finally, tourism is booming like never before; last year, more than 1.5 million foreigners visited Sri Lanka, a nearly 20 percent jump over 2013 figures. Tourism now contributes close to $1.7 billion a year in revenues, up from barely $1 billion in 2012.

Yet relatively few Americans visit the island to explore its beaches, mountains, Buddhist shrines, elephant orphanages and tea plantations for themselves.

Kariyawasam hopes that’ll change, now that Sri Lanka is finally at peace and seems to be leaving its troubled past behind.The New York Times ranked the country as “the best tourist destination of 2010,”while National Geographic Traveler magazine named it among the six best attractions in 2012 and Forbes ranked Sri Lanka “among the top 10 coolest countries in the world” to visit in 2015.

“After the election, there is great excitement in Washington and the United States about all the positive developments that have taken place in Sri Lanka,” Kariyawasam said with enthusiasm. “I expect this will enhance our relations to a level of irreversible excellence.”

Larry Luxner, news editor of The Washington Diplomat, has been writing for this publication for nearly 18 years. His first article — a profile of Sri Lankan Ambassador Jayantha Dhanapala — appeared in our May 1997 issue.

follow The Diplomat Connect at www.washdiplomat.com.

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The Washington Diplomat Page 13

Digital Diplomacy Forum

Southeast Asia

Philippine Embassy Reaches Diaspora Via Innovative App

by Molly McCluskey

Editor’s Note: Digital Diplomacy Forum is a new monthly series on how high-tech tools are changing the face of 21st-century statecraft.

W

hen Typhoon Haiyan struck the Philippines in November 2013, it brought with it nearly unthinkable damage, a death toll in the thousands and a diaspora desperate for news from home.

Immediately following the disaster, the Embassy of the Philippines worked with AudioNow to create a callto-listen platform that lets users hear information blasts from the embassy on their phones. AudioNow specializes in connecting diaspora communities with broadcasters in their native countries to provide same-language information on their smartphones, but it was the first time an embassy had made such a request.

“The model here initially was Haiti,” Elmer Cato, first secretary and consul at the Philippine Embassy, said.

“We saw how AudioNow was able to connect the Haitian-Americans with Haiti after the earthquake, because only one or two radio stations were left standing after the quake. They provided them with a call-tolisten platform and a number in the U.S. that HaitianAmericans could call that would allow them to listen to live broadcasts from Haiti. It was also through that platform that news from the Haitian side was coming through.”

That call-to-listen platform morphed into Radyo Tambuli, a virtual radio station mobile app that had its U.S. launch in November 2014 and will debut globally in late spring.The app, the first of its kind developed for an embassy, features daily news, original Filipino music, coverage of town hall-styled meetings, interviews, opinion surveys, fairytales for children and, of course, an emergency alert system.

“For the Philippines, we think the emergency alert feature is the most important,” said Cato, the driving force behind the app’s creation.“Under our system, we can send out alerts to notify Filipinos in a certain country — all the Filipinos who have the app in Libya, for instance — that we’re in an alert, and tell them which level. We could say, ‘We’re now in an alert level four.

Please proceed to your nearest evacuation point immediately.’”

The alert system, which includes direct messaging, push notifications and social media, works both ways.

Filipinos on holiday or living abroad can send a message through the app that they’ve lost their passport or are in another type of distress. The message will go directly to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Manila, which will then send a message to the app user’s nearest embassy with information on their location and contact information.

“The app is a Swiss army knife of sorts,” Cato said, “where you’ll have everything that a Filipino living abroad or a Filipino traveling overseas would need to connect them with home.”

But the app is more than just an alert system. Users can take language lessons, participate in discussions on the various topics of the day, discover the hottest Filipino musicians and read the news. Filipino broadcasters Veritas and the People’s Television Network

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Photo: Romolo Tavani / fotolia

“

What we envision the app to be is something that each Filipino, who leaves the country either to work abroad, to migrate or just to travel as a tourist, has on their phone, and it’s a lifeline that should be there for them.

”

— Elmer Cato

first secretary and consul at the Embassy of the Philippines

provide live and recorded content, as do more remote stations throughout the country.

A daily broadcast is also generated from the embassy itself; Cato’s assistant gathers the news, another staff member reads it into an iPhone and they upload it to the platform.

“We broadcast good news about the Philippines that maybe doesn’t get the air time or the column inches,” Cato said.

While the embassy in Washington has been the driving force behind the app’s creation and launch, and in securing existing content, Cato said he expects the Department of Foreign Affairs in Manila, and other Philippine Foreign Service missions, will also add content in the future.

Since taking his post in 2011, Ambassador Jose L. Cuisia Jr. has repeatedly stressed that the role of the embassy is to serve and connect the 11 million Filipinos around the world, particularly the more than 3.5 million in the United States.

“One of our overriding goals is to serve the Filipino diaspora to the best of our ability,” the ambassador said.

“The app increases our presence in the lives of overseas Filipinos and helps further our digital public diplomacy goals.

“Through this app, we are hoping to connect our kababayans abroad with home,” he added, using the Tagalog word for countrymen.

The app is a bold step in making the news and culture of the Philippines immediately accessible not only to the diaspora, but to anyone interested in learning more about the dynamic country.

Since its soft launch in November, the app already has had more than 3,000 (free) downloads on iPhone and Android platforms worldwide — without much promotion from the embassy. Users can access the various features through their mobile data plans or a Wi-Fi connection, as well as through the app’s one-touch callto-listen feature, which uses voice minutes and incurs no extra calling charges from the United States.

Although the Embassy of the Philippines was the first to create such a platform, Cato said he could see that other embassies would follow suit. “We’re the pioneers, but other embassies are developing platforms to reach their diaspora,” he said.“They just may have different needs.”

Being a pioneer in the mobile landscape is its own reward, but for the Philippine Embassy, being first comes second to providing a necessary service for its citizens.

“What we envision the app to be is something that each Filipino, who leaves the country either to work abroad, to migrate or just to travel as a tourist, has on their phone, and it’s a lifeline that should be there for them,” Cato said.

Molly McCluskey (@MollyEMcCluskey) is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.

April 2015

An Ancient Art Form TAKING THE WORLD BY STORM

Photo: David Adam Kess / CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

The historic center of Quito has been designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

from page 7

Ecuador Super Bowl. That made it the first foreign government to ever buy ad time to promote itself in such a way.

“We needed some huge event that would put Ecuador on the radar of the Americans,” said Cely. “This was the president’s idea. He thought, why not buy an ad during the Super Bowl?”

The 30-second spot, which ran in selected markets, featured tortoises, waterfalls, rainforests, historic churches and mountain vistas, with the soundtrack playing the Beatles hit “All You Need Is Love” in the background.

“It’s too soon to measure, but a lot of people are talking about it on social media and blogs,” Cely said of the ad, noting that if tourism arrivals rise by even just 1 percent, the ad will have paid for itself.

“People loved it — even those who usually have strong opinions against President Correa because they don’t believe the socialist model is the way to go.”

Glitzy tourism promotion ads aside, Correa’s critics are seething at what they see as attempts by an authoritarian president to muzzle the press.

Current legislation to amend Ecuador’s constitution to categorize communications as a “public service” has sparked fierce debate in Quito, with one pundit comparing the amendment to efforts by Stalin and Hitler to use the press as a propaganda tool.

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said Correa regularly accuses the press of being corrupt, insults journalists and tears up newspapers in public. In two separate cases he successfully sued the independent daily El Universo and two investigative reporters who wrote a critical book about his brother.

“Rafael Correa has repeatedly used the ‘public service’ argument as pretext to exercise broad regulatory powers over the media and influence news coverage of his government,” said Carlos Lauría, CPJ’s senior program coordinator for the Americas. “We urge Ecuadorean legislators to modify the proposed constitutional amendment to ensure that it respects international guarantees of freedom of expression.”

Asked about accusations of press censorship, Cely conceded that this is “a highly debated topic,” but “totally denies” that such a thing is going on in her country.

“I don’t blame them,’” she told us.

“Journalists tend to worry about journalApril 2015

ists not being able to do their job. But the debate is full of vivid, colorful, different opinions. We totally welcome constructive criticism. That’s how you create dialogue. That’s how society builds common goals and common dreams.”

Exactly what constitutes “constructive criticism” is itself debatable, though Cely is quick to blame the “media elite” in Ecuador for distorting the whole issue and Americans for not understanding the nuances of her country.

Interestingly, critics accuse Correa of using U.S. laws to take down content critical of the president posted on Twitter, YouTube and Facebook. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act, passed by Congress in 1998, was intended to combat online piracy but is being exploited by Correa to silence critics on the grounds their posts constitute copyright infringement.

Correa has made no secret of his disgust at those who lash out at him on social media. The president recently warned in his weekly TV appearance that “for every lying tweet they send out, we will send 10,000 that are truthful.”

Perhaps it is no surprise that Cely is also an avid Twitter fan. Since signing up in 2010 she’s sent out close to 30,000 tweets.

“I tweet for various reasons,” she said.“I believe in direct communications, and there’s a lot of advantages in being able to pass your messages to such a large audience. Also, there was so much to debunk about Ecuador that I was using every available means to do just that.”

The ambassador, who’s been a currency trader, head of an educational foundation, vice president of a large bank and now a diplomat, is returning to Quito to resume her post as Ecuador’s coordinating minister of production, employment and competitiveness. She’ll also likely continue to be a staunch defender of the Correa administration.

“Ecuadoreans are not shy,” Cely said of the man who’s led her country for the past eight years. “Everybody is free to say how they feel and have their own opinions. If President Correa is trying to control the press, he’s doing a very lousy job.”

Larry Luxner is news editor of The Washington Diplomat.

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POLItICs

United States

Obama’s Budget, Security Strategy Depict Menacing But Hopeful World President Barack obama listens during a technology strategy discussion in the rose garden of the White house on Oct. 8, 2014.

by John shaw

T

he foreign policy of all American presidents is a composite of what they say and what they do, what they propose and what they fight for, what they desire and what they fear. During his six years in office, President Barack Obama has served during a time of profound global change.

In speeches, interviews and press conferences, he often describes a world that is messy, menacing but also hopeful.

The president’s most recent State of the Union address, his fiscal 2016 budget and his new National Security Strategy all describe, in different ways, Obama’s perspective on this complicated world.They provide important insights into how the president views the international scene and America’s role in it.They also provide guidance about how Obama will govern during the final two years of his presidency.

During his State of the Union speech on Jan. 20, 2015, the president argued that the steadily improving American economy gives the nation a solid foundation to confront global challenges and opportunities. He promised vigorous and prudent American leadership.

“My first duty as commander-in-chief is to defend the United States of America,” Obama said to a joint session of Congress.

“In doing so, the question is not whether America leads in the world, but how.

When we make rash decisions, reacting to the headlines instead of using our heads; when the first response to a challenge is to send in our military — then we risk getting drawn into unnecessary conflicts, and neglect the broader strategy we need for a safer, more prosperous world. That’s what our enemies want us to do.

“I believe in a smarter kind of American leadership,” he continued. “We lead best when we combine military power with strong diplomacy; when we leverage our power with coalition building; when we don’t let our fears blind us to the opportunities that this new century presents.

That’s exactly what we’re doing right now.And around the globe, it is making a difference.”

The president vowed to go after terrorists who threaten American interests and dismantle their networks, saying he that he reserves the right to act unilaterally if necessary to accomplish these missions. But he said it’s far better to work closely with partners. The United States, he declared, has learned painful lessons during more than a decade of combat in Afghanistan and Iraq about the dangers and costs of ground wars in distant places. These lessons, the presiden-

16

The Washington Diplomat

said, will guide the nation’s fight against the Islamic State, also called ISIS or ISIL. “In Iraq and Syria, American leadership — including our military power — is stopping ISIL’s advance. Instead of getting dragged into another ground war in the Middle East, we are leading a broad coalition, including Arab nations, to degrade and ultimately destroy this terrorist group. We’re also supporting a moderate opposition in Syria that can help us in this effort, and assisting people everywhere who stand up to the bankrupt ideology of violent extremism.”

The president said the nation must project its power intelligently, blending its formidable military force with shrewd and tough-minded diplomacy. “Leading, always, with the example of our values.

That’s what makes us exceptional.That’s what keeps us strong. That’s why we have to keep striving to hold ourselves to the highest of standards — our own.”

BUDgEt VIsION

CrEDIT: WhITE hOUSE PhOTO By PETE SOUzA

“

I believe in a smarter kind of American leadership….

“We lead best when we combine military power with strong diplomacy; when we leverage our power with coalition building; when we don’t let our fears blind us to the opportunities that this new century presents.

— U.S. President Barack Obama

A little more than a week after his State of the Union address, Obama presented his new budget for the 2016 fiscal year that begins on Oct. 1, 2015, and extends until Sept. 30, 2016. In it, the president proposes spending $3.99 trillion and raising $3.53 trillion in revenues, resulting in a deficit of $474 billion. The federal budget deficit has fallen sharply during Obama’s presidency from $1.4 trillion in 2009 to less than $500 billion now. (The Congressional Budget Office recently said that under Obama’s plan, the deficit would fall to $380 billion in 2016 and reach a total 10-year deficit reduction of $1.2 trillion, somewhat less than the president’s projections.)

A striking feature of Obama’s budget

”

is his proposal to rewrite the 2011 Budget Control Act’s strictures on discretionary spending. The law, negotiated by Obama and Congress, places tight caps for almost a decade on both defense and domestic discretionary programs. The cuts, otherwise known as sequestration, total $1.2 trillion over 10 years and cover those programs that are funded each year by the 12 appropriations bills that Congress must pass and the president must sign into law.

On the heels of steady and strong economic growth in recent years, Obama has called for replacing “mindless austerity with smart investments.” For the coming fiscal year, his budget proposes to exceed the spending caps by $75 billion, divided evenly between defense and

non-defense programs. The budget also allocates $58 billion for a special fund in Afghanistan and against the Islamic State, called Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO).

Obama is proposing $534 billion for regular defense programs and $43 billion for foreign affairs, while OCO would give an additional $51 billion for the Pentagon and $7 billion from OCO to the State Department.

A president’s budget blueprint is just that — a blueprint — and merely the starting point for tough negotiations with Congress, which controls the purse strings. Obama’s vision to boost government spending through large tax increases and reverse budget cuts is fundamentally at odds with Republicans who remain committed to shrinking the size of government.

Obama may find common cause with some GOP hawks who want to restore Pentagon spending. But on the whole, many of the president’s key proposals are likely dead in the water.That includes increasing taxes on the wealthy and multinational corporations who shelter profits overseas to finance new investments in education initiatives, infrastructure

See oBAMA, page 46 April 2015

Book Review

Paul Johnson

From Mediocre to Memorable: The Evolution of Ike’s Legacy

by John Shaw

D

wight D. Eisenhower served as the 34th president of the United States from 1953 to 1961. Eisenhower was initially seen as a mediocre president who breezed through his two terms in office, delegating key decisions to others, explaining his policies in jumbled syntax and whiling away his free time by playing bridge and golf.

The defeat of Ike’s vice president, Richard Nixon, to the Democratic challenger, John F. Kennedy, in 1960 appeared to be at least a partial repudiation of Eisenhower’s presidency. When Ike left the White House in January of 1961, many experts viewed him as a good man whose personal and professional skills never quite translated into a strong presidency. For example, one poll by scholars in 1962 rated Eisenhower as 21st among the 34 American presidents.

However, Eisenhower’s stock has risen steadily over the past half century, and he is now often regarded as a superb president and is even ranked in the top five of all American presidents by some scholars. He is credited with keeping the American economy humming and defending the nation’s international position without stumbling into a catastrophic war with the Soviet Union or China. Additionally, declassified documents from his White House years show he was a far more active, engaged and sophisticated chief executive than most of his contemporaries appreciated.

“

Seen from the perspective of the twenty-first century, the Eisenhower years, 1953 to 1961, were the climax of ‘the American century.’

”

— Paul Johnson, author of ‘Eisenhower: A Life’ Paul Johnson, a British journalist and historian, subscribes to and advances the view of Eisenhower as a fine man, model soldier and highly successful president in his book, “Eisenhower: A Life.” Johnson has written books on such wildly different people as Mozart, Charles Darwin, Socrates, Jesus, Winston Churchill, Napoleon and George Washington, as well as histories of the Jewish people and the modern world.

Opinionated and self-confident, Johnson writes with sweep and authority. There April 2015

are few traces of doubt or uncertainty.

In “Eisenhower: A Life,” Johnson summarizes and interprets one of the most consequential leaders of the 20th century. In less than 125 pages, he tells Eisenhower’s story from boyhood to death, pausing for analysis and commentary. The book relies exclusively on secondary sources and claims no original research. Still, it’s an excellent primer on Ike; most readers will enjoy and largely agree with Johnson’s laudatory but not entirely uncritical assessment of Eisenhower.

Eisenhower was born Oct. 14, 1890 in Denison, Texas and grew up in Abilene, Kansas, as the third of seven sons. He attended West Point military academy and was a solid but not stellar student.

He graduated 61st in a class of 164 and was part of the fabled West Point Class of 1915 that had 59 men who became brigadier generals or higher.

Eisenhower rose quickly through the ranks, reaching lieutenant colonel during World War I. However, after the Armistice was signed in November 1918 and America’s peacetime Army shrank, his career stagnated. Even so, important mentors helped mold him into a fine soldier, including Gens. Fox Conner, John Pershing and Douglas MacArthur.

Eisenhower had an important, if not always warm, relationship with MacArthur. According to Johnson, MacArthur’s view of Eisenhower shifted with the general’s moods. He once called Ike “the best officer in the Army” and on another occasion ridiculed him as the “best clerk in the Army.”

Eisenhower developed an expertise in industrial mobilization and honed his skills as a staff officer. Johnson argues that he became the best staff officer in the U.S. Army. Just days after the Pearl Harbor attack on Dec. 7, 1941, Ike was summoned by Gen. George C. Marshall to help him develop America’s war strategy. Marshall appreciated Eisenhower’s organizational skills and ability to devise solutions rather than just outline problems. Eisenhower directed the Office of War Plans and later was assigned to the Mediterranean theater, where he organized Operation Torch, the American, British and Canadian landing in North Africa. He also played a key role in the

Photos: Mark Gerson

liberation of Italy be­fore being named the Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force in Europe. It was in this job that he planned and oversaw the Battle of Normandy, which Johnson calls “one of the big moments in history.”

After the stunning success of D-Day, Eisenhower led the Allied forces that drove steadily east, sending German armies into retreat and then unconditional surrender. He was later criticized by some military analysts for not seizing Berlin before the Soviets did, resulting in decades of Soviet hegemony over Eastern Europe. Eisenhower, though, believed that Allied soldiers rushing into Berlin would cause needless casualties and would break faith with the Soviets, who had suffered egregiously during the war.

Ike emerged from World War II as an American hero and a global superstar.

He received a remarkable congratulatory

note from Marshall who was never known for effusive praise of anybody.“You have completed your mission with the greatest victory in the history of warfare,” Marshall declared. “You have made history, great history, for the good of mankind and you have stood for all we hope for and admire in an officer of the United States Army. These are my tributes and my personal thanks.”

Upon returning to the United States after World War II, Eisenhower became the president of Columbia University, where he was known for prudent financial management and skepticism toward the academic world he then inhabited.

He once described an intellectual as “a man who takes more words than is necessary to tell more than he knows.”

See Book Review, page 45 The Washington Diplomat Page 17

Medical

Exercise

Fit for Life: The Best Thing You Can Do to Live Longer

by Gina Shaw

I

f you aren’t already convinced that regular exercise is one of the best things for just about every aspect of your health, maybe two new studies can help make the case.

In early March, Johns Hopkins researchers reported that they’ve developed a new formula that estimates how likely you are to die over the next decade — based strictly on your ability to exercise on a treadmill at an increasing speed and incline.

That isn’t all that new. Cardiologists have been using treadmill-based stress tests to measure short-term risk of death for years, but primarily in people with known heart disease or cardiac symptoms, and usually accompanied by other kinds of testing. But the new test from Hopkins, which they call the FIT Treadmill Score, can predict long-term death risk in anybody, whether or not they have current heart symptoms, based strictly on how they handle it when the speed is cranked up from 3.5 to 6 or 7 and the incline ramps up from 0.0 to 5 percent or 10 percent.

The FIT Treadmill Score factors in the peak heart rate each person reaches during intense exercise, as well as a measure of how much energy the body is expending during exercise, a measure known as metabolic equivalents, or METs. “We hope the score will become a mainstay in cardiologists’ and primary clinicians’ offices as a meaningful way to illustrate risk among those who undergo cardiac stress testing and propel people with poor results to become more physically active,” said senior study author Dr. Michael Blaha, director of clinical research at the Johns Hopkins Ciccarone Center for the Prevention of Heart Disease.

Photo: monkey business images / BigStock

In early March, Johns Hopkins researchers reported that they’ve developed a new formula that estimates how likely you are to die over the next decade — based strictly on your ability to exercise on a treadmill at an increasing speed and incline.

The study team dug through data on nearly 60,000 people in a wide age range — from 18 to 96 — who underwent standard exercise stress tests, and then tracked how many of the participants at each fitness level died from any cause over the next decade. Fitness level, as measured by peak heart rate and METs, was the single strongest predictor of death risk.

Exercise also keeps your brain healthier longer, says another new study — this one from researchers at Boston University and published in the Journals of Gerontology in December.They found that older adults who are physically fit have better memory and “executive function” skills (problem-

18

The Washington Diplomat

solving, planning, organization) than adults who are out of shape.

The study compared 33 young adults (18 to 31) and 28 older adults (55 to 82) with a wide range of fitness levels. Being physically fit didn’t seem to make much difference in memory or executive function for the younger people in the study, but for the older participants, the fitter they were, the better their memory, problem-solving, and decision-making skills.

This is just the latest of many studies to find that a fit body equals a fit brain.

In a study published in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience in November 2013, a group from

the Center for BrainHealth at the University of Texas found that older adults who participated in aerobic exercise for one hour at least three times per week had increased blood flow to key areas of their brain, including the hippocampus, the primary region affected by Alzheimer’s disease.

They also had significant improvements in both their immediate memory (the ability to recall your grocery list right after you’ve made it) and delayed memory (the ability to remember it accurately 15 minutes later when you’re actually at the grocery store).

So if you want to not only live longer, but have a better chance at keeping your brain sharp during those extra years you’re buying yourself, get off the couch and move! Any exercise is better than no exercise at all, but most studies show that you need a good chunk of vigorous aerobic exercise — that is, something that gets your heart pumping — on a regular basis.

Gina Shaw is the medical writer for The Washington Diplomat.

April 2015

T R A V E L &

HOTELS ■ A Special Section of The Washington Diplomat

■ April 2015

Fever

CHERRY BLOSSOM Pink Flowers Heat Up Post-Winter Washington

by Stephanie Kanowitz

T

he snow totals this winter may have been

unimpressive compared to previous seasons, but the winter felt long, and few Washington residents and visitors will be sad to see it go. A sure sign that single-digit temperatures are behind us, at least for a while, is the bloom of the Japanese yoshino cherry trees along the Tidal Basin.

Continued on next page

PhoTo: nATionAl Cherry BloSSoM FeSTivAl

April 2015

TRAVEL & HOTELS

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19

PhoTo: Joy ASiCo / KiMPTon

Continued from previous page The tiny pink blossoms are iconic and symbolic, representing not only pleasant weather forecasts but also the congenial relationship between the United States and Japan.Their beauty is also an enduring symbol of Washington, D.C., and one of the city’s biggest tourist draws.

The annual National Cherry Blossom Festival, running from March 20 to April 12 this year, commemorates the 1912 gift of 3,000 cherry trees from Tokyo Mayor Yukio Ozaki to Washington. This year marks the 103rd anniversary of that gift, and about 1.5 million will come out to see the flowers and participate in four weekends of related programming.

Cherry blossom fever is hard to avoid. Celebrations of the event are happening all over the nation’s capital, and the frigid weather won’t dampen the delicate but durable flowers, which the National Park Service expects will reach peak bloom at the tail end of the festival. In the meantime, whether you are looking for a luxurious spa experi-

PhoTo: WillArd inTerConTinenTAl WAShinGTon

Above, live cherry blossoms grace the stately lobby of the Willard interContinental Washington. At left, the area’s Kimpton properties will be hosting evening sake celebrations to mark the national Cherry Blossom Festival.

ence, a hotel getaway, a blossom-inspired meal or some cultural exposure, there’s something for everyone.

Hotels are offering not just overnight deals, but also spa, food and drink specials:

WILLARD INTERCONTINENTAL WASHINGTON washington.intercontinental.com

The hotel that hosted Japan’s first delegation to the United States in 1860 is going all out for this year’s festival. In addition to its annual live cherry blossom display in the lobby, the Willard is offering a Cherry Blossom Afternoon Tea (Thursday to Sunday through April 12, from 1 to 4 p.m.; $51 per person, $22 for children up to age 12) in the hotel’s blossom-laden Peacock Alley.

A Legendary Hotel Located on Pennsylvania Avenue in the Nation’s Capital… Truly Inspirational

The Melrose Hotel Ms. Ella Savon, Diplomatic Relations 202.463.2391 ella.savon@melrosehoteldc.com

Snack on vegetarian spring rolls made with a teriyaki glaze, orange sesame chicken salad, black tea or cherry scones, green tea crème brulee and sake shortbread — all while a kimono-clad player strums a koto, a Japanese harp-like instrument. The hotel will also display handcrafted Japanese dolls from Akiko Keene’s Washington Japanese Dolls and Crafts School.

Book the Willard’s Very Cherry Blossom Package (available until April 30) and you’ll receive a twonight stay along with complimentary breakfast for two at Café du Parc, or stay three nights and enjoy complimentary Cherry Blossom Afternoon Tea for two.

FOUR SEASONS HOTEL WASHINGTON, DC fourseasons.com/washington

At this Georgetown oasis, guests can literally bathe themselves in the spirit of spring with the 80-minute Cherry Blossom Champagne Body Treatment ($265 Monday to Thursday; $285 Friday to Sunday) at the Four Seasons Spa. The ritual starts with a dry brushing exfoliation of the body before guests sink into a deep soaking tub. Next, an allnatural champagne and salt scrub is applied, followed by a relaxing body wrap. A body butter seals in moisture at the end of the session.

Cherry blossom-inspired food and drink are also available. During breakfast, Seasons Restaurant is serving French toast made with smashed chocolate croissants served with Nutella, black cherry compote, whipped butter and maple syrup ($17). Bourbon Steak’s Jido cocktail ($16) derives from the Japanese word jidohanbaiki, meaning vending machine. It’s a mixture of Botanist Gin and a house-made version of the popular Japanese vending machine drink Calpis, all served over a hibiscus ice sphere adorned with orange flower water.

CAPELLA WASHINGTON, D.C., GEORGETOWN 2430 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW Washington DC 20037 202.955.6400 www.melrosehoteldc.com

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PhoTo: WWW.WAShinGTondCPhoToGrAPher.CoM / CAPellA

Above, the Capella rye Bar is serving a Cherry Blossom Sour, made with Copper Fox bourbon distilled in virginia.

Below, the newly renovated embassy row hotel is offering a Cherry Blossom hotel Package through May 15.

PhoTo: GreG PoWerS / eMBASSy roW hoTel

for two at the Grill Room; a private Segway tour for two through prime blossom-viewing spots including the Tidal Basin, National Mall, Capitol, Washington Monument and Jefferson Memorial; and a private professional photography session among the trees.

The photos will be framed and packaged, too.

If that’s not enough, Capella’s Rye Bar is serving a Cherry Blossom Sour, made with Copper Fox bourbon distilled in Virginia, house-poached cherries, honey syrup, homemade cherry shrub and soda water with basil.

KIMPTON HOTELS kimptonhotels.com/cherryblossom and enter rate code BlooM

Visitors to any of the chain’s 11 locations in D.C. and Virginia can opt for the Blossoms & Bubbles Package (starting at $169 per night through April 12), which includes a deluxe room, handcrafted cherry blossom soap from nearby Harmony Creek Farm and evening sake celebrations.

Additionally, the Lorien Spa in Old Town Alexandria, Va., is offering a new Cherry Blossom Massage Ritual ($200) that will be available year-round. The 80-minute treatment involves an exfoliation with warming gingergrass and bamboo, a rub of organic rice bran scented with cherry blossoms, a mist of yuzu mimosa sea algae and antioxidantrich rose camellia, and the application of wild lime silk oil and plum blossom and silk cream.

PARK HYATT WASHINGTON

capellahotels.com/washingtondc/georgetown

parkhyattwashington.com

If luxury is your idea of the best way to see the cherry blossoms, try the Cherry Blossom Package (starting at $995 per night through April 12) at one of D.C.’s poshest hotels.You’ll get a twonight stay in a superior room; breakfast

As part of its Spring Cherry Blossom Package (starting at $309 per night through April 26), the hotel is giving guests a pot of cherry blossom green tea from its rare and vintage tea section, breakfast for two at Blue Duck Tavern

TRAVEL & HOTELS

April 2015

When Welcoming the Diplomatic Community The Choices Are Clear

PhoTo: Four SeASonS

EnO Wine Bar, part of the Four Seasons, is featuring a cherry blossom-inspired rose wine flight.

and a children’s backpack full of sightseeing supplies.

The hotel is also serving a Cherry Quinoa Cocktail ($14) in Blue Duck Tavern and in its lounge during the festival. It’s made with Plymouth Gin, house-made cherry tonic syrup, Bittercube cherry bark bitters, Luxardo Maraschino Liqueur and club soda.

EMBASSY ROW HOTEL embassyrowhotel.com

Fresh off a $15 million renovation, this 231-room Washington fixture is offering a Cherry Blossom Hotel Package (starting at $259 per night with code CHERRY) through May 15 that includes two all-day Metro passes, a gift bag and two free cherry blossom cocktails at Station Kitchen & Cocktails, which is opening this spring. The cocktail is called the Pamplemouse and is made with grapefruit-infused rye, lychee and pink peppercorns.

cherry blossom-inspired dessert, breakfast for two in the hotel’s restaurant and the National Cherry Blossom Give-A-Tree Card featuring the official artwork of the Cherry Blossom Festival. The National Arbor Day Foundation will plant a tree in a national forest for every card that is given.

if the way to spring is through your stomach, check out what local restaurants are cooking up:

ZENTAN zentanrestaurant.com

A Welcoming Home For The Diplomatic Community Centrally Located In The Heart Of the City Contemporary Flair with Unique Suite Accommodations $BMM . 4USFFU /8 t 8BTIJOHUPO % $ XXX TUHSFHPSZIPUFMXED DPN

Try a festive take on a classic at this Asianfocused D.C. eatery. The Cherry Blossom Bento Boxes ($21) will come with a choice of California roll, escolar crudo, seaweed salad or two pieces of salmon or tuna and a house-made cherry soda.

MANGO TREE mangotreedc.com

A newcomer to CityCenterDC, this Thai restaurant is getting in on the celebration with a red curry ($28) that has cherry glaze and roasted Jurgielewicz Farm duck breast served with plum and apricot.

SUSHIKO CHEVY CHASE sushikorestaurants.com PhoTo: yoShino SAKurA TidAl BASin dC By uBerleMur / WiKiMediA CoMMonS

RITZ-CARLTON, TYSONS CORNER ritzcarlton.com/en/Properties/TysonsCorner/ reservations/Packages/detail/CherryBlossoms-Package.htm

Metro’s new Silver Line bridges the gap between the area’s biggest mall, Tysons Corner Center, and the area’s most famous Mall, making the blossoms more accessible than ever. Through April 26, the Ritz-Carlton in McLean,Va., is offering the Cherry Blossoms Package (starting at $249 per night), which includes deluxe accommodations, a Metro map and concierge recommendations, two one-day Metro passes, a cherry blossom amenity from the hotel’s pastry chef and a Ritz Sailing Boat Tote with drinks and snacks.

RITZ-CARLTON, WASHINGTON, D.C. ritzcarlton.com/en/Properties/WashingtondC/ reservations/Packages/detail/Cherry-BlossomGive-Tree-Package.htm

The downtown Ritz location is offering the Cherry Blossom Give-a-Tree Package (starting at $399 per night through April 12). That buys you a deluxe guestroom, a

April 2015

This sushi-serving staple in Maryland will introduce a unique dish inspired by this year’s cherry blossom festivities.The Madai Blossom ($18) with kombu jime sea bream, cherry gelÊe, cucumber, tomato and melon water will be available only during the festival.

OVAL ROOM ovalroom.com

An American-themed restaurant with Mediterranean influences, the Oval Room will offer sashimi of stone bass from Japan ($15) with rose water gelĂŠe, sweet and sour rice and dried cherries, topped with candied cherry blossoms from Japan. Follow that with cherry-infused ice cream and chocolate cake ($10) garnished with kirsch cherries, candied cherry blossoms and toasted pistachios.

FOUNDING FARMERS wearefoundingfarmers.com/tag/cherry-blossomfestival

“A Superb Central Location On Embassy Row�

Superior Service and Newly Renovated Accommodation Welcoming Hospitality, Multilingual Staff Call 202-296-2100 3IPEF *TMBOE "WFOVF /8 t 8BTIJOHUPO % $ XXX CFBDPOIPUFMXED DPN

In honor of the festival, this farm-to-tablefocused eatery is offering through April 14 the Cherry Almond Buckle, a moist cherry cake topped with almond-brown sugar

See chERRY BlOSSOMS, page 24

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Enjoy Extraordinary Value With Our Diplomatic Rates The Washington Diplomat

21

[ travel ]

Wanderlust Central Travel & Adventure Show Offers Mini-Getaway Packed with Ideas

by Kate Oczypok

W

ith peak travel season fast approaching, many winterweary Washingtonians are counting down the days until the coveted summer slowdown. Just in time, the Travel & Adventure Show came to town to offer them a respite from the cold — and a place to dream about their next escape.

Now in its 11th year, the multicity show gives travel lovers ideas and tips for their upcoming vacations — whether it’s Alaska, India or New Zealand — along with cultural performances, tastings and other hands-on activities. It also offers an all-star lineup of experts such as Rick Steves and Samantha Brown, and serves as a convenient one-stop shop to meet with companies that can help trip planners save time and money. Held March 7 and 8, the D.C. leg of the show attracted hundreds of people to the Washington Convention Center.

John Golicz, founder and CEO of the Travel & Adventure Show, introduced a new feature this year, the Savvy Traveler Theater.

Visitors could attend seminars like “How to Fix Your Trip When it Breaks” and “Travel Skills,Tips and Tricks: Know Before You Go.” Journalist and Travelchannel. com host Ryan Van Duzer encouraged attendees to “Get Off the Couch and Get Out There!”

Golicz got the idea for the theater when the show placed speakers like “The “Travel Ambassador” Angel Castellanos on its destination stage and the audience swelled to capacity.

“We realized that attendees liked getting information and expertise on how to travel better,” Golicz said. The Travel & Adventure Show is planning to put the Savvy Traveler Theater in every market next year. Additional cities that the Travel & Adventure Show visits include Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego and Philadelphia.

Golicz said he enjoys traveling once show season is over and tends to favor sunny, sandy destinations with his wife, though he also enjoys Europe.“I’m also a big boater; we tend to travel around a lot by boat,” Golicz added. “We mix traditional vacations and more adventurous stuff on our own.”

Over the past three years, Golicz and his family have started a new travel tradition: taking a multigenerational trip. Golicz, his wife and children (who are grown and in their 20s), his sister-in-law’s family and their younger children, grandparents and other relatives spend time in a rented villa.“There’s 17 of us in all,” Golicz said.“That for me is the highlight of the year.”

The D.C. stop brings in a lot of business for the show, given that many of the city’s inhabitants are frequent travelers.

“What we hear from exhibitors is that D.C. has a very highly educated base,” Golicz said. “[Washingtonians] are worldly, culturally attuned, used to traveling, come armed with great questions and are very diverse.”

But what if you’re so well traveled that you’re bored with your usual destinations?

Pauline Frommer, editorial director of Frommer’s Travel Guides and Frommers. com and daughter of the famous veteran traveler Arthur Frommer, recommends giving Taiwan a try.“There are some spectacular nature and cultural sights there.

There’s Chinese culture but with a softer edge in terms of person-to-person interactions,” she said.“I’m also a big fan of the Cayo District of Belize. It’s fabulous, not too crowded and there are plenty of ancient Mayan sights to explore, like temples and caves where human sacrifices took place, and lots of natural beauty.”

Frommer’s father Arthur is founder of the Frommer’s series of travel guides and Budget Travel magazine. Since the 1950s, Frommer has published many books for

22

Photo: Travel & Adventure Show

The 11th annual Travel & Adventure Show on March 7 and 8 attracted hundreds of people to the Washington Convention Center.

travelers, including the classic “Europe on 5 Dollars a Day.” Growing up, Pauline and her family didn’t really vacation. All of their trips were for work, either to update “the book” (“Europe on 5 Dollars a Day”), or to check on former ventures like four hotels Arthur founded, or to check in on a tour company. “That being said, when we were researching ‘the book,’ I always looked forward to our time in Copenhagen, because I absolutely adored the Tivoli Gardens,” Pauline recalled.“It was my dream in life, when I was about 8, to work as one of the marching child soldiers there. Alas, you had to be Danish to get that gig!”

Now a well-traveled adult, Pauline loves to purposely get lost and wander. She will jump on public transportation in an unfamiliar area and ride to a less touristy part of the city.“I’ll go without a map and resist looking at the map on my phone, and just wander so that I can see what local life actually is like in the destination,” she said. “I’ve met the most wonderful people and have seen fascinating sights that way.”

For budget-conscious young Washingtonians who may not have the means to travel as their older counterparts do, Pauline recommends taking advantage of the sharing economy. Travelers can now stay for free in a spare room of someone’s home through sites like GlobalFreeloaders.com and CouchSurfing.com, whose website tagline reads:“Stay with locals instead of at hotels.”

“Lodgings can take a big chunk out of your travel budget, but thanks to these sites and a number of others, it’s possible to sleep in safe, clean places for a pittance,” she said. “Hostels are terrific too, for young travelers, not just because of the cost but because they’re social hubs for people from across the globe.”

Pauline also recommended rental-sharing sites like Wimdu.com and Airbnb. com — sites fellow Travel & Adventure Show speaker Patricia Schultz, author of “1000 Places to See Before You Die,” also mentioned as great budget-friendly lodging ideas. Airbnb.com, for example, offers unique rentable places to stay from local hosts in over 190 countries, according to its website.

It’s even an option for those looking to make a little money — as hosts. Living in D.C., the demand is certainly there. “If you live in the Washington area, that’s golden,” Schultz said.

The New York Times bestselling author recommends traveling in the off-season, as it guarantees slashed prices, fewer crowds and more space at in-demand

TRAVEL & HOTELS

The Washington Diplomat

April 2015

restaurants and popular tourist hotspots.

However, if you are setting out to places where spring and summer are considered the off-season, do your homework. “If you’re getting a really cheap ticket to Kuala Lumpur or Hanoi, it may be monsoon season and you may wind up never leaving your hotel,” Schultz cautioned.“Things are discounted for a reason.”

One mistake Schultz made in the past was not having a printout of her hotel reservation on a trip.“In this day and age, with so much information readily available on tablets, iPads, iPhones, you might be busy and working and think, ‘I’ll just wing it,’” she said.“If you’re in line to check in and someone behind the desk is flustered and the hotel is sold out, it’s easier for them to say they have no recollection of your reservation. A printout gives you a better chance of them admitting their mistake.”

However, if one is up for the uncertainty, traveling without a reservation could work to your advantage. If you arrive the night before and the hotel knows it has 15 percent of its rooms available, it will offer discounts that aren’t typically available when booking in advance, according to Schultz.“Personally, I don’t like to compromise,” she added.“I like to know I have a hotel on the other side of my flight or train ride.”

Hot destinations Schultz recommended include Sri Lanka,Vietnam and Eastern European countries. Many people have been lately asking her about Cuba, where — John Golicz, founder and CEO the Obama administration recently eased of the Travel & Adventure Show travel restrictions for Americans, although trips to the communist island still ostensibly need to have an educational or cultural component. Schultz will be visiting Cuba again in April and has previously been there twice independently.

However, if you don’t consider yourself travel savvy or a real adventurer just yet, it could make the experience not as remarkable as one would hope.“Infrastructure is very limited at best, and tourism is not their strong point,” Schultz said.“It will take some time for them to be prepared for the floodgates to open. Right now it’s mostly Canadians and Europeans who visit.”

Although challenging, Schultz found her time on the island — just 90 miles from Florida but preserved in time thanks to a U.S. economic embargo — a very rewarding experience. Her advice is to go with American-licensed tour groups that are authorized

“[Washingtonians] are worldly, culturally attuned, used to traveling, come armed with great questions and are very diverse.”

April 2015

Photo: Jim Donnelly / Travel & Adventure Show

The Global Beats Stage at the Travel & Adventure Show in Washington, D.C., featured a variety of cultural performances.

by the government to travel there.“Go now before McDonald’s arrives!” she said.

For those working in embassies in D.C. who are looking to explore the United States this summer, Schultz shared some interesting advice.A Georgetown University graduate, Schultz completed her junior year abroad. Her Italian friends always told her the three places they wanted to visit in America were New York City, Orlando, Fla., and the Four Corners, or what they saw as the Wild West.

“They were absolutely fixated. They’d seen every John Wayne movie in the book,” Schultz said. “During one of their trips to visit me, we drove out there and saw Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona, [including] Monument Valley, which is a Navajo reservation and background for every Western that’s ever been filmed.”

Many semi-autonomous Native American tribes still inhabit the Four Corners, where some of the country’s earliest chapters began, Schultz added. She also noted that if you’re looking to plan next year’s vacation, 2016 will be a big year for the National Park Service, as it is celebrating its 100th anniversary.

And if you missed the Travel & Adventure Show this year, mark your calendars: Next year’s expo comes to town Feb. 20 and 21.

Kate Oczypok (@OczyKate) is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.

TRAVEL & HOTELS

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23

The 60 Annual Corcoran Ball

did

you

know ?

The annual national Cherry Blossom Festival, running from March 20 to April 12, commemorates the 1912 gift of 3,000 cherry trees from Tokyo Mayor yukio ozaki to Washington. This year marks the 103rd annivsary of that gift, and about 1.5 million will come out to see the flowers and participate in four weekends of related programming.

,  , 

from page 21

cherry Blossoms crumble and served with a scoop of house-made cherry kirsch ice cream.

For those seeking a more active experience, try these special offerings:

STEP INTO SPRING FITNESS nationalcherryblossomfestival.org/ step-into-spring-fitness/

Work out among the flowers with two free classes April 4 on the National Mall hosted by the National Cherry Blossom Festival.

From 10 to 11 a.m., work on your lower half with Belly Butt & Thighs, a two-part class that focuses on those areas. From 11 a.m. to noon, try Inner Vinyasa Flow, a yoga class that incorporates mind and body awareness.

Photography © Tony Powell

Proceeds from the 2015 Corcoran Ball benefit the newly established Corcoran Women's Committee Scholarship Endowment Fund to aid students at the Corcoran School of Arts and Design at The George Washington University. Ball funds will also sustain and advance the arts in after school programming through ArtReach, the awardwinning community arts program with THEARC in Southeast DC. The 2015 Corcoran Ball will take place at Washington’s newest museum, The George Washington University Museum and the Textile Museum located on the university’s Foggy Bottom campus. In addition to a three-course dinner and dancing, guests will view the exciting exhibitions, Unraveling Identity: Our Textiles, Our Stories featuring more than 100 spectacular artworks that span 2,000 years and five continents, and Seat of Empire: Planning Washington, 1790-1801, uses maps and related images to tell the story of an early experiment in urban design that shaped the landscape of Washington, D.C. For more information and to purchase tickets, please visit CorcoranBall.org.

PhoTo: SCoTT BAuer / u.S. dePArTMenT oF AGriCulTure

CHERRY BLOSSOM TOURS WITH A NATIONAL PARK SERVICE RANGER nps.gov/cherry/cherryrangerprograms.htm

Free walking tours take place daily at 2 p.m. through April 12 starting at the Lincoln Memorial. Or take a two-hour nighttime tour by Japanese lantern light on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays through April 11. This group meets at the Tidal Basin Welcome Area at 8 p.m. On Saturday mornings at 8 a.m. through April 11, take a jog among the flowers with a ranger, starting at the Washington Monument Lodge, or on Saturdays and Sundays from 2 to 5 p.m. through April 12, meet at the Thomas Jefferson Memorial for a bike tour. Bring your own bike.

SOUTHWEST WATERFRONT FIREWORKS FESTIVAL nationalcherryblossomfestival.org/southwest-waterfront-fireworks-festival-2

This free event on April 4 runs from 1 to 9 p.m. It includes live music and kidfriendly activities, cultural experiences and food. Fireworks begin at 8:30 p.m.

CHERRY BLOSSOM FAMILY CELEBRATION nationalcherryblossomfestival.org/cherry-blossomfamily-celebration

The Smithsonian American Art Museum will have free traditional Japanese music and dance performances while guests make tatebanko (Japanese paper dioramas) and fold origami.

NATIONAL CHERRY BLOSSOM FESTIVAL PARADE nationalcherryblossomfestival.org/2015parade

Join the thousands of spectators who will line Constitution Avenue on April 11 to watch floats, giant helium balloons, marching bands and celebrity performers during the parade. Tickets for grandstand seats are $20; curbside viewing is free.

SAKURA MATSURI JAPANESE STREET FESTIVAL sakuramatsuri.org

This Japanese street festival, now in its 55th year, is America’s largest one-day exhibition of Japanese culture and the April 11 grand finale to the festival ($10 per person ages 13 and up, free for 12 and under).Along six city blocks from 9th to 14th Streets on Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, there will be live music and dance performances, Asian and Western foods, two Kirin Ichiban beer gardens, a sake tasting pavilion, martial arts demos and Japanese art.

Stephanie Kanowitz is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.

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TRAVEL & HOTELS

April 2015

LIVING L U X U R Y

â– A Special Section of The Washington Diplomat

PARTY

â– April 2015

Lynda Webster

PRO Veteran Event Planner Webster Offers Tricks of the Trade

F

by Stephanie Kanowitz rom the time she was able to help her father, a funeral director, straighten chairs, LYNDA WEBSTER was planning events. Today she runs the 20-year-old Webster

Group, an event planning firm whose portfolio includes more than 600 events, some of which have been attended by ambassadors, foreign heads of state, u.S. presidents, military leaders, government officials and executives of Fortune 500 companies.

Continued on next page PhoToS: The WeBSTer GrouP

Country singers Tim McGraw and Faith Hill attend the 2006 dedication of the Air Force Memorial.

April 2015

Actress Jaclyn Smith talks to the audience at the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Honoring the Promise Gala.

LUXURY LIVING

Actors Jada and Will Smith, left, receive the Butterfly of Hope Award from the Lupus Foundation of America.

The Washington Diplomat Page 25

Continued from previous page Webster, the wife of former FBI and CIA Director William Webster, got her professional start at the Willard InterContinental Washington hotel and also worked in marketing at the Watergate and the Four Seasons in Boston. Her shift to event planning came when the father of Queen Noor of Jordan asked her to handle an event by the nonprofit Save the Children. Since then, she has produced shows with Hollywood entertainers, events with the United Nations and been involved with the National Cherry Blossom Festival. Her biggest event to date was the 2006 dedication of the Air Force Memorial, which 43,000 people attended.

Here,Webster shares what she’s learned from her experiences and offers tips for handling affairs of any size.

As the wife of a former CIA and FBI director, you must have attended a fair share of events. How did being on that side of it help you when you started your company?

It gave me a tremendous amount of perspective.

I saw a lot of events. I saw well-run events.What we say at the Webster Group is:“How would the White House do it?” I mean, our standards are that high, because I saw how the White House did it, I saw how the CIA and State Department did some of the finest events ever run in our city. But I also got to attend a lot of events that were not very well run by other organizations. I thought,“Wait a minute.These could be run a lot better, much tighter.”

What was wrong with them?

For example, a lot of Washington events have, in

“One of the things that I think is starting to slide a little bit in our society because we are so connected to our networks, our digital lives, is that personal experience, and I think diplomats represent the importance of connecting humans.”

— lYnDA WEBSTER, chairwoman and founder of the Webster Group my view, way too much talking, and I have this little saying that my staff makes fun of from time to time: I think,“The last great speech was given in Gettysburg 150 years ago, and it was two and a half minutes long.” I try to get our clients to think about how to get their message across in a compelling way that doesn’t involve eight speakers because the chances are out of eight speakers, you might have a good one.

What should someone look for in an event planner?

I would first and foremost make certain especially that they understand money because events are big business these days, especially if you’re dealing with thousands of people. They’re expensive to do and if they’re not done well, you could certainly lose money. Make certain that the company has a good track record for managing the budget. I would also make certain that they really think long and hard about the various goals of the event.You don’t want somebody who just cares about the tablecloths. I think this is something that is overlooked, but look for somebody who is nice to work with. It’s nice to make certain that people are congenial and represent you well.

PhoTo: STePhen ellioT / The WeBSTer GrouP

cheerleaders perform at the Black Tie and Boots inaugural Ball.

RENT QUALITY, STYLISH FURNITURE, NO MATTER WHERE YOUR APPOINTMENT TAKES YOU.

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LUXURY LIVING

April 2015

Cindy Souza Presents The Best in Luxury Living

What personal characteristics does an event planner need to succeed?

Patience.A lot of diplomacy. Creativity helps, and I also think just thinking out of the box.

We try to do things a little differently.We try to dig a little deeper. I like to say, “Anybody can order tablecloths and chairs” — I mean, that’s such a small part of what we do. We like to start off by asking our clients, “What are your goals for the event? What are two or three different things you want to accomplish?” We all know you want to have a successful event, but what does that really mean, and a lot of clients have never thought about that.

Photo: The Webster Group

From left, former Presidents Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush attend the Points of Light Gala.

you?” to show them it’s their event, it’s their home, it’s their country. When we go to an embassy, we’re going to a foreign country, so we need to respect that and try to make the event something that they would be proud of.

Trying to make it personal to them is what makes an embassy event special.

What’s unique about event planning in D.C.?

I think event planning in D.C. is fabulous because there are just so many things going on. I think we’re the most exciting city in the country right now in terms of people who are doing a variety of things. We have people doing medicine, we have people doing foreign affairs — every imaginable subject matter, so it’s not boring. Some cities might be oil towns, like Houston, or a banking town, so a lot of the events are similar, whereas in Washington, the events are so varied; people from literally all over the world are coming to Washington.

How do you make it personal?

My philosophy is no matter how big the event, it should be an event not unlike what you would do at home. For example, if my husband and I are entertaining, one of us always greets our guests warmly, we help them with their coats and we bring them cocktails, and when they are leaving we thank them for coming and say goodbye.

There’s no reason for an event for 43,000 people you can’t do the same.

You’ve worked with U.S. government agencies, trade groups, philanthropic organizations. What’s unique about embassy event planning?

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What are some mistakes embassies make in planning events?

Working in conjunction with embassies is fun because it’s always interesting to say, “What’s important to you?” We want them to feel like we’re not just barging in and trying to show them how we would do it.We like to say, “What would make the event special to

It’s a mistake that everybody makes, not just embassies. Sometimes they don’t think about their audiences as well as they should.

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The Washington Diplomat Page 27

Continued from previous page Some people just don’t mix well.A lot of people don’t think about the guest list well enough.Try to make certain that everybody invited probably will fit in together well. You don’t want people to stand around and not have anything in common with each other.

What elements of event planning are the same regardless of who’s putting on the event?

The same thing happens whether it’s a funeral or an event for 43,000 in terms of budget. You need to develop an accurate budget, you need to put together a timeline.We are anal about having a very detailed timeline. We want to make certain our events are on time and on schedule and on budget.The timeline is what helps us plan the event, so that if we are six months out, three months out, two months out, we have a game plan, sort of a playbook.

The actual day of the event we have what we call a minuteto-minute, and that minute-to-minute schedule is literally minute-to-minute: what is involved in making the event happen. For example, setup, the caterers arrive, the food arrives, the salads are set, the gong goes off and the crowd’s moved in. Whether it’s a board meeting for 15 or an event for 40,000, each event has that minute-to-minute.

What tips do you have for planning events on a budget?

I believe that every dollar that I save a client goes into their mission, so we teach our staff to negotiate. We always get two to three bids for everything.We have caterers we use a lot, we have florists we like, we have suppliers for tablecloths and chairs, but we don’t just use the same people.We get bids from two or three of them because we want them to give us their best price so that our clients get the price.

What are some venues you love for hosting events in the D.C. area?

We do a lot of government work, and their budgets aren’t

Photos: The Webster Group

Above, a dragon graces the Points of Light Gala at the Chinese Embassy; top left, Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the Lab School of Washington Gala; and below, “Star Wars” director George Lucas is featured at the Common Sense Media Awards — all events organized by the Webster Group.

as strong so we use a lot of hotels that are a little more budget-oriented. We use the Hiltons and the Hyatts — those business-oriented hotels. The fundraisers tend to go to the Four Seasons or the Mandarin or the RitzCarlton [which] we use a lot. It can seat a lot of people and they still have a cachet about them. Then we go outside the hotels. Probably our favorite venue is the [Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium] just because you can have a lot of people there and the venue is so beautiful, you don’t hardly need to spend a dime on decor.We love working with the National Building Museum. It’s probably the biggest venue inside that we use because it could seat 1,200.

What’s your dream event? The one you’d love to throw?

I would love to be part of the Super Bowl. I would love to help on the Olympics, and I think we’ve got the talent to do it now.Ten years ago I wouldn’t have said we could do it,

but I really think we could. I’ve never worked on either one of the conventions. I’m a flaming independent myself so I probably wouldn’t have a shot. They may lean on Republicans or Democrats.

What are your favorite types of events to attend?

I love the embassy events because they tend to be smaller. I came to Washington wanting to work for the CIA and travel and live abroad and my degree is in international business, so I personally have a very strong interest in the diplomatic world.

One of the things that I think is starting to slide a little bit in our society because we are so connected to our networks, our digital lives, is that personal experience, and I think diplomats represent the importance of connecting humans.

That’s why I think embassies are extremely important in our town because at the end of the day, people have to trust and respect each other if they’re going to work together.

Stephanie Kanowitz is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.

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DIPLOMACY

DIPLOMATIC SPOUSES

Busy Benin Wife Yolonda Richardson, the American wife of Benin’s ambassador, is a sought-after expert on international development issues whose latest project is a campaign to reduce tobacco use worldwide. PAGE 32

SISTERLY Miami and Buenos Aires.

Baltimore and Bremerhaven, Germany. Seattle and faraway Tashkent, Uzbekistan.

LOVE

The Alabama port of Mobile and Cuba’s capital city, Havana.

These are but a few of the 2,100 U.S. sister cities and other partnerships

ART

in 145 countries linked by friendship and civic pride — an enduring concept

Mexican 25

celebrated at Sister Cities International’s recent Diplomatic Gala. PAGE 30

To mark its 25th anniversary, the Mexican Cultural Institute presents “25 Years / 25 Artists,” an eclectic exhibit that chronicles 20th-century Mexican art and spans several different generations, schools and movements. PAGE 33

PHOTOGRAPHY

Fresh Eyes Now in its 11th year, “gute aussichten: new german photography 2014/2015,” an annual exhibition featuring the winners of Germany’s top photography competition, seems as fresh and forward-looking as ever. PAGE 34

FILM REVIEWS Hungary’s “White God,” an unorthodox tale told primarily from the perspective of a canine protagonist, speaks volumes about the far-right politics gripping Europe. PAGE 36

[ diplomacy ]

Sisterly Bonds Sister Cities International Embodies Citizen Diplomacy

by Karin Zeitvogel

E

leven years after the end of World War II, the world was still roiled by conflict.The Cold War was in full swing. The Korean Peninsula was seething. Kenya was four years into the Mau Mau rebellion against colonial power Britain. Algerians were fighting for independence from France.

Sudan’s first civil war had broken out.

That’s not even a complete list of the conflicts that flared up in the 1950s. It seemed that the lessons World War II should have taught governments and military leaders had fallen on deaf ears, or maybe the students weren’t paying attention in class.Amidst all of the tensions, U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower decided to take a different approach to peacemaking.

Why not, he thought, kick world leaders out of the classroom and replace them with grassroots citizens?

He convened a meeting at the White House and called on ordinary Americans to do something that smacked of insurrectionism.

“If we are going to … take advantage of the assumption that all people want peace, then the problem is for people to get together, to leap governments, if necessary; to evade governments; work out not one method but thousands of methods by which people can gradually learn a little bit more of each Above from left, Tara Compton, Ambassador of Trinidad and Tobago Neil Parsan, other,” Eisenhower said in a speech at a citizen Ambassador of Barbados John Beale, Leila Beale, Ambassador of the Democratic Republic of Congo Faida Mitifu and Ambassador of Mozambique Amélia Matos diplomacy summit on Sept. 11, 1956.

Ike had just sown the seeds of the Sisters Cities Sumbana attend the Sister Cities International 2015 Diplomatic Gala.

International program. His vision was to create a Bottom photo from left, Sister Cities International President and CEO Mary network that would “be a champion for peace and Kane, former Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.) and former Transportation Secretary prosperity by fostering bonds between people Norman Mineta attend the Sister Cities International 2015 Diplomatic Gala, from different communities around the world,” where Moran received the Congressional Diplomatic Leadership Award.

Sisters Cities International says on its website.

“Governments can do no more than point the partnership between Ljubljana, way and cooperate, and assist with mechanical details, and they can publish certain official documents. But I am talking about exchanges Slovenia’s capital, and Cleveland, of professors and students and executives … about doctors helping in the conquering of Ohio. Although it is unclear when PHOTOS: JOY ASICO / SISTER CITIES INTERNATIONAL that partnership began, it is said to disease,” Eisenhower told the White House gathering.

In the beginning, the Sisters Cities program focused on cities in America’s World War II predate the establishment of Slovenia as an independent country. (Slovenia grew out of foes, Germany and Japan, and in countries behind the Iron Curtain.Today, the nonpartisan the disintegration of Yugoslavia in 1991.) What is known is that around 80,000 people of nonprofit has grown into a global venture, involving 545 communities and with more Slovenian heritage live in Cleveland, making it the city with the largest population of people of Slovenian descent outside Slovenia itself, and they played a crucial role in pushthan 2,100 partnerships in 145 countries.

In March, scores of diplomats joined American lawmakers and ordinary citizens from ing for the sister city status with the city in Ohio.

Likewise, Slovenians from Murska Sobota who settled in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, around the world for the annual Sister Cities International Gala held at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Several awards were handed out at the gala, including the Congressional were instrumental in setting up a thriving sister city relationship with that town.

The mission of Sister Cities International is still as vital as it was in the 1950s, as tenDiplomatic Leadership Award, which was given to former Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) and sions, conflict and disasters continue to rake different parts of the globe.

Congressman Jim Moran (D-Va.).

The city of Austin,Texas, holds an annual golf tournament to raise funds for a clinic in Lugar said the Sisters Cities program allows the world’s different peoples to learn from and about each other. Sister relationships “go on for several years so that, before long, you its sister city in the African nation of Lesotho, for children with HIV/AIDS or who are affected by the disease.“We have gained a lot through that arrangement,” Lesotho’s ambashave a generation who have shared good experiences,” he said.

Slovenian Ambassador Božo Cerar said that while the relationship between govern- sador to Washington, Eliachim Molapi Sebatane, said. More than 23 percent of Lesotho’s ments is important, it’s not the same as people-to-people interactions.“In that sense, the population lives with HIV, giving the southern African country the second-highest HIV prevalence rate in the world.

Sister Cities program is very important.”

The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has struggled since independence from From start to finish, the process of setting up a city partnership usually takes between six and 18 months, Sisters City International President and CEO Mary Kane said.There are Belgium in 1960 to bring peace and prosperity to its people. In 2006, the Washington no preset criteria for pairing up cities, but the initial push to create a partnership often suburb of Falls Church, Va., became the sister city of a small town in Congo’s Equateur province, called Kokolopori. The partnership is the only one between a U.S. city and comes from members of a particular diaspora who live in the United States.

“They come together and talk to their elected officials and say, ‘We need to form this anywhere in the DRC, but that’s not the only way it stands out.

“Kokolopori is an area that has a sanctuary for bonobo apes, and the bonobos are a relationship,’” Kane said.

It was Somali leaders in Minneapolis who put forward the proposal to form a sister city symbol of peace,” DRC Ambassador to the U.S. Faida Mitifu explained to The Washington alliance with Bosaso, a port city in northern Somalia. The city council adopted the pro- Diplomat. “If they fight, they always end up having sex to make peace, and as funny as posal in October last year, and this summer, Minneapolis, which has a large Somali popu- that sounds, this is an animal that symbolizes peace,” she said.

The Kokolopori-Falls Church partnership says on its website that it was set up to prolation, will formalize the first ever sister city agreement between an American city and a mote friendship and cooperation between the two communities, help build a more city in Somalia.

Similarly, Cerar said Slovenian-Americans were the driving force behind the sister city peaceful world and preserve rainforests and wildlife for future generations.

30

The Washington Diplomat

April 2015

At right, Ambassador of the Philippines Jose L. Cuisia Jr. and his wife Maria Victoria Cuisia were among dozens of diplomats at the Sister Cities International 2015 Diplomatic Gala.

Below, Ambassador of Ukraine Olexander Motsyk and his wife Natalia Motsyk talk with a guest at the Sister Cities Diplomatic Gala.

Above, former Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), who served 32 years on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, receives the Sister Cities International’s Congressional Diplomatic Leadership Award.

PHOTOS: JOY ASICO / SISTER CITIES INTERNATIONAL

Above, Sister Cities International President and CEO Mary Kane welcomes guests to the nonprofit’s 2015 Diplomatic Gala held at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce on March 10.

Above, recently appointed Ambassador of Vietnam Pham Quang Vinh and his wife Hoang Bich Lien attend the Sister Cities Diplomatic Gala.

Above, Ambassador of Lesotho Eliachim Molapi Sebatane talks with guests at the Sister Cities Diplomatic Gala.

Above, Victor Melara, director of community relations for D.C. United, accepts the Corporate Diplomacy Award for Washington’s professional soccer team, which in 2014 announced a partnership with Britain’s Sunderland A.F.C.

Ambassador of St. Vincent and the Grenadines La Celia A. Prince, left, poses with Denny Doyle, mayor of Beaverton, Ore., during the Diplomatic Gala for Sister Cities International, which has helped establish over 2,100 partnerships in 145 countries.

Aldona Zofia Wos, left, a Polish-born doctor and former U.S. ambassador to Estonia, receives the Sister Cities Diplomatic Leadership Award.

PHOTO: LARRY LUXNER

Acknowledging that not only miles but also lifestyle and cultural differences separate the two towns, the Americans and Congolese involved in the partnership choose nonetheless to focus on their similarities.

“Citizens of Falls Church City and Kokolopori recognize that our future depends on the well-being of our children and the health of our environment….Together we can help protect the rarest of the great apes, help prevent tropical deforestation that contributes to climate change and teach our children valuable lessons about global citizenship,” the Kokolopori-Falls Church Partnership says.

Ambassador Mitifu says that’s what makes the Sisters Cities program “very important.”

“Sometimes, people think they are very, very different, but once they become sisters, they visit each other, they realize there is much more that they have in common than differences,” the ambassador said.

The popularity of Sisters City International has grown so much over the years that the group has set up the equivalent of an online dating site for cities.

“Cities would call us from all over the world and say,‘Well, we’d

April 2015

like a partner.’ So we decided we need to make this a feature where you can call us and we will be your Match.com,” Kane said.

Fifty U.S. cities and several hundred cities around the world are actively looking for a date, or partner city, through Sister Cities International.

While they can’t stipulate what hair or eye color they’re looking for, Kane says cities are paired up based on “things that they have in common and what they want to do together” in terms of cultural, business and other exchanges.

Having things in common is a useful ingredient for a successful match, but Mitifu pointed out what is possibly the best reason to seek a long-term relationship with a like-minded city somewhere else in the world.

“Where there’s sisterhood,” she said, “there is laughter, there is joy, there is sharing.” And that would make for a long and very happy relationship.

Karin Zeitvogel (@Zeitvogel) is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.

Award Winners at the 2015 Sister Cities International Gala Congressional Diplomatic Leadership Award: Former Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) and former Rep. James Moran (D-Va.) Diplomatic Leadership Award: Former U.S. Ambassador to Estonia Aldona Zofia Wos Global Citizen Diplomat Award: The late Vin Martin, who served as Jamaica’s honorary consul in Atlanta, Georgia, for 16 years.

Corporate Diplomacy Award: D.C. United soccer team.

In 2014, D.C. United partnered with Sunderland, a football team in England.

Excellence in Diplomacy Award: Maryland National Guard

The Washington Diplomat Page 31

[ diplomatic spouses ]

Life of Development Benin Envoy’s Wife Campaigns to Keep Kids From Smoking

by Gail Scott

A

s an American who is married to an African ambassador, Yolonda Richardson is proud to be “a citizen of the world.” The wife of Benin’s ambassador, Omar Arouna, Richardson has been to 50 countries, mostly on her own, and worked with important NGOs almost all of her life, becoming a sought-after expert on international development issues.

She is currently executive vice president of global programs for the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, which fights to reduce tobacco use and its deadly toll in the United States and around the world. She was also president and CEO of CEDPA (Centre for Development and Population Activities) for five years, in addition to holding top positions at Africare and the World Health Organization. As president and founder of Richardson Consulting, she provided expertise to a range of nonprofits, development agencies and major corporations including ExxonMobil and the Carnegie Corporation of New York. Richardson also speaks and lectures regularly on international development issues and has appeared in media outlets such as the Associated Press, Christian Science Monitor, C-SPAN and National Public Radio.

“Now, I have a balancing act with three jobs: the campaign, my husband and being a mom. We have a nanny from Benin and she is worth every penny. She makes a huge difference in our lives,” Richardson said.

The mother of a son and daughter who married her husband 14 years ago, Richardson said she has enjoyed representing Benin, a West African country of 10 million that enjoys a stable democracy but still struggles with issues such as poverty. “Benin is a lovely country, small and off the radar screen, secure and safe, with beautiful beaches and lots of cultural attractions.The art community is phenomenal,” Richardson noted.

She finds that many people in Washington “don’t quite know where Benin is, and yet I’m surprised how many do know. Benin is peaceful, in the news for the right reasons,” Richardson said, crediting the Peace Corps for spreading the word about this quiet nation and being “ambassadors for the country.”

Her husband became Benin’s ambassador to the United States, Mexico and the Organization of American States in May of last year.

“

Now, I have a balancing act with three jobs: the campaign, my husband and being a mom…. I try to keep my roles separate, not confusing them.

I take off my advocate’s hat, unless someone asks me about something specific.

Previously, he worked for 20 years as an information technology officer for the World Bank. In 1997, he became IT manager for the nonprofit Africare, and in 2001, he was named managing director for the consulting firm Global Specialty.

— YOLONDA RICHARDSON Ambassador Arouna also worked for the lobbying firm GoodWorks wife of Ambassador of Benin Omar Arouna International, where he was promoted to executive vice president in 2013, and as a consultant with Opportunities Industrialization Centers International, a nonprofit that focuses on aid to sub-Sahara Africa.

Richardson and Arouna met in New York City while both worked for Africare, where she was his boss. “He left a year after I left. We saw each other out dancing one night.We danced — he was a very good dancer,” she recalled. “He said, ‘Since you are no longer my boss, I want to ask you out.’

That was 2001. We were married in 2004.”

Both are interested in making a difference and often have conversations

”

32

The Washington Diplomat

Yolonda Richardson, an international development expert, and her husband, Ambassador of Benin Omar Arouna, have two children: Samad, 18, and Rihanna, 7. The couple met in New York City while they both worked for Africare, where she was his boss.

of how to help in particular situations.At the Embassy of Benin, Richardson said that her husband sometimes draws on her background as a CEO and a manager to help manage staff, build relationships or write reports.

“I try to keep my roles separate, not confusing them,” she explained. “I take off my advocate’s hat, unless someone asks me about something specific.”

Richardson, who holds a master’s degree in public health from Columbia University and a law degree from Yale, has advocated for international development, global health, reproductive rights and global philanthropy. She worked to raise the profile of CEDPA, which seeks to advance women’s rights and expand their access to health and other services through partnerships with more than 150 organizations in 40 countries. At Africare, she oversaw the program design, implementation and evaluation of more than 150 rural development projects throughout Africa focused on community health, agriculture, democracy and governance. She also spent 10 years at the Carnegie Corporation of New York, a global foundation, where she managed an international grant program focused on improving women’s health

See DIPLOMATIC SPOUSES, page 35

April 2015

[ art ]

Wide-Ranging Milestone Mexican Cultural Institute Celebrates 25th Anniversary With Homegrown Innovation

by Lisa Troshinsky

T

he Mexican Cultural Institute has a lot to celebrate and is exploding with artistic events — and talent — to commemorate its 25th anniversary.

“Many people have a certain image of Mexican culture that can be limited,” a spokesman from the institute, which opened its doors in 1990, explained to The Washington Diplomat. “With these wide variety of events, including pubmore on abstraction, expreslic art, photography, music, film and sionism and cubism. culinary presentations, we’re high“This new trend proposed lighting the strong cultural and artisthe idea of ‘art for art’s sake’ and tic diversity of Mexico.” characterized art as an expresHe added: “We’re also highlighting sion of the individual and not as a bilateral artistic dialogue between being in service of a particular Mexico and the United States by colsocial cause,” said an institute laborating with other institutions like press release. the Kennedy Center.”

Prominent in this artistic One of the centerpiece anniversary phase was José Luis Cuevas, events is “25 Years / 25 Artists,” an who published “The Cactus eclectic exhibit at the institute that Curtain,” in which he rejected chronicles Mexican art during the PHOTO: MURALES RIVERA - AUSBEUTUNG DURCH DIE SPANIER 1 PERSPECTIVE / WOLFGANG SAUBER DERIVATIVE WORK / CC BY-SA 3.0 VIA WIKIMEDIA COMMONS the idea of educating people 20th century, spanning several different generaFor many, Mexican art is through art that carried polititions, schools and movements. The works on commonly associated with cal and social messages.Another display include pieces produced by both muralists like Diego Rivera featured icon is Arturo Rivera, Mexican-born artists and those who came to (whose mural depicting the considered the greatest artist of Mexico to create art. exploitation of Mexico by his generation — whose visualThe extensive and thorough exhibition, Spanish conquistadors is seen ly arresting, at times shocking, housed in the institute’s historic building on paintings above), but it also encompassed contemporary 16th Street, is divided into four galleries: the stunned audiences with their movements such as the Mexican School of Painting; the Ruptura and dark, macabre imagery.

Ruptura generation and works Other Expressions;Artistic Vanguards; and Artists The third gallery demonlike “Chivo (Goat),” at left. that the World Gave to Mexico. strates how Mexican art evolved The Mexican Cultural Institute Many people associate Mexican art with the as a result of the Ruptura moveis exploring the breadth of muralist movement, considered one of the most ment and incorporated the age Mexican art in a new exhibit, enduring legacies of the post-Mexican of information technology. Here, Revolution landscape.With its themes of folk art “25 Years / 25 Artists.” artists experimented with artiand cultural nationalism, muralist painters such sanal techniques and modern as Diego Rivera and José Clemente Orozco 25 Years / 25 Artists instruments, with a shift toward the figurative, while still leanresponded to the Revolution of 1910 and proing on older techniques like abstraction and the use of geomoted their political views through murals that through May 30 metric shapes. evoked traditions dating back to the pre-Hispanic Mexican Cultural Institute For example, Feliciano Béjar used recycled materials as a Olmec civilization.

2829 16th St., NW creative catalyst, which led to his famous “Magiscope” sculpOne of the featured artists in the first gallery is tures made of reclaimed steel parts and a cut crystal “lens.”

José Chávez Morado, who established himself in For more information, please call (202) 728-1628 The show wraps up with artists from other countries who the 1930s, experimented with various materials or visit www.instituteofmexicodc.org. eventually made Mexico their home — among them, Leonora and was one of the first Mexican artists to use Carrington, a British-born surrealist painter and writer.

Italian mosaic in monumental works. He was considered a realist, a folk art engraver and a defender of the social principles of the Carrington escaped the rigid demands of her wealthy English upbringing by running away to Paris with her lover Max Ernst and later fled Europe after World War II for Mexican Revolution, one of the greatest upheavals of the 20th century.

“Morado was the last relevant muralist,” said the institute spokesman.“The murals Mexico, where her career, and fantastical imagination, took off.

The country served as a launching pad for numerous artists, as seen in “25 Years / — mostly large scenes of daily life — came out of the revolution and made people identify with what was going on in the country at the time,” he said.“It was a time for 25 Artists.” This engine of artistic growth is also on view in a related exhibit at the the country to get back to its roots and recognize the indigenous elements of their Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center, where an innovative sculpture series by Gilberto Aceves Navarro, titled “Las Bicicletas,” is on display.As a tribute culture.”

Also in this gallery are works by Luis Nishizawa, one of the foremost Mexican to Aceves’s 83rd birthday, 83 sculptures of multicolored bicycles (in black, white, red landscape painters whose goal was to “recreate characters that have contributed to and orange — colors that were used by the Mayan culture to symbolize the four cardinal points) will be exhibited with the artist’s intention to show that bicycles are raising the human spirit and justice in mankind,” he once stated.

The exhibit also examines the Ruptura movement, named because it moved away vehicles of health and happiness. (or ruptured) from the strongly nationalist movement of the muralists and strived for openness with the international currents of art during the 1950s, which focused Lisa Troshinsky is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.

[

April 2015

]

The Washington Diplomat Page 33

[ photography ]

Refreshing Eyes Young Germans Examine Life, Death and Traces in Between

by Gary Tischler

N

[

gute aussichten: new german photography 2014/2015

]

ow in its 11th year, “gute aussichten: new german photography 2014/2015,” an annuthrough April 30 al exhibition at the GoetheGoethe-Institut Washington Institut featuring the winners 812 7th St., NW of Germany’s top photograFor more information, please call phy competition, seems as (202) 289-1200 or visit fresh and forward-looking as ever.

A jury of seven chose eight award winwww.goethe.de/washington. ners out of 115 applications from 40 different institutions. While each young talent is vastly different from the other, all of the phobooks, rooms, the details of domesticity — in tographers, according to the Goethe-Institut, images that seem to almost immediately begin to are chasing “the most basic and existential age, gather dust, lose their importance and become questions of life: the banality of death and unhooked from daily use. that which remains — or that, following the Meanwhile, Karolin Back offers huge installadeceased, vanishes without a trace.” tions of familiar imagery around the “the mounOther themes the photographers explore tain of mountains” the Matterhorn in Europe, then include people’s roots and traditions, their unsettles her audience with unfamiliar motion assimilation into affluent Western society, and imagery. the mundane nature of daily routines and There are other startling contrasts, such as the role, or job, of photography itself to Eduard Zent’s majestic, almost regal portraits that study art and create a particular image. tie his subjects to the past and present — a young In tackling dark issues such as death, desAfrican man, handsome as a prince, with glaringly peration, discrimination and isolation, the colored running shoes, for example, or a modern, photographers embody a refreshing attitude ethereal Madonna testing the tea in her teabag, and curiosity about life — their works at hinting perhaps that were are all connected to once groundbreaking and unique to royalty in our own way.

Germany and a generation of new artists, Compare this to Jannis Schulze’s “Quisqueya,” a while at the same universally resonant. rambling, vivid, energetic group of pictures of the Looking at some of the diverse images — people who live on the island shared by Haiti and ranging from a Ghanaian man dressed in the Dominican Republic. There is a rough beauty traditional garb to brightly colored doors in these images that resemble the in-the-moment and staircases drenched in sunlight — you’re immediacy of Polaroids.

PHOTOS: GOETHE-INSTITUT WASHINGTON reminded of the old admonition by famed These photographers carry their cameras like photographer Walker Evans, who told artists to go antennae, measures of alertness gauging the world “gute aussichten: out and see the world with a “hungry eye.” around them.There is even a video about the pronew german The “gute aussichten” photographers are indeed cesses of photographing — events, occasions, photography hungry — for content, for meaning, for traces, memory making and how it’s done and not done.

2014/2015” features hints, nuances and echoes in the life, and death, The video by Stefanie Schroeder is an objective works by the winners around them. They’re hungry for answers, or at commentary on photography’s usefulness, not as of Germany’s top pho- art but as occupation. least asking questions that force us to contemplate tography competition, our lives.They’re not as interested in achieving the But perhaps the most moving piece in the including, from clockperfect, beautiful picture. Beauty, in fact, is not show is Katharina Fricke’s “One Day in October. wise left, Karolin much of a factor in these works.The content is not Or in November. Or in December,” a series of Back’s “Matterhorn” about shadows and light, or capturing a telling small photographs that fill a wall with the barely series, Jannis moment that elicits clarity and understanding.The blowing wind of daily life. There are no faces, or Schulze’s “Quisqueya, people or movement in these pictures of what approach is more literary than that.

Marvin Hüttermann’s The results are often startling, some of them appears to be a suburban landscape that is so ach“So Nicht” and Kolja visual essays in the art of questioning. The quesingly familiar, no one bothers to notice it. Cars Warnecke’s “Traces.” tions are the same that painters, writers, poets and parked on curbs, sidewalks marked by cracks, PHOTOS: SAMUEL ZUDER / GOETHE-INSTITUT WASHINGTON novelists have always asked: What is truth, what is rooftops, garages, winding streets, the façade of a happening in people’s lives, what is the sum of one house — Fricke captures the ordinary scenes that person’s life, what is the meaning of death, what kind of physical world do we people pass by daily, oblivious and unaware of the simple, quiet beauty lurking occupy, how does the past influence the present? underneath.

Two of the projects — “Traces” by Kolja Warnecke and Marvin Hüttermann’s “It Even as you look at the work in the Goethe-Institut, the scenes across the street Has Not Been”— are disturbing, moving and uneasy efforts that try to identify, each — a jazz saxophonist playing outside the Chinatown Metro station, the neighborin their own way, the contours of a life.Warnecke established a relationship with his hood’s ever-changing business signs and looming subject, a middle-age woman he had met at a social club who agreed to have him construction cranes — may have escaped your photograph her during the course of her daily life. The tightly framed shots are attention. revealing in what they do not reveal: We see her face but have no idea what’s going But these young photographers peel back the on inside her head.The portraits have a haunting, in-your-face reality, as if something everyday imagery that often gets overlooked to ask secret is being bluntly shared about how strangers lead their lives. deeper questions about life, death and everything in Hüttermann’s interests lie elsewhere but take on the same questions in harsh, between. almost brutal photographs that depict, among other things, a woman’s body in a morgue, a coffin and a body being burned. He also examines what’s left behind — in Gary Tischler is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.

34

The Washington Diplomat

April 2015

The Washington Diplomat

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from page 32

Diplomatic Spouses and programs and promoting improved democracy and governance.

Richardson’s attention is currently on “the Campaign,” as she calls it, a global effort “to prevent kids from ever smoking.”

The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids aims to tackle the world’s leading cause of preventable death by advocating for public policies that keep children from smoking, help smokers quit and protect everyone from secondhand smoke. Richardson oversees the group’s international program focused on reducing global tobacco consumption in middle- and low-income countries.

Even in the United States, where the group says “enormous progress” has been made, tobacco still kills more than 400,000 Americans every year. The worldwide death toll stands at more than 5 million a year and climbing.

“We are a watchdog,” Richardson said, “supporting government legislation, developing and passing laws…. It’s a fun job.”

Despite its laudable goals, not surprisingly, the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids faces heavyweight opposition.“The tobacco industry is very powerful, very resourceful. Cigarettes are cheap to make.They are introduced in poor countries by the tobacco industry,” Richardson said. “In China cigarettes are given as gifts; other countries use them as a right of passage….

Success for us is a lowered tobacco use, declines in sales.”

As important as tackling policy prob-

April 2015

Yolonda Richardson and her husband, Ambassador of Benin Omar Arouna, along with their son Samad and daughter Rihanna, prepare to go to the White House for his credentialing ceremony in May 2014.

lems is to them, Richardson and her husband always put the children first. Samad is 18 and a senior at Walt Whitman High School with plans to go this fall to American University, his father’s alma mater. Rihanna, 7, goes to Burning Tree Elementary School, which is “down the street” from their family home in Bethesda, Md., Richardson noted.

“We decided to keep our old home and live there so the children could stay in their schools.We use the official residence in Potomac for entertaining,” she said.

“We are respectful of our private life,” she added. “We relax on the weekend — shuttle the kids back and forth to their

different activities like violin lessons. I don’t have a car and driver. I am the kids’ driver!

“We are not an active sports family, except the kids go swimming and ice skating,” she continued. “We love to go to the movies or theater as a family and out to a local restaurant.”

Life wasn’t always like this. After graduating from Yale Law School, Richardson chose to live in New York because she called it a “good place for a single woman,” saying she “loved life in New York. I had a lot of friends.”

Now that she lives here with a family, she said she realizes that “Washington is

much more livable. It’s small enough you can really know people. It’s clean, pretty, easy and hassle-free. Washington is a company town; New York isn’t like that.

Washington is all about the proximity to power — how much power you have and how much access you have to power. New York is about money — how much money you have.”

Gail Scott is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.

Get the latest diplomatic news.

Sign up at www.washdiplomat.com.

The Washington Diplomat Page 35

[ film reviews ]

Dog-Eat-Dog World Man Not So Nice to His Best Friend in ‘White God’

by Ky N. Nguyen

year’s Sundance Film Festival.With an impeccable sense of timing, the casually assured direction (credited to David Zellner) shapes the foundation of this delightfully unorthohe 2015 Sundance Film dox road movie. Director of photography Festival’s Spectrum section Sean Porter’s widescreen cinematography showcased “White God,” a fascidreamily depicts the otherworldly fantasy, nating Hungarian movie from while the award-winning Octopus Project’s writer-director Kornél Munhaunting score sets an appropriately disoridruczó (“Delta,” “Tender Son: enting tone.

The Frankenstein Project”).

As the leading lady of“Kumiko, the Treasure One of the most unusual selections Hunter,” Japanese actress Rinko Kikuchi playing in Park City, Utah, the gripping (Academy Award-nominated for “Babel”) is a drama depicts a mixed-breed dog as pleasure to watch, which is a very good thing the main character. But “White God” is since she appears in nearly every scene. She not your typical cuddly fido flick. must rely on her facial expressions and body Co-written by Mundruczó, Viktória movements to effectively portray Kumiko, Petrányi and Kata Webér, the allegoriwho has sparse Japanese dialogue and does cal screenplay represents the cultural not speak English. Evoking a silent movie star, clashes fueled by the rising tide of Kikuchi’s largely non-verbal performance reactionary political and social forces charmingly depicts the adorable heroine’s sweeping across contemporary PHOTO: MAGNOLIA PICTURES blend of oblivious determination, innocence Hungary and Europe in general. More and melancholy.

Zsófia Psotta portrays a 13-year-old Hungarian girl whose dog is kicked to the curb by her father, and frequently than not, these extreme In Tokyo, 29-year-old Kumiko leads a soliby society, in “White God.” conservative movements proclaim tary life, enduring a deadening routine as an intolerance of opposing viewpoints “office lady” for a large company. Her over— say, progressive politicians and thinkbearing mother worries about Kumiko, mostly that she may be getting too ers — as well as ethnic, religious, lowerold to marry and have children. At home, she does get some uncondiclass and other minorities. tional love from her rabbit Bunzo.

When her mother leaves for Australia One day, Kumiko’s life changes forever when she discovers her puron an extended work assignment, pose. She comes across an old VHS cassette of “Fargo,” which opens with 13-year-old Lili (Zsófia Psotta) must titles that claim, “This is a true story.” Obsessed with the scene showing move in with her never-do-well father Steve Buscemi’s kidnapper burying the ransom in a frozen field, she Daniel (Sándor Zsótér), who lives in a embarks on an ill-conceived mission to dig up the hidden treasure, believbleak apartment building in Budapest. ing the film is actually a Lili’s adored dog Hagen is not permittreasure map. ted to stay because her father refuses to Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter Kumiko buys a flight to PHOTO: SEAN PORTER / AMPLIFY buy the expensive license that the gov(English and Japanese with subtitles; Minneapolis, Minnesota — ernment requires for mixed-breed dogs. Director David Zellner, left, plays a deputy in his film “Kumiko, the the nearest airport to 105 min.; scope) Such mongrels serve as a metaphor for Treasure Hunter,” starring Japanese actress Rinko Kikuchi, right.

Fargo, North Dakota — Landmark’s E Street Cinema the “impure” groups of people that sociwith her company’s credit ety’s traditional demographics may consider undesirable. card, which is subsequently canceled. ★★★★✩ A meddling neighbor reports Hagen, bringing the authorities to their door. In search of Lacking funds, she hilariously struggles to Lili, the dog make his way to her orchestra rehearsal, creating a ruckus that infuriates the make her way to Fargo but is unable to speak English with the quirky locals, whose conductor. After her father picks her up, he breaks her heart by angrily throwing the friendly overtures she finds difficult to accept. unwanted mutt out of their car. Dogcatchers capture the stray and lock him in a stark The smart script written by David and Nathan Zellner (also credited as producer) animal control facility. mixes dark humor, deadpan dialogue, eccentric characters and unlikely scenarios into a A shady visitor to the pound takes Hagen, who is trained to battle in deadly dogfights. tasty cocktail.The eponymous protagonist’s wistful journey suggests the influence of the The formerly meek, obedient house pet transforms into a fierce warrior. Soon enough, laidback black comedy’s executive producers,Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor.The Zellner hardened Hagen learns to rebel against his evil masters. He escapes and frees other “unfit” brothers’ homage to the Coen brothers (“The Big Lebowski,”“Barton Fink”) appears crysdogs from their cages, leading them throughout the streets of Budapest to violently revolt tal clear when Kumiko watches their 1996 hit “Fargo.” against their human masters. Hagen eventually finds his way back to Lili, to whom he remains loyal.

White God The Salt of the Earth On a surface level, “White God” unspools as an Entrancing (Fehér isten) exciting action flick that bleeds into the exploita(French, English and Portuguese (Hungarian and English with subtitles; tion horror genre. It thrillingly portrays how humans ‘Salt of the Earth’ with subtitles; 109 min.)

116 min.; scope) “The Salt of the Earth,” an entrancing docfrequently and systematically abuse dogs, even Landmark’s E Street Cinema Landmark’s E Street Cinema though they have long been known as man’s best umentary, takes a revealing look at the life Opens Sat., April 3 Opens Sat., April 3 friends. Admittedly, the film’s explicit cruelty is not and career of legendary Brazilian-French photographer Sebastião Salgado.

He is best easy to watch. Director of photography Marcell Rév ★★★★✩ ★★★★✩ artfully shoots the stylish scenes, including the known for his massive projects in black-andunique canine point of view. Mundruczó’s steady pacing supports the palpable tension white photojournalism, particularly in developing countries. His photographs are typically that he creates. Yet some scenes drag a bit, so the nearly two-hour final cut would have complex compositions full of rich details that are far better seen on the big screen, so do not miss your opportunity to catch the mesmerizing visual poem while it is playing in benefited from tighter editing.

The helmer steers his ensemble cast to deliver intense performances, though they are theaters.

Sebastião’s son, Juliano Ribeiro Salgado, and esteemed German auteur Wim Wenders occasionally overly melodramatic. They vividly express their characters’ unstable psychological states, reflecting the prevalent negative mood in today’s Hungary. Mundruczó and (“Wings of Desire,”“Buena Vista Social Club”) co-directed “The Salt of the Earth,” which was lead dog trainer Teresa Ann Miller impressively control Luke and Body, the canine actors recently nominated for the 2015 Academy Award for Best Documentary.

Sebastião’s photographs are prized for more than their technical excellence. He is celplaying the lead character Hagen, to display deliberate movements, behaviors and emoebrated for elegantly depicting humanism and dignity in his subjects, even among those tions. who have suffered the most — subjects he got to know well by living with them for extended periods.“The Salt of the Earth” ambitiously reviews Sebastião’s vast body of work ‘Kumiko’: Quixotic Quest from around the world. The documentary displays a curated selection of Sebastião’s most “Kumiko, the Treasure Hunter,” the crowd-pleasing fable by American indie filmmaker memorable pictures, successfully condensing a 40-year legacy into a feature-length running brothers David and Nathan Zellner (“Kid-Thing,” “Goliath”), wowed moviegoers at last time of nearly two hours.

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The Washington Diplomat

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April 2015

[ film interviews ]

Dark ‘White God’ Canine Story Offers Cautionary Hungarian Parable on Social Oppression

by Ky N. Nguyen

H

ungarian writer-director Kornél Mundruczó presented his sixth feature, “White God,” to critical and audience acclaim at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival. A mountain of buzz surrounded the Hungarian production’s unorthodox tale, primarily told from the perspective of a canine protagonist. Hagen leads other undesirable mixed-breed dogs in a shocking rebellion against abusive humans in his quest to return to his 13-year-old owner.The action-packed thriller is an intelligent allegory about minorities being increasingly oppressed by the majorities in Hungarian and greater European societies.

“I would like to reflect my society as much as I can.

Of course, it’s a fairytale, so it’s not as black and white if you are there in Budapest as it is in my movie. I would like to reflect our society as more and more extreme. Our political situation is more and more extreme.The intolerance is strong. Even the chauvinism is strong,” said Mundruczó, whose soft-spoken, pleasant demeanor starkly contrasts with the angry, rude characters predominant in “White God.” “It’s like in a war, especially if you wanted to go for democracy and go for freedom….This movie is a metaphor … about minorities and reflecting the majority,” he added, citing, among the minorities in Hungary, “Gypsies, poor people, even gays, intellectuals, liberals.”

Asked if the majority of his country is conservative, he responded emphatically: “Exactly! And more and more extreme. I really try to criticize as much as I can.

“The funny thing is that I was really reflecting my own society. But I recognized, especially in Cannes, that Europe is more extreme. Paris is not so far from Budapest any more. We are really problematic in how we handle minorities everywhere.”

Mundruczó hypothesized about the origins of the far-right extremism that he sees sweeping Europe: “In my eyes, there was the economic crisis [in 2008]. It changed the world but especially Europe. After the crisis … came a huge moral crisis, and old society loaded by lots of fear, existentialist fear.They don’t want to face anything … deal with anything. This is really a huge base for nationalism.

“So Hungary nowadays is a quite nationalistic country, which is sad,” the director continued. “Not every Eastern European country is like that. This is … politically quite extreme: very populist, very right-wing. This is an answer [to] the fear surrounding society. On the one hand, I can quite understand it. But the result, I’m totally against it. It’s always contradictions.”

Not surprisingly, the filmmaker says the response to his film in Hungary has been quite divided. “With the right-wing press, they really cannot watch, in this way, themselves. But we had a great audience, very big,” he

In the 1990s, Sebastião was burnt out as a photojournalist after covering the genocide in the Congo and Rwanda. Back on his family’s land in Brazil, he and his wife Leila started Instituto Terra to stem the deforestation of the local rainforest. His environmental efforts led him to refocus his photography on the natural world for his current “Genesis” project.

Though certainly powerful, the images may not always speak for themselves. When needed, Wenders and Juliano act as narrators who provide additional context that fleshes out the story.

Sebastião’s commentary often accompanies his

April 2015

the answer — and the wealth of his stories and his economic, political, sociological, psychological knowledge of all the places he went to.That was going to make it possible to make a film.”

Juliano Salgado agreed. “That’s what we shared, actually, when we started. It was the idea that we were not going to make a film of the photographer, but one of the great witnesses of the last 40 years — someone who had lived so much, had so much to pass on. You could see the photos in the exhibitions, in the press a lot, in books, but no one knew about all those stories and all those things Sebastião saw. It was really important that we could share this with a much broader audience than just the friends and the family. There was something important to pass on.That’s what we believed.That’s how PHOTO: WWW.SANDORFEGYVERNEKY.COM / MAGNOLIA PICTURES we started.”

Hungarian writer-director Kornél Mundruczó criticizes the growing “Yeah, it’s the knowledge that leads him to tide of conservatism in Europe with his allegorical film “White God.” take these photographs and to share this process of getsaid. “It gives me a lot of ting involved with all these hope, so I was really happy.” people and their situations,” “White God” opens Sat., April 3, Wenders observed. at Landmark’s E Street Cinema “Sebastião has this uncanny ability to become part of the humanity he’s witnessImmersive ‘Earth’ ing. And I was, of course, Award-winning German very curious how is that filmmaker Wim Wenders and possible because I saw Brazilian-French filmmaker something in his photoJuliano Ribeiro Salgado team graphs that I didn’t see in PHOTO: THIERRY POUFFARY / THIERRY POUFFARY/SONY PICTURES CLASSICS up to co-write and co-direct any other photographs. I “The Salt of the Earth.” Their From left, Wim Wenders, Juliano Ribeiro Salgado and saw an empathy, and I saw respectful, enlightening biog- Sebastião Salgado bring the latter’s photography to an ‘immersement.’ I wanted raphy of Salgado’s father, life in the documentary “The Salt of the Earth.” to understand that. I finally renowned photojournalist found out it’s time.

Sebastião Salgado, highlights his haunting photographs, “This man spends more time with these people, and which regularly focused on third-world subjects. he spends more time to prepare himself.Then when he The Washington Diplomat had the pleasure of speak- goes there, he doesn’t take the next plane out because ing with the filmmakers in Manhattan, where MoMA it’s uncomfortable. He stays and lives with these people was hosting a retrospective of films by Wenders. Asked under their conditions. He eats … he shares the same about the process of thinking about photography ver- food. He stays, and he comes back. He sometimes sus film, he responded, “I don’t think I would have comes back countless times because he feels he’s made dared getting involved with a film about a photogra- friends, and he can’t abandon them. He has a different pher if I hadn’t known already that this man — who I implication. For me, that was a huge discovery,”Wenders had already encountered for a couple of months and told us. became friends with — was a great storyteller. If I The director concluded, “It was also a slow realizahadn’t known that, I don’t think I would have dared to tion that I only had a right to make a film about this man enter the territory of a movie because photos in a film if I did the same — if I applied his own rules. That need protection. meant I had to spend three and a half years with him “Without protection they become a slideshow,” and his son in order to have a right to make this Wenders explained. “My own photographer friends movie.” have always refused to have them on a screen because I think they lose something. That’s why I liked them as “The Salt of the Earth” opens Sat., April 3, prints or in a book. But on a screen it’s difficult; I feel as at Landmark’s E Street Cinema. if they’re strangely naked. I only got involved in this adventure with Juliano realizing Sebastião himself was Ky N. Nguyen is the film reviewer for The Washington Diplomat.

stills, serving as a sort of master class. The film starts off with Sebastião reflecting on his famous shots of the Serra Pelada mines in Brazil.

Wenders, who is himself a published still photographer,interviews Sebastião through an opaque mirror that displays projections of his photographs. The innovative technique permits the audience to see the master photographer commenting on images that can be viewed simultaneously, a big improvement over the standard talking heads that usually dominate documentaries.

Juliano’s involvement with the documentary provided the filmmakers with very intimate

access, particularly since he accompanied Sebastião on his recent photography expeditions, including a trip to Siberia. Juliano’s work with his father may have benefited their complicated relationship. Sebastião’s long absences from home made him more of a mythical creature rather than a real patriarch. His wife was left by herself to manage the family’s domestic obligations, including raising their two sons, one with Down syndrome, largely without a resident father figure.

Ky N. Nguyen is the film reviewer for The Washington Diplomat.

PHOTO: © SEBASTIÃO SALGADO / AMAZONAS IMAGES / SONY PICTURES CLASSICS

Brazilian-French photographer Sebastião Salgado’s rich black-and-white images often depicted life in developing countries, as seen in a new documentary, “The Salt of the Earth.”

The Washington Diplomat Page 37

[ film ]

CINEMA LISTING

THE WASHINGTON DIPLOMAT film’s fatalism.

*Unless specific times are listed, please check the theater for times. Theater locations are subject to change.

AFI Silver Theatre Mon., April 6, 9:30 p.m., Wed., April 8, 9:30 p.m.

English

Pardon My French aka The Lady From Boston

5 to 7

Directed by Bernard Vorhaus (France/U.S., 1951, 82 min.)

Directed by Victor Levin (U.S., 2015, 95 min.)

Part of a short cycle of dual-language Franco-American co-productions, this film features Merle Oberon as a New England schoolmarm who inherits a French chateau run as a home for displaced war orphans by a bohemian musician.

An aspiring novelist has an extramarital affair with a French diplomat’s wife (English and French).

Landmark’s E Street Cinema Opens Fri., April 24

’71

AFI Silver Theatre Sat., April 4, 11:10 a.m., Sun., April 5, 11:10 a.m.

Directed by Yann Demange (U.K., 2014, 99 min.)

Set in Northern Ireland during the early years of the Troubles, “’71” takes place over a single night in the life of a young British soldier accidentally abandoned by his unit following a riot on the streets of Belfast.

Landmark’s E Street Cinema

Child 44 Directed by Daniel Espinosa (Czech Republic/U.K./Romania/U.S., 2015, 137 min.)

A disgraced member of the military police investigates a series of nasty child murders during the Stalin-era Soviet Union.

Angelika Mosaic Opens Fri., April 17

Clouds of Sils Maria

Directed by Olivier Assayas (France/Switzerland/Germany/U.S./ Belgium, 2014, 124 min.)

A veteran actress comes face-to-face with an uncomfortable reflection of herself when she agrees to take part in a revival of the play that launched her career 20 years earlier (English, French, German and Swiss-German).

Landmark’s E Street Cinema Opens Fri., April 17

Desert Dancer Directed by Richard Raymond (U.K., 2015, 98 min.)

Afshin Ghaffarian risks everything to start a dance company amidst his home country of Iran’s politically volatile climate and the nation’s ban on dancing.

Landmark’s E Street Cinema Opens Fri., April 10

Don’t Think I’ve Forgotten: Cambodia’s Lost Rock ‘n’ Roll Directed by John Pirozzi (U.S./Cambodia/France, 2014, 105 min.)

During the ‘60s and early ‘70s, as the war in Vietnam threatened its borders, a new music scene emerged in Cambodia that took Western rock and roll and stood it on its head, creating a sound like no other. But as Cambodian society — young creative musicians in particular — embraced Western culture and flourished under its influence, the rest of the country was rapidly moving to war.

AFI Silver Theatre Wed., April 29, 7 p.m.

Effie Gray Directed by Richard Laxton

38

April 2015

Photo: Magnet Releasing

Simon Pegg stars as a mercurial assassin in “Kill Me Three Times.”

Queen and Country

(U.K., 2014, 108 min.)

Directed by John Boorman (Ireland/France/Romania, 2015, 115 min.)

Set in the Victorian era, when neither divorce, nor gay marriage were an option, “Effie Gray” is the story of a young woman coming of age, finding her own voice in a world where women were expected to be seen but not heard.

Landmark’s E Street Cinema Opens Fri., April 3

Ex Machina Directed by Alex Garland (U.K., 2015, 108 min.)

Wed., April 15, 9:20 p.m.

An Honest Liar Directed by Tyler Measom and Justin Weinstein (U.S./Spain/Italy/Canada, 2014, 92 min.)

A story of cons and deceptions enacted for both good and evil, “An Honest Liar” follows the life of James “The Amazing” Randi, a world-renowned magician, escape artist and master skeptic who has entertained and educated the world for over 50 years.

A young programmer is selected to participate in a breakthrough experiment in artificial intelligence by evaluating the human qualities of a breathtaking female A.I.

Landmark’s E Street Cinema

Theater TBA Opens Fri., April 17

The statistics are staggering: One in five college women is sexually assaulted, yet only a fraction of these crimes are reported, and even fewer result in punishment for the perpetrators. Writerdirector Kirby Dick chronicles the horrors faced by assault victims after they survive what they thought was the worst ordeal of their lives.

Gringo Trails Directed by Pegi Vail (U.S., 2014, 79 min.)

Are tourists destroying the planet or saving it? From the Bolivian jungle to the party beaches of Thailand, and from the deserts of Timbuktu to the breathtaking beauty of Bhutan, “Gringo Trails” traces stories over 30 years to show the longterm impact of tourism on cultures, economies and the environment.

Freer Gallery of Art Sun., April 19, 2 p.m.

The Gunman Directed by Pierre Morel (Spain/U.K./France, 2015, 115 min.)

A sniper on a mercenary assassination team kills the minister of mines of the Congo. Returning to the Congo years later, he becomes the target of a hit squad himself.

Angelika Mosaic

Headlines of Destruction (Je suis un sentimental) Directed by John Berry (France/Italy, 1955, 95 min.)

Eddie Constantine plays a callous journalist who discovers his conscience, while director John Berry slips in some class commentary between the wisecracks and action sequences (dubbed in English).

AFI Silver Theatre Mon., April 13, 9:20 p.m.,

The Hunting Ground Directed by Kirby Dick (U.S., 2015, 90 min.)

Landmark’s E Street Cinema

Kill Me Three Times Directed by Kriv Stenders (U.S./Australia, 2015, 90 min.)

In this darkly comedic, suspenseful thriller, Simon Pegg is a mercurial assassin who discovers he isn’t the only person trying to kill the siren of a sun-drenched surfing town.

Landmark’s E Street Cinema Opens Fri., April 10

Little Boy Directed by Alejandro Monteverde (U.S./Mexico, 2015)

In this heartwarming tale, a 7-year-old boy is willing to do whatever it takes to end World War II so he can bring his father home.

Theater TBA Opens Fri., April 24

Night and the City Directed by Jules Dassin (U.K., 1950, 96 min.)

Often considered the quintessential film noir, this film’s “man-on-the-run” narrative and dark mood uses London’s Blitzscarred cityscape to accentuate the

In John Boorman’s bittersweet sequel to his “Hope and Glory,” Bill Rohan is grown up and drafted into the army where he and his eccentric best mate, Percy, battle their snooty superiors on the base and look for love in town.

Landmark’s E Street Cinema

The Tales of Hoffman Directed by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger (U.K., 1951, 133 min.)

In some ways an artistic “sequel” to “The Red Shoes,” this 1951 version of French composer Jacques Offenbach’s 1881 opera, in turn based on three stories by the late German author E.T.A. Hoffmann, is a pure opera, a film composed entirely of music, dance, color, light, rhythm and fancy.

AFI Silver Theatre Opens Fri., April 3

The Victors Directed by Carl Foreman (U.S., 1963, 175 min.)

Following a World War II army platoon from the fighting in Italy to after the fall of Berlin, Carl Foreman emphasizes the human moments between the action to reflect a multivalent, multinational view of the conflict.

AFI Silver Theatre Sun., April 5, 5:15 p.m.

The Water Diviner Directed by Russell Crowe (Australia/Turkey/U.S., 2014, 111 min.)

An Australian man travels to Turkey after the Battle of Gallipoli to try and locate his three missing sons. (English, Turkish, Greek and Russian).

Farsi A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night Directed by Ana Lily Amirpour (U.S., 2014, 99 min.)

Ana Lily Amirpour’s acclaimed, awardwinning debut feature, famously called “the first Iranian vampire Western,” signals the arrival of a cool and confident new cinematic talent. In the Iranian provincial town of Bad City, a place that reeks of death and loneliness, the townspeople are unaware they are being stalked by a lonesome, chadorclad vampire simply called “The Girl.”

AFI Silver Theatre Mon., April 13, 9:30 p.m., Tue., April 14, 9:30 p.m., Wed., April 15, 9:30 p.m.

French 3 Hearts (3 coeurs) Directed by Benoît Jacquot (France/Germany/Belgium, 2014, 106 min.)

A touching and tense drama about destiny, connections, and passion, “3 Hearts” presents a headily romantic look at a classic love triangle between a tax inspector, his new bride and her sister.

Landmark’s E Street Cinema Opens Fri., April 10

Goodbye to Language 3D (Adieu au langage) Directed by Jean-Luc Godard (Switzerland/France, 2014, 70 min.)

Winner of the Jury Prize at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival, Jean-Luc Godard’s sensorially immersive experience employs verbal and visual poetry via 3D technology to mind-expanding effect.

Landmark’s E Street Cinema

Georgian Don’t Breathe (La faille) Directed by Nino Kirtadze (France, 2014, 86 min.)

Forty-something Levan receives a vague prognosis following a routine medical exam. Advice pours in from all corners — his partner, his doctor, friends, strangers — but each opinion contradicts the other, and instead of helping Levan, he instead develops severe hypochondria (English and Georgian).

AFI Silver Theatre Tue., April 14, 7 p.m.

Theater TBA Opens Fri., April 24

The Pipeline Next Door (Un dragon dans les eaux pures du Caucase)

Woman in Gold

Directed by Nino Kirtadze (France, 2005, 90 min.)

Directed by Simon Curtis (U.S./U.K., 2015, 109 min.)

Maria Altmann, an octogenarian Jewish refugee, takes on the government to recover artwork she believes rightfully belongs to her family.

Angelika Mosaic The Avalon Theatre Landmark’s E Street Cinema Opens Fri., April 3

David faces Goliath when a village of Georgian farmers takes on the BP oil corporation in this evenhanded, character-driven documentary exploring BP’s purchase of Georgian countryside to construct a 1,700-kilometer pipeline from Kazakhstan to the Black Sea (English, Georgian and Russian).

AFI Silver Theatre Mon., April 13, 7 p.m.

The Washington Diplomat

April 2015

Khmer Angkor’s Children Directed by Lauren Shaw (U.S., 2014, 66 min.)

This film about Cambodia’s cultural and artistic renaissance is told through the voices of young Cambodian women who are part of the first generation born after the Khmer Rouge genocide that killed 2 million people, including 90 percent of the country’s artists and intellectuals.

maker Lina Yang moved into the Qing Ta district of Beijing, where she noticed a group of men that gathered every day at the curbside. Yang spent two years creating this expressive film about what occurs among men when their life’s work has ceased.

Freer Gallery of Art Sun., April 12, 2 p.m.

Spanish

Beautiful Youth (Hermosa juventud) Directed by Jaime Rosales (Spain, 2014, 102 min.)

Twentysomethings Natalia and Carlos are deeply in love, flat broke and have a baby on the way. With job prospects scarce to non-existent, the young couple are part of a lost generation whose limited means lead to diminished hopes, further distracted from their thwarted ambitions by ever-present and all-consuming technology.

Freer Gallery of Art Sun., April 26, 2 p.m.

All the Women (Todas la mujeres)

AFI Silver Theatre Fri., April 10, 8 p.m.

Italian

Directed by Mariano Barroso (Spain, 2013, 90 min.)

In a Foreign Land (En tierra extraña)

Black Souls (Anime nere) Directed by Francesco Munzi (Italy/France, 2014, 103 min.)

This darkly elegant gangster drama centers on a former narcotics trafficker, now living peacefully as a shepherd, who is drawn back into his family’s drug-trade dynasty by his impetuous son.

Angelika Mosaic Angelika Pop-Up Opens Fri., April 17

Mandarin Old Men (Lao tou) Directed by Lina Yang (China, 1999, 94 min.)

In 1996, pioneering independent film-

A down-and-out veterinarian seeks advice from all of the most important women in his life — his lover, his ex-wife, his mother, his sister-in-law and his psychologist — after his scheme to steal five horses from his father-in-law falls apart.

AFI Silver Theatre Sat., April 11, 7:45 p.m.

Gloria is one of the 700,000 Spaniards who have left Spain since the economic crisis started. This documentary, by Spain’s highest-profile female director portrays the experience of intraEuropean exile.

AFI Silver Theatre Sun., April 12, 7:30 p.m.

Arctic (ärtico)

The Kid (El Niño)

Directed by Gabriel Velázquez (Spain, 2014, 78 min.)

Two young hustlers hit the streets every day to find ways to make ends meet, but beyond their everyday adventures, each desires something neither has (preceded by “Inside the Box” (Spain/U.S., 2013, 15 min.)).

AFI Silver Theatre Fri., April 10, 10 p.m.

Repertory Notes

Directed by Icíar Bollaín (Spain, 2014, 73 min.)

Directed by Daniel Monzón (Spain, 2014, 136 min.)

This Spanish blockbuster tells the story of two teenagers on the one side, El Niño and El Compi, who want to enter the world of drug trafficking, and two police officers on the other who have been trying to eradicate the drug trafficking network in the Gibraltar Straits

for years.

AFI Silver Theatre Thu., April 9, 7:15 p.m., Sat., April 11, 5 p.m.

Magical Girl Directed by Carlos Vemut (Spain, 2014, 127 min.)

Luis is desperate to fulfill his terminally ill daughter’s last wish: to own the prohibitively expensive “Magical Girl Yukiko” dress from her favorite Japanese cartoon.

Fate leads him to cross paths with an attractive young woman with mental disorders and with a teacher retired from everything but his troubled past.

AFI Silver Theatre Sat., April 11, 9:45 p.m.

Open Windows Directed by Nacho Vigalondo (Spain/France/U.S., 2014, 100 min.)

Nick is excited to discover that he’s won a dinner date with his favorite actress, Jill Goddard. But when Jill refuses to honor the contest, Nick begins watching the unknowing star on her webcam, not realizing that this decision will put both himself and Jill at risk as they enter a terrifying world of cat-and-mouse where nothing — and no one — is as it seems (preceded by “Sequence” (U.S., 2013, 20 min.)).

AFI Silver T heatre Sun., April 12, 9:30 p.m.

Filmfest DC Filmfest DC, the 29th annual Washington, DC International Film Festival, returns April 16 to 26.

Programming sidebars include “World View – New International Cinema,” “The Lighter Side – International Comedies,” “Trust No One – International Thrillers,” “Justice Matters – Issues of Social Justice,” “Global Rhythms,” “Reel Jazz” and “Shorts Programs.

Filmfest DC selections will play at the Embassy of France, the GoetheInstitut, AMC Mazza Gallerie and Landmark’s E Street Cinema (April 17-25).

(888) 996-4774, www.filmfestdc.org Landmark’s E Street Cinema Landmark’s E Street Cinema hosts Filmfest DC screenings from April 17 to 25.

“The Studio Ghibli Collection: 19842014” retrospective concludes with “From Up on Poppy Hill” (April 4-5, 10:30 a.m.), “The Tale of the Princess Kaguya” (April 4-5, 1 p.m.), “The Kingdom of Dreams and Madness” (April 11-12, 10:30 a.m.) and “The Wind Rises” (April 11-12, 1 p.m.)

(202) 783-9494, www.landmarktheatres.com

by Washington Diplomat film reviewer Ky N. Nguyen

Please see International Film Clips for detailed listings available at press time.

National Gallery of Art The National Gallery of Art co-hosts a variety of programs at venues around town. At AFI Silver: Concluding the “Discovering Georgian Cinema” series, director Nino Kirtadze presents two of his films, “The Pipeline Next Door” (April 13, 7 p.m.) and “Don’t Breathe” (April 14, 7 p.m.).

At American University’s Malsi Doyle and Michael Forman Theater, McKinley Building: Paul Smith introduces British filmmaker Ken Loach’s rare documentary, “The Spirit of ’45” (April 10, 7 p.m.), shown with gratitude to the British Council.

At the National Gallery’s West Building Lecture Hall: French Nouvelle Vague auteur Chris Marker’s 1996 “Level Five” (March 29, 4 p.m.; April 1, 2 p.m.) plays in repertory.

Presented with thanks to the Embassy of Poland, the program “Sound of My Soul: Wojciech Bąkowski – Spoken Movies and Other Animations” (April 4, 2:30 p.m.) boasts an appearance by Bąkowski, a Warsaw-based animator and video artist.

Glasgow-based artist Luke Fowler’s montages of archival footage include “To the Editor of Amateur Photographer” (also by Mark Fell), preceded by “Depositions” (April 5, 4 p.m.).

British artist Bill Morrison compiled archival historical footage into “The Miners’ Hymns” (April 11, 2:30 p.m.), accompanied by Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannsson’s musical score.

The short film anthology “London: Day In, Day Out” (April 12, 4 p.m.)

epitomizes the city symphony genre.

Freer Gallery of Art

Manuel Mozos’s documentary “Others Will Love the Things I Have Loved: João Bénard da Costa” (April 18, 2:30 p.m.) is a unique cinematic and textual portrayal of da Costa, the entrenched director of Lisbon’s Cinemateca Portuguesa.

As part of the series “The Traveler’s Eye: Scenes of Asia” and “Road Works: Films Inspire Writers,” Val Wang, author of “Beijing Bastard: Into the Wilds of Changing China,” introduces Lina Yang’s documentary “Old Men” (April 12, 2 p.m.), followed by Wang’s book signing.

Shown in conjunction with the Embassy of Spain and AIA|DC Architecture Week 2015, Pablo Bujosa Rodríguez presents his documentary “J. L. Sert – A Nomadic Dream” (April 26, 4 p.m.), a biography of the cutting-edge Spanish-born American architect, city planner and dean of Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design.

(202) 842-6799, www.nga.gov/content/ngaweb/calendar/film-programs.html

American Film Institute (AFI) Silver Theatre The eighth annual Festival of New Spanish Cinema (April 9-12) is programmed and produced by SPAIN arts & culture and Pragda.

Co-presented with the National Gallery of Art, the “Discovering Georgian Cinema” series closes with two free films directed by Nino Kirtadze, who appears in person: “The Pipeline Next Door” (April 13, 7 p.m.) and “Don’t Breathe” (April 14, 7 p.m.).

Continuing film series include “Hollywood Exiles in Europe” (through April 15), “Frank Capra in the 1930s” (through April 16) and “Leading Ladies of Hollywood’s Golden Age” (through April 16).

In the same two series, travel writer, blogger and former editor-inchief of National Geographic Traveler Keith Bellows introduces the documentary “Gringo Trails” (April 19, 2 p.m.), which precedes a talk with director Pegi Vail, an anthropologist, and Costas Christ, editorat-large for National Geographic Traveler.

The screening “Angkor’s Children and Arts in Cambodia” (April 26, 2-4 p.m.) precedes a panel discussion with director Lauren Shaw Arn; Chorn Pond, human rights activist and founder of Cambodian Living Arts; Phloeun Prim, executive director of Cambodian Living Arts and CEO of Season Cambodia festival; Elizabeth Becker, former New York Times reporter and author of “When the War Was Over: Cambodia and the Khmer Rouge Revolution”; and Chris Decherd, Khmer Service chief at Voice of America.

(202) 357-2700, www.asia.si.edu/events/films.asp

Goethe-Institut

Ana Lily Amirpour’s “A Girl Walks Home Alone,” dubbed “the first Iranian vampire Western,” plays a special engagement (April 13-15).

“Film|Neu Presents,” the new German-language film festival’s yearround showcase, screens “Inbetween Worlds” (April 4, 6:30 p.m.) and “I Feel Like Disco” (April 13, 6:30 p.m.).

(301) 495-6700, www.afi.com/silver

(202) 289-1200, www.goethe.de/ins/us/was/ver/enindex.htm

April 2015

The Washington Diplomat Page 39

[ around town ]

EVENTS LISTING **Admission is free unless otherwise noted.

All information on event venues can be found on The Diplomat Web site at www.washdiplomat.com. Times and locations are subject to change. Unless listed, please call venue for specific event times and hours of operation.

ART April 4 to May 24

Remembrances of Voices Past

“Remembrances” features paintings by Indian artist V. Ramesh, for whom an act of devotion, or Bhakti, seems not only an apt social response to existential tragedies, but also a quest for freedom. Painting primarily with oils on large-scale canvas, his oeuvre reveals a preoccupation with meditative terrain, incorporating voices from medieval poetry and images culled from mythology to explore the relationship between states of transcendence and the realities of culture and personal experience.

American University Museum at Katzen April 10 to July 2015

War & Art: Destruction and Protection of Italian Cultural Heritage during World War I

This photographic exhibition illustrates the Italian people’s struggle to protect their cultural patrimony from the ravages of war. A century later, the images not only document early preservation efforts, but have become works of art in their own right, reminding us of the enduring struggle to save the highest expressions of the human spirit from the degradations and savagery of war.

Woodrow Wilson House Through April 12

Days of Endless Time

This exhibit presents 14 installations that offer prismatic vantage points into the suspension and attenuation of time or that create a sense of timelessness, with themes such as escape, solitude, enchantment and the thrall of nature.

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Through April 12

Picturing Mary: Woman, Mother, Idea

For millennia, Mary has been one of the most popular subjects in the history of Western art. This landmark exhibition of more than 60 beautiful depictions of the Virgin Mary explores the concept of womanhood represented by Mary and the power her image has exerted through time.

National Museum of Women in the Arts April 24 to Sept. 7

Watch This! Revelations in Media Art

This exhibit of pioneering and contemporary artworks that trace the evolution of a continuously emerging medium celebrates artists who are engaged in a creative revolution — one shaped as much by developments in science and technology as by style or medium.

Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Through June 7

Unearthing Arabia: The Archaeological Adventures of Wendell Phillips

Through May 1

Fordlandia: The Lost City of Henry Ford

This series of photographs, completed in 2012, reveals what has become of Fordlandia, the American town built in the Brazilian rainforest by tycoon Henry Ford. Today, the town is a post-industrial wasteland, complete with prefabricated industrial sheds from Michigan and American clapperboard houses.

More curious still is that, in spite of no new economy or employer in the area, Fordlandia is coming back to life.

Art Museum of the Americas Through May 1

gute aussichten: new german photography 2014/2015

In its eleventh year, the eight “gute aussichten 2014/2015” award winners are hot on life’s heels. This young generation of photographers is after the most basic and existential questions of life: the banality of death and what remains — or follows the deceased and vanishes without a trace — migration, discrimination, loneliness, isolation and desperation, all of which are put face to face with happiness, cognizance, diversity and creative energy.

Goethe-Institut Through May 3

Piero di Cosimo: The Poetry of Painting in Renaissance Florence

The first major retrospective exhibition of paintings by the imaginative Italian Renaissance master Piero di Cosimo features 44 of the artist’s most compelling paintings, including fanciful mythologies, powerful religious works (one on loan for the first time from the church in Italy for which it was created 500 years ago), and sensitive portraits.

National Gallery of Art Through May 10

Man Ray—Human Equations: A Journey from Mathematics to Shakespeare

Highlighting the multimedia work of the legendary Surrealist artist, “Man Ray— Human Equations” explores the intersection of art and science that defined a significant component of modern art on both sides of the Atlantic at the beginning of the 20th century.

The Phillips Collection

April 25 to May 25

Hiroshi Sugimoto: Conceptual Forms and Mathematical Models

40

amasses personal memories through an accumulation of nearly 400 individual shoes, each with a note from the donor describing lost individuals and past moments.

American University Museum at Katzen

Through May 10

Curatorial practice students from

April 2015

American University and the Vilnius Academy of Arts are developing their skills in the management of art as well as promotion of the artistic ambitions of their fellow students through this international exchange of exhibitions. Young Lithuanian artists exhibiting are working in a wide range of media varying from traditional craftsmanship to unique technological solutions, and demonstrate the varied influence of the Vilnius Academy of Arts on the creativity of its students.

Smithsonian American Art Museum

Lost and Found: Young Art from Lithuania

THE WASHINGTON DIPLOMAT

This exhibition features approximately five photographic works and three sculptures by Hiroshi Sugimoto —

Photo: OAS Art Museum of the Americas

Wendell Phillips, a young paleontologist and geologist, headed one of the largest archaeological expeditions to remote South Arabia (present-day Yemen) from 1949 to 1951. Through a selection of unearthed objects as well as film and photography shot by the expedition team, the exhibition highlights Phillips’s key finds, recreates his adventures (and misadventures), and conveys the thrill of discovery on this important great archaeological frontier.

Hector Poleo’s “Grito Frente al Mar (Scream by the Sea)” is among the works in “Libertad de Expresión: The Art Museum of the Americas and Cold War Politics.”

Arthur M. Sackler Gallery

one of Japan’s most important contemporary artists — inspired

by Man Ray’s 1930s photographs.

Zen, Tea, and Chinese Art in Medieval Japan

of expression and changed the way art was seen in Mexico.

Mexican Cultural Institute

The Phillips Collection Through May 15

Francesco Nonino: Selected Works

Francesco Nonino is one of few Italian photographers whose work has been acquired by both the Library of Congress and the Phillips Collection.

The exhibit at the Embassy of Italy will include some recent works from two series: “Come La Vergogna” and “Atmospheres.” As an homage to his mother, Italian traditions and to introduce the theme of the upcoming EXPO 2015, some photos of his mother’s hands making pasta will also be on display. Viewings are by appointment only; for information visit www.iicwashington.esteri.it.

Embassy of Italy Through May 15

Hands-On Urbanism.

The Right to Green

The research-based exhibition is dedicated to the history of the idea of appropriating land in urban space.

Since the shockwave of modernization that accompanied industrialization, towns and cities worldwide have had to face some very significant challenges.

City-dwellers, who have always found a number of solutions in crisis situations, are involved in bottom-up urban development, as fruit and vegetable gardens led to other forms of collective cohesion, neighborliness and fair distribution.

Embassy of Austria Through May 30

25 Years / 25 Artists

This visual arts exhibition celebrating the Mexican Cultural Institute’s first 25 years presents works from several generations and artistic movements. From the contemporaries of the third stage of Mexican muralism, to the members of the “Ruptura” in the 1960s, this exhibit explores art that proposed new forms

Through May 31

Style in Chinese Landscape Painting: The Yuan Legacy

Landscape painting is one of the most outstanding achievements of Chinese culture. Key styles in this genre emerged during the Yuan dynasty (1279–1368) and are still followed today.

Freer Gallery of Art Through May 31

The Traveler’s Eye: Scenes of Asia Featuring more than 100 works created over the past five centuries, “The Traveler’s Eye: Scenes of Asia” provides glimpses of travels across the Asian continent, from pilgrimages and research trips to expeditions for trade and tourism.

Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Through June 7

Libertad de Expresión: The Art Museum of the Americas and Cold War Politics

Following the creation of the Organization of American States in 1948, its Visual Arts Section, under the direction of Cuban José Gómez Sicre, began an ambitious exhibition program that would further awareness of the art of the Caribbean and Central and South America in the United States. Sicre’s support for international modernism also allied him with U.S. Cold War Warriors, who used freedom of expression as a tool in the cultural and intellectual struggle against the Soviets.

Art Museum of the Americas Through June 7

Perspectives: Chiharu Shiota

Performance and installation artist Chiharu Shiota, Japan’s representative at the 56th Venice Biennale in 2015, will recreate a monumental yet intimate work in the Sackler pavilion that

Through June 14

Zen Buddhism, tea and ink painting — well-known expressions of Japanese culture — have their roots in Chinese arts and ideas brought to medieval Japan from the late 12th to the 16th century. Chinese and Japanese paintings, lacquer ware and ceramics illuminate this remarkable period of cultural contact and synthesis.

Freer Gallery of Art Through Aug. 2

From the Library: Florentine Publishing in the Renaissance

This exhibition presents a variety of books from the late 15th through the early 17th century and explores the development of publishing related to the artistic and scholarly community in Florence.

National Gallery of Art Through Aug. 9

Jacob Lawrence: Struggle …

From the History of the American People

Produced between 1954 and 1956, Jacob Lawrence’s “Struggle … From the History of the American People” portrays scenes from American history, chronicling events from the Revolutionary War through the great westward expansion of 1817.

The Phillips Collection Through Aug. 30

Hot to Cold: An Odyssey of Architectural Adaptation

On the heels of its summer blockbuster “BIG Maze,” the international design firm BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) returns to take visitors from the hottest to the coldest parts of our planet and explore how BIG’s design solutions are shaped by their cultural and climatic contexts. More than 60 threedimensional models will be suspended at the second-floor balconies of the museum’s historic Great Hall in an unprecedented use of this public space.

National Building Museum

The Washington Diplomat

April 2015

Through Aug. 23

Ships, Clocks & Stars: The Quest for Longitude

To mark the 300th anniversary of the passing of the Longitude Act in 1714, this landmark exhibition tells the extraordinary story of the race to determine longitude (east-west position) at sea, helping to solve the problem of navigation and saving seafarers from terrible fates including shipwreck and starvation.

Folger Shakespeare Library Through Sept. 13

Chief S.O. Alonge: Photographer to the Royal Court of Benin, Nigeria

This retrospective showcases the work of noted Nigerian photographer Chief S.O. Alonge, the first indigenous photographer of the Royal Court of Benin, in conjunction with royal arts from the Benin kingdom. The collection of historic photographs was captured on Kodak glass-plate negatives and documents more than 50 years of the ritual, pageantry and regalia of the obas (kings), their wives and retainers.

National Museum of African Art

DANCE April 8 to 12

The Washington Ballet: Swan Lake

Mesmerizing audiences for over 100 years, “Swan Lake” is considered by many to be the greatest classical ballet of all time. Now, the Washington Ballet will take on this mysterious, lyrical and dramatic ballet. Tickets are $45 to $215.

Kennedy Center Eisenhower Theater April 17 to 26

Shen Yun 2015: Reviving 5,000 Years of Civilization

Shen Yun Performing Arts returns to the Kennedy Center Opera House with a lavish new production for 2015 of classical Chinese dance and music, presented by the Falun Dafa Association of Washington, D.C. Tickets are $50 to $250.

Kennedy Center Opera House Sat., April 25, 8 p.m.

twists and turns, also revealing new information about the great charter of rights and liberties that was created in England in 1215.

Library of Congress James Madison Building Wed., April 8, 5:30 p.m.

Celebration of International Roma Day

The Embassy of the Czech Republic invites you to a celebration of International Roma Day, featuring a special piano concert of Roma music performed by Tomáš Kačo and a panel discussion with Jiří Dienstbier, Czech minister for human rights; Drahomíra Miklošová, mayor of Obrnice, Czech Republic; and Philip Kaplan, acting deputy assistant secretary; moderated

by Erika Schlager of the U.S. Helsinki Commission.

Embassy of the Czech Republic Thu., April 9, 6:45 p.m.

Lecture: Professor Elizabeth Boone

The Mexican Cultural Institute in collaboration with the University of Maryland is proud to present “The Dilemma of the Gods and the Familiarity of the Kings: Constructions of Aztec Identity in Early Colonial Mexico,” a talk by Elizabeth Boone of Tulane University.

The talk will put into dialogue Bernardino de Sahagún’s and other chroniclers’ images of the Aztec gods and the Aztec kings to show how the ancient deities were constructed from an array of discursive practices, whereas the lords easily remained within their pre-conquest frame.

Mexican Cultural Institute Wed., April 15, 6 p.m.

Lecture: Laura Spinadel – To Believe in Urban Miracles Since starting out with a humanistic, theosophical and sensualist vision, architect Laura P. Spinadel has moved toward a holistic and ecological position that seeks to put maximum emphasis on the health of open and closed spaces, as well as on the requirements and principles of bioconstruction. Admission is free but registration is required and can be made at acfdc.org.

Embassy of Austria

Solo Tango

DC Tango Festival presents Pan American Symphony’s “Solo Tango,” a show of the best of tango, from its dark and steamy beginnings to the daring interpretations of Astor Piazzolla, with two bandoneón players, internationally acclaimed tango dancers and Argentine tenor, Martin de Leon, whom the Washington Post applauded as “quite simply one of the finest voices ever heard for tango.” Tickets are $35 to $45.

GW Lisner Auditorium

DISCUSSIONS Mon., April 6, 1 p.m.

Magna Carta from Runnymede to Washington: Old Laws, New Discoveries

Noted Magna Carta scholar Nicholas Vincent discusses the Magna Carta’s connection to Washington, D.C., which he says is a story with many strange

MUSIC Tue., April 7, 7:30 p.m.

Concert: Lana Cencic

Lana Cenčić grew up in a richly creative home in Croatia and went on to become a highly lauded actress, musician and dancer in Europe. Underneath it all, however, something was missing.

So she made the decision to move to New York City to pursue her own artistic identity as Lana Is. “In Your Head,” her 2013 breakthrough solo album, is widely celebrated by critics and fans alike. Admission is free but registration is required and can be made at acfdc.org.

Embassy of Austria Sat., April 11, 8 p.m.

Salomé Chamber Orchestra

The Dumbarton Concert Series concludes its 37th season with the electrifying, conductor-less Salomé Chamber

Orchestra in its D.C. debut, performing Brahms’s clarinet quintet, “Libertango”

by Astor Piazzolla, showpieces by Alexey Shor and “La cumparsita”

by Matos Rodríguez. Tickets are $35.

Dumbarton Church Wed., April 15, 7:30 p.m.

Martin Kasík, Piano

Among the foremost Czech pianists today, Martin Kasík has devoted himself to piano since the age of 4 and is the top prizewinner of several domestic and international contests, as well as the recipient of a number of prestigious awards. Tickets are $85, including buffet dinner; for information, visit www.embassyseries.org.

Embassy of the Czech Republic Fri., April 17, 7:30 p.m.

Russian Chamber Art Society: From Moscow to Hollywood – Songs from the Movies

The Russian Chamber Art Society will present “From Moscow to Hollywood Songs From the Movies,” an exciting and diversified collection of composers of songs from Hollywood films from the 1930s to the 2000s, and their counterparts writing for the Russian silver screen at the same time. Tickets are $50; for information, visit acfdc.org.

Embassy of Austria Tue., April 21, 7:30 p.m.

Lecture/Recital: PostClassical Ensemble – Interpreting Mahler

PostClassical Ensemble hosts an evening of lecture and recital by baritone Christòpheren Nomura with pianist Lura Johnson. Presentations will be held with live and recorded music on Viennese musician Gustav Mahler in New York and Mahler & “Jewishness”

by James Loeffler and Joe Horowitz.

Admission is free but registration is required and can be made at acfdc.org.

Embassy of Austria Wed., April 22, 7:30 p.m.

Mendelssohn Piano Trio

The Mendelssohn Piano Trio, the Embassy Series’s resident ensemble, will perform “Piano Trio in B Major Op. 8” by Brahms and “Piano Trio in D Minor Op. 63” by Schumann. Written within a decade from each other, these two celebrated masterpieces are finest examples of German Romanticism with its dramatic scope of expression ranging from poignant melancholy to soaring passion. Tickets are $95, including buffet; for information, visit www. embassyseries.org.

Embassy of Slovenia

“Slow Falling Bird” explores the brutal realities confronting those who arrive unbidden in Australia’s waters and the warping social and mental conditions on both sides of the wire, asking what kind of new life, and new society, can be born into such barren surroundings.

Tickets are $15 to 18.

Georgetown University Davis Performing Arts Center Sat., April 11, 5 p.m.

The Hero of Everything

by InterAct Story Theatre

The Montgomery College Department of Visual and Performing Arts– Takoma/ Silver Spring presents the familyfriendly troupe InterAct Story Theatre performing “The Hero of Everything,” about a do-it-yourself Captain Everything who loves saving the day and doesn’t need anyone’s help to do it, or does she? Tickets are $10.

Montgomery College Takoma Park/Silver Spring Cultural Arts Center April 15 to May 10

Murder Ballad

The Studio Theatre April 16 to May 10

Mariela en el desierto / Mariela in the Desert

Mariela and José were once the golden couple of an elite social circle of artists in Mexico City. Together they built a family and an artist colony to host friends Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo and Rufino Tamayo. But now, in the desert of Northern Mexico in the 1950s, José and Mariela live an isolated existence haunted by the ghost of their young son and the withering of their creativity and artistic inspiration. Tickets are $38 to $42.

GALA Hispanic Theatre Through April 19

Slow Falling Bird

By turns bleak and darkly comical,

Through April 26

Man of La Mancha

As Miguel de Cervantes presents his tale of knight errant Don Quixote, his journey comes alive in a play-withinthe-play, featuring loyal friends, troubled maidens, giant monsters and brave knights. Please call for ticket information.

Shakespeare Theatre Sidney Harman Hall

The Originalist

Four-time Helen Hayes Award winner Edward Gero stars as Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia in a daring world premiere about the brilliant, but polarizing justice, his bright, new, liberal clerk, and their clash over one of the most incendiary cases ever to reach the nation’s highest court. Tickets are $55 to $90.

Arena Stage Thu., April 30, 7:30 p.m.

Otho Eskin’s ‘Final Analysis’

Otho Eskin’s “Final Analysis,” performed by Scena Theatre, is set in turn-of-the-century Vienna, a crossroads of art, music, science and politics. But festering beneath the façade of frivolity and joy, the city is rotting at its core, sickened by moral corruption, obsessed with death and ravaged by a growing hatred of the Jews. Admission is free but registration is required and can be made at acfdc.org.

Out West in the 1920s, a dynamite accident at a gold mine leaves young Mabel wealthy but orphaned. She’s shipped off to a calculating aunt whose nephew is charged with seducing her to control Mabel’s fortune — a hapless courtship reveals a shared love of silent movies and a plan for greater things.

Tickets are $44 to $88.

Through May 20

Studio Theatre

Ford’s Theatre

Freedom’s Song

This epic musical features the words of Abraham Lincoln and music inspired by the letters of those who lived through the Civil War, evoking the soaring hopes and tragic losses of real people through a series of highly theatrical vignettes.

Tickets are $20 to $69.

CULTURE GUIDE

Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike

April 8 to 11

Anacostia Playhouse

Embassy of Austria

Laugh

April 3 to May 3

Arena Stage

Scena Theatre presents this contemporary comedy in which two women meet in a Minnesota bar and lament the struggle “to find a lover before the first freeze” as well as curse the notso-nice men who have recently dumped them. It turns out there are really, really nice hit men for hire who will take out your miserable ex and text you when it is over. Tickets are $25 to $45.

Through April 26

Studio Theatre will transform one of its theater spaces into a gritty, immersive dive bar to present this explosive rock musical, staged cabaret-style, about an old flame, a dangerous passion and a love triangle headed for ignition. Tickets are $45 to $80.

THEATER

Helen Hayes Award-winning director and playwright Aaron Posner, known for his Chekhov-inspired plays, lends his hand to this riotous sendup, which satirizes characters and themes from Anton Chekhov’s classics. Tickets are $45 to $90.

Through April 19

The Norwegians

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The Washington Diplomat Page 41

DIPLOMATIC SPOTLIGHT

The Washington Diplomat

April 2015

Passport DC Launch

From left, Executive Director of Cultural Tourism DC Steven E. Shulman, PR consultant Jan Du Plain, Syed M. Ali of the Pakistani Embassy and Syed Waqas Abbas of the Pakistani Embassy attend the opening ceremony of Passport DC 2015 at the Melrose Georgetown Hotel.

4Cinnamon Bottaro, former intern at the Embassy of Belize, left, and Ardelle Sabido, deputy chief of mission of the Belize Embassy, attend the launch of Passport DC, an annual citywide showcase hosted by Cultural Tourism DC that features dozens of embassy open houses, street festivals and other events.

Timothy Cox, board chairman of Cultural Tourism DC and CEO of the Washington Home and Community Hospices, welcomes guests to the kickoff for this year’s Passport DC, a month-long showcase of international culture in May that includes programming by 70 embassies and more than 40 cultural institutions in the city.

Irish Arts

photo: margot schulman

Taoiseach of Ireland Enda Kenny, left, greets Kennedy Center President Deborah Rutter during a visit to celebrate the recent announcement of “Celebrating a Century of Irish Arts and Culture!” — a major festival highlighting Irish culture and its relationship to America at the Kennedy Center in May and June.

Prevent Cancer Spring Gala

From left, Chief Executive Officer of the Hugh O’Brian Youth Leadership Javier LaFianza, Sheila Switzer, Natalia Dementieva of the Russian Embassy and Patricia Borg attend the launch of Passport DC at the Melrose Georgetown Hotel.

Cherisani Asa, left, and Barongwa Master Baipidi of the Embassy of Botswana attend the launch of Passport DC, an annual citywide showcase hosted by Cultural Tourism DC that features dozens of embassy open houses, street festivals and other events.

Tara Compton, left, and Seiichu Urauchi, first secretary at the Japanese Embassy, attend the launch of Passport DC in May, which includes the Around the World Embassy Tour, EU Embassies’ Open House and the Asian Heritage Festival.

photos: kate oczypok

From left, First Secretary of Cultural Affairs at the Hungarian Embassy Dávid Singer, Szabolcs Somogyi of the Hungarian Embassy and Jeffrey Werner, board member of Cultural Tourism DC, attend the launch of Passport DC at the Melrose Georgetown Hotel.

Lithuanian Independence

Ambassador of Lithuania Žygimantas Pavilionis welcomes guests to a reception marking the 25th anniversary of the restoration of Lithuania’s independence at the Library of Congress Thomas Jefferson Building.

From left, Defense, Military, Air and Naval Attaché at the Belgian Embassy Johan Andries, Defense Attaché at the Italian Embassy Maj. Gen. Giovanni Fantuzzi, Defense and Military Attaché at the Greek Embassy Evangelos Papadopoulos and Defense Attaché at the Canadian Embassy Nicolas Matern attend the Lithuanian Independence Day celebration.

President of the National Endowment for Democracy Carl Gershman, left, and former Ambassador of Georgia Temuri Yakobashvili, now with the German Marshall Fund, attend a reception marking the 25th anniversary of the restoration of Lithuania’s independence.

photos: Jack Hartzman Photography / prevent cancer foundation photos: kate Oczypok

From left, scholar George Khelashvili, Deputy Chief of Mission of the Croatian Embassy Mario Skunca and Jurijs Pogrebnaks attend a reception at the Library of Congress marking the 25th anniversary of the restoration of Lithuania’s independence.

photos: kate oczypok

Rep. Michael R. Turner (R-Ohio), chairman of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces, speaks to guests at Lithuania’s Independence Day celebration.

42

Minister of Foreign Affairs for Lithuania Linas Linkevičius speaks to guests at Lithuania’s Independence Day celebration.

European Parliament member Vytautas Landsbergis, who was Lithuania’s first head of state after its independence from the Soviet Union, speaks to guests at Lithuania’s Independence Day celebration.

From left, Ambassador of Switzerland Martin Dahinden, Anita Dahinden, Laura Denise Bisogniero, Ambassador of Ireland Anne Anderson, Prevent Cancer Foundation President and founder Carolyn Aldigé, former WJLA anchor Greta Kreuz and Ambassador of Italy Claudio Bisogniero attend the Prevent Cancer Foundation’s 21st annual Spring Gala at the National Building Museum.

Kent Bress, director of the NASA Aeronautics and Cross Agency Support Division, left, and Eivile Cipkute of the Management Board at UAB attend a reception at the Library of Congress marking the 25th anniversary of the restoration of Lithuania’s independence.

Executive Vice President of Strategic Staffing Solutions Denise Kurowski, left, and Carol Werner attend a reception at the Library of Congress marking the 25th anniversary of the restoration of Lithuania’s independence.

The Washington Diplomat

From left, former Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.), Lala Abdurahimova and Ambassador of Azerbaijan Elin Suleymanov join 900 guests for the Prevent Cancer Foundation’s Spring Gala, which raised $1.6 million in support of programs that save lives through cancer prevention and early detection.

Ambassador of Ireland Anne Anderson, left, talks with Carolyn Aldigé, president and founder of the Prevent Cancer Foundation, at the group’s 21st annual Spring Gala.

Anderson was the honorary patron of the gala, whose theme was “Ireland: Legendary and Contemporary.” She talked about Ireland’s fight against cancer and its goal of becoming a tobacco-free country by 2025.

April 2015

Ecuador Farewell

From left, Ambassador of Argentina Cecilia Nahón, Ambassador of Ecuador Nathalie Cely Suárez and President and co-founder of the Women’s Foreign Policy Group Patricia Ellis attend a farewell reception for Ambassador Cely, who is leaving Washington after three years to become Ecuador’s minister of production, employment and competitiveness (also see story on page 6).

From left, Iván Hernandez, an Ecuador advisor at the World Bank and husband of the Ecuadorian ambassador, Lala Abdurahimova and Ambassador of Azerbaijan Elin Suleymanov attend a farewell reception for Ambassador of Ecuador Nathalie Cely Suárez.

From left, Ambassador of Dominica Hubert John Charles, Miriam Hooker and Ambassador of Nicaragua Francisco Obadiah Campbell Hooker attend a farewell reception for Ambassador of Ecuador Nathalie Cely Suárez at the Ecuadorian Embassy.

Icons of Georgetown From left, Gabriel Gross, María Gracia Muñoz, President of the Guayaquil Chamber of Industries Francisco Alarcón and Mónica Gross of the Ecuadorian Embassy attend a farewell reception for Ambassador of Ecuador Nathalie Cely Suárez.

From left, D.C. Councilmember Jack Evans, CEO of Capital Restaurant Concepts Thomas L. Gregg and Paul J. Cohn, founder of J. Paul’s restaurant, attend the first Icons of Georgetown awards dinner at J. Paul’s, which honored Evans and Cohn for their efforts to improve the historic neighborhood of Georgetown.

Bulgarian National Day 3Ambassador of Bulgaria Elena Poptodorova, right, greets Ambassador of Greece Christos P. Panagopoulos.

Guests enjoy the Bulgarian National Day festivities at the Organization of American States. photos: embassy of bulgaria

4From left, Ambassador of Bulgaria Elena Poptodorova, Deputy Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs Hoyt Brian Yee and Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) speak at the Bulgarian National Day reception.

Ambassador of Bulgaria Elena Pop­ to­dorova welcomes guests to the Bulgarian National Day reception at the Organization of American States.

Etihad Airways Actress Nicole Kidman, center, joined Etihad Airways Chief Commercial Officer Peter Baumgartner, left, and James Hogan, its president and CEO, for the Abu Dhabi launch of Etihad Airways’s new global brand campaign “Flying Reimagined” featuring a new TV commercial narrated by Kidman.

Norway at Union Station 3Interim Secretary of the District of Columbia Sharon Anderson, left, talks with a Norwegian Sami performer, who sang several yoiks, traditional songs passed down through the generations. photos: kate oczpyok

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), left, and Ambassador of Norway Kåre R. Aas listen to the speakers at the Norwegian Christmas at Union Station launch.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) lights Norway’s Christmas tree in Union Station during the launch of the annual Norwegian Christmas at Union Station program. The tree featured 20,000 lights and 700 polar bears to reflect the importance of the Arctic and how Norway and the U.S. are working together on Arctic issues.

Defense Attaché at the Norwegian Embassy Finn Hannestad and Tale Sumdlisaeter attend the Norwegian Christmas at Union Station launch.

4The Carolers of Greater Washington, D.C., sing for guests at the Norwegian Christmas at Union Station launch, including children from Eliot-Hine Middle School, partner of the Norwegian Embassy through the Embassy Adoption Program.

The International Patient Program at the George Washington University Hospital A boutique concierge program offering care for our diplomats and international community:

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April 2015

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The Washington Diplomat Page 43

AROUNDTHEWORLD

THE WASHINGTON DIPLOMAT

HOLIDAYS AFGHANISTAN April 28: Victory of Mujahideen ANDORRA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday ANGOLA April 24: Peace and National Reconciliation Day ANTIGUA and BARBUDA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday ARGENTINA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter ARMENIA April 24: Armenian Genocide Memorial Day

BANGLADESH April 14: Bangla New Year BARBADOS April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 28: National Heroes’ Day

BURKINA FASO April 5: Easter CAMBODIA April 13-15: Cambodian New Year CAMEROON April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

CROATIA April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday CYPRUS April 1: Greek Cypriot National Day CZECH REPUBLIC April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

BELGIUM April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

CANADA April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

BELIZE April 3: Good Friday April 4: Holy Saturday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

DENMARK April 2: Maundy Thursday April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 16: Queen’s Birthday

CHAD April 5: Easter

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC April 3: Good Friday

CHILE April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

ECUADOR April 3: Good Friday

BENIN April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday BOLIVIA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter

AUSTRALIA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 25: ANZAC Day

BOTSWANA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

AUSTRIA April 6: Easter Monday

BRAZIL April 3: Good Friday April 21: Tiradentes’ Day

BAHAMAS April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

HONDURAS April 2 to 6: Easter Week April 14: Day of the Americas

BULGARIA April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

COLOMBIA April 2: Maundy Thursday April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday COSTA RICA April 11: Juan Santamaria Day April 2 to 6: Holy Week CÔTE D’IVOIRE April 6: Easter Monday

EL SALVADOR April 2 to 6: Holy Week EQUATORIAL GUINEA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday ESTONIA April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday ETHIOPIA April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

APPOINTMENTS Algeria Madjid Bouguerra became ambassador of Algeria to the United States on Feb. 23, 2015. Ambassador Bouguerra previously served as minister delAmbassador egate in charge of Madjid Bouguerra Maghreb and African affairs at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2013-14), Algeria’s ambassador to Germany (2010-13), secretary-general at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2007-09) and ambassador to China (2001-05). He was also Algeria’s ambassador to Niger (1992-97), its ambassador to Zambia (1987-90), counselor at the Algerian Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York (1981-85) and first secretary at the Algerian Embassy in Tanzania (1978-81). In addition, Ambassador Bouguerra has held various postings at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Africa Department, including director general (1997-2001), director (199092) and deputy director (1986). Ambassador Bouguerra holds a diploma from the National School of Administration and a degree in economics from the University of Algiers. He speaks Arabic, French, English and intermediate German.

Hungary Dorottya Martonffy Nagy assumed the position of trade representative attaché on Oct. 1, replacing Katalin Balogne Csorba.

Iceland Geir H. Haarde became ambassador of Iceland to the United States on Feb. 23, 2015.

Ambassador Haarde was prime minister of Iceland from 2006 to 2009, the country’s minister for foreign affairs from 2005 to 2006 and its minister of finance from 1998 to 2005.

44

Since 2009, he has worked as independent consultant and speaker. Ambassador Haarde previously served as a long-time member of the Icelandic parliament, the Althingi (19872009); chairman (2005-09) and vice chairman (1999-2005) of the Independence Party; member of the International Monetary and Financial Committee of the International Monetary Fund (2002-04); and chairman of the Independence Party’s Parliamentary Group (1991-98). Other postings include chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Althingi (1995-98); president of the Nordic Council (1995); chairman of the Nordic Council’s Conservative Party (1995-97); chairman of the Standing Committee of Parliamentarians of the Arctic Region (1995-98); and chairman of the Organizing Committee of the World Championship in Team Handball in Iceland (1995). Ambassador Haarde was also political advisor to the minister of finance (1983-87) and an economist with the Central Bank of Iceland (1977-83). He holds a bachelor’s magna cum laude in economics from Brandeis University, a master’s in economics from the University of Minnesota and a master’s with distinction in international relations from Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. Born in 1951, Ambassador Haarde is married to Inga Jona Thordardottir and has five children.

South Africa Mninwa Johannes Mahlangu became ambassador of South Africa to the United States of Feb. 23, Ambassador 2015. Known as “MJ,” Mninwa Johannes Ambassador Mahlangu Mahlangu’s public and political life started in the late 1960s when he was elected president of the Student Christian

FIJI April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

HUNGARY April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

FINLAND April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 30: May Day Eve

ICELAND April 2: Maundy Thursday April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 23: First Day of Summer

FRANCE April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

INDIA April 3: Good Friday

GABON April 5: Easter

INDONESIA April 3: Good Friday

GAMBIA April 5: Easter

IRELAND April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

GEORGIA April 5: Easter GERMANY April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter GHANA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday GRENADA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday GUATEMALA April 2: Holy Thursday April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter

ISRAEL April 3 to 11: Passover ITALY April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 25: Liberation Day JAMAICA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday JAPAN April 29: Greenery Day KENYA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

LAOS April 13-15: Lao New Year LATVIA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday LEBANON April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter LESOTHO April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday LIECHTENSTEIN April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday LITHUANIA April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday LUXEMBOURG April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday MACEDONIA April 5: Easter MADAGASCAR April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday MALAWI April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday MALTA April 3: Good Friday MOLDOVA April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

April 2015

MOZAMBIQUE April 7: Women’s Day NAMIBIA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 22: Independence Day NETHERLANDS April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 30: Queen’s Day NEW ZEALAND April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 25: ANZAC Day NICARAGUA April 2: Holy Thursday April 3: Good Friday NIGER April 5: Easter April 24: National Day NIGERIA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday NORWAY April 2: Maundy Thursday April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday PANAMA April 3: Good Friday PAPUA NEW GUINEA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday PARAGUAY April 2: Holy Thursday April 3: Good Friday

Movement, in then Eastern Transvaal. From 1973 to 1976, he served as assistant secretary of the Transvaal United African Teachers Association. Ambassador Mahlangu played a critical role in the processes leading up to the end of apartheid. Between 1991 and 1994, he was a negotiator at the Congress for Democratic South Africa (CODESA) and the Multiparty Negotiation Forum. In 1993, he became the co-chairperson of these bodies, and from 1993 to 1994, he was a member of South Africa’s Transitional Executive Council.

After the first democratic elections in 1994, Ambassador Mahlangu joined the National Assembly in the Parliament of South Africa as a representative of the African National Congress. He became a member of the Constitutional Assembly, the body that drafted the constitution. During his tenure with the National Assembly, he also served as chairperson of House Committees. In 2002, Ambassador Mahlangu was elected permanent deputy chairperson of the National Council of Provinces (NCOP) in Parliament, becoming chairperson in 2005, a position he held until 2014. Ambassador Mahlangu has represented South Africa in many international platforms, including the United Nations and G20 Speakers Conferences. He was the leader of the South African Parliament’s delegation to the Pan-African Parliament and has served as chairperson of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (Africa region) and president of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (international). He is married to Nomaswazi Mahlangu and they have two daughters and three sons.

Suriname Sylvana Simson-Hew A. Kee assumed the position of second secretary in August 2014, having previously served as the chief of protocol to the president and desk officer in the Americas Division of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Hargwatie Maikoe departed the post of first secretary in May 2014.

Thailand Pisan Manawapat became the 44th ambassador of Thailand to the United States on Feb. 23, 2015, having most recently served as the Thai ambassador Ambassador Pisan Manawapat to the European Union, Belgium, Luxembourg, India and Canada. His first overseas posting was in D.C. (1986-90), where he spent his first 12 months on Capitol Hill as an APSA Congressional Fellow in the offices of Congressman Don J. Pease (D-Ohio) and Sen. Daniel P. Inouye (D-Hawaii). He also served at the Royal Thai Embassy in Malaysia (1993-95) and as deputy chief of mission in Japan (1999-2002).

Ambassador Manawapat served as directorgeneral of the Department of International Economic Affairs from 2002 to 2004, during which time he was also APEC SOM leader for Thailand while Thailand hosted APEC 2003. From 2004 to 2007, Ambassador Manawapat served as the Foreign Affairs Ministry’s deputy permanent secretary supervising all bilateral relations. He was also Thailand’s chief negotiator for the Japan-Thailand Economic Partnership Agreement from start to finish (2002-06).

Born in 1956, Ambassador Manawapat attended Bangkok Christian College and Triam U-dom Suksa School in Bangkok. He graduated with a bachelor’s in economics and a master’s in economics, majoring in international trade, from the London School of Economics and Political Science and the University of London, respectively. He also completed Thailand’s National Defence College in 2003. He is married to Wanchana Manawapat and has one daughter.

Venezuela Maximilien Sanchez Arvelaiz assumed the position of chargé d’affaires on July 4, 2014, replacing Calixto Ortega.

The Washington Diplomat

PERU April 2: Holy Thursday April 3: Good Friday PHILIPPINES April 2: Holy Thursday April 3: Good Friday April 9: Araw Ng Kagitingan POLAND April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday PORTUGAL April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 25: Liberty Day ROMANIA April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday RWANDA April 7: National Mourning Day ST. KITTS and NEVIS April 3: Good Friday April 4: Easter Saturday April 5: Easter ST. LUCIA April 3: Good Friday April 4: Easter Saturday April 5: Easter ST. VINCENT and THE GRENADINES April 3: Good Friday April 4: Easter Saturday April 5: Easter SENEGAL April 5: Easter April 24: Independence Day SEYCHELLES April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter

SIERRA LEONE April 27: Independence Day SLOVAKIA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday SLOVENIA April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 27: National Uprising Day SOUTH AFRICA April 3: Good Friday April 25: Family Day April 27: Freedom Day SPAIN April 2: Holy Thursday April 3: Good Friday SWEDEN April 3: Good Friday April 4: Easter Saturday April 5: Easter SWAZILAND April 19: King’s Birthday April 25: National Flag Day SWITZERLAND April 3: Good Friday April 4: Easter Saturday April 5: Easter SYRIA April 17: Independence Day TANZANIA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 26: Union Day (National Day) THAILAND April 6: Chakri Memorial Day April 13-15: Songkran Festival Day TOGO April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday April 27: Independence Day TRINIDAD and TOBAGO April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday TUNISIA April 9: Martyrs’ Day TURKEY April 23: Children’s Day UGANDA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday UNITED KINGDOM April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday URUGUAY April 2 to 6: Holy Week VENEZUELA April 3: Good Friday April 5: Easter April 19: Declaration of Independence VIETNAM April 30: National Reunification Day ZAMBIA April 3: Good Friday April 19: Holy Saturday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday ZIMBABWE April 3: Good Friday April 3: Independence Day April 4: Holy Saturday April 5: Easter April 6: Easter Monday

April 2015

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from page 17

Book Review Eisenhower took a leave of absence from Columbia in October 1950 to accept President Harry Truman’s offer to become the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe in Paris, leading NATO during its infancy. He rebuffed several suggestions from Truman that he run for president as a Democrat and then decided to run for the White House as a Republican in 1952.

According to Johnson, Eisenhower approached politics with broad instincts rather than a well-articulated philosophy or a specific policy agenda. He supported balanced federal budgets with low taxes and tight spending controls, including on defense programs.A devoted internationalist, he also advocated a firm but not reckless American stance in the world. He hated war.“Don’t go to war in response to emotions of anger and resentment. Do it prayerfully,” he once said.

Johnson describes Eisenhower’s 1952 presidential campaign as one in which he used his stellar reputation and the nation’s exhaustion with Democrats to trounce his opponent, Illinois Gov. Adlai Stevenson. But the author rebukes Eisenhower for acquiescing during the campaign to Republican Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s request that he drop a statement praising his former boss, George Marshall, in a speech in Wisconsin, where McCarthy had a large base of voter support. McCarthy, who rose to fame with his Red Scare demagoguery, became a frequent critic of Marshall, accusing the widely respected former secretary of state and defense of siding with the Soviets.

Johnson said Eisenhower’s capitulation to McCarthy’s unfounded attacks was an unforgivable mistake. “There came one moment of ignominy — the only one in his entire career — when he bowed to pressure in a manner that left him deeply ashamed for the rest of his life,” Johnson writes of the incident.

“Ike regretted it immediately and never forgave himself. Before this episode and after, he often paid tribute to Marshall’s patriotism, but the damage was done and could not be repaired. It was a moment of turpitude and brought home to Ike the painful cost of politics in a way that nothing else could have done. He refused April 2015

“

Don’t go to war in response to emotions of anger and resentment.

Do it prayerfully.

”

— former U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower

to talk about it — ever,” Johnson writes.

The author depicts Ike as a successful and purposeful president who selected a strong Cabinet and White House staff to manage a quietly effective government. Eisenhower, the author argues, was excellent at focusing on those issues that meant the most to him: low taxes, a balanced budget, a truce in Korea, restrained defense spending, prudent foreign aid programs and world peace. Eisenhower had a limited domestic agenda and believed, according to Johnson, that “time and prosperity would solve most problems, including civil rights.”

Eisenhower gave the United States “a decade of unexampled prosperity and calm,” Johnson declares in his book. “Seen from the perspective of the twenty-first century, the Eisenhower years, 1953 to 1961, were the climax of ‘the American century.’”

Johnson argues that Eisenhower’s personal qualities made him a success. He had a clear, analytical intelligence; wrote and spoke effectively; got along well with subordinates, peers and superiors; was a gifted problem solver; worked hard but always seemed relaxed, confident and unhurried; and identified specific goals that he pursued quietly but vigorously.There was also a shrewdness, even craftiness, to Ike that few appreciated. Johnson quotes Richard Nixon as saying,“I served General Eisenhower as his vice president for eight years. He was by far the most devious man I ever met in my life.”

Johnson’s “Eisenhower: A Life” is a good book that offers a clear and succinct summary of an admirable man and his impressive career.While an unabashed admirer of Ike, the author is also willing to criticize him when appropriate, such as his capitula-

tion to McCarthy regarding his planned praise for Marshall.

I think Johnson gives Eisenhower too much credit for the Korean truce, which the Truman administration largely negotiated, and assigns too little blame to Ike for the future debacle in Vietnam, where Eisenhower played an early and important role.

He opposed sending American grounds troops into Indochina to save the beleaguered French forces in 1954, saying,“This war in Indochina would absorb our troops by the legions.” But Ike did commit the American government to support South Vietnam in the aftermath of the Geneva Accords in 1954 that divided Vietnam into northern and southern regimes. He sent South Vietnam about $1 billion in assistance between 1955 and 1961 and deployed about 1,000 U.S. military advisers to South Vietnam There are several areas that deserve more attention, even in a brief book. For example, I wish Johnson had written more about the 1960 presidential campaign in which Ike was conflicted about his role. He was deeply disappointed by the result and saw Kennedy’s victory as a repudiation of his presidency.

I would also have liked discussion of his 1953 appointment of Earl Warren as chief justice of the Supreme Court, one of the president’s most consequential decisions. In Warren’s first year, he drafted and pushed through a unanimous Supreme Court decision on the historic Brown versus Board of Education ruling that overturned the “separate but equal” doctrine and played a major role in advancing the civil rights movement. While Eisenhower had major misgivings about the ruling, he insisted on enforcing it and had his attorney general draft a major civil rights bill in 1956 that was approved by Congress in a scaled-back form in 1957.

I would also have liked Johnson to say more about Ike’s re­­ markably prescient farewell address in which the former five-star general warned about the dangers of a military-industrial complex and urged fiscal prudence and generational responsibility.

Nevertheless, “Eisenhower: A Life” is an excellent book for those seeking an introduction to Ike or a refresher about the life and times of a man still worth studying, understanding and admiring.

John Shaw is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.

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Obama in education initiatives, infrastructure construction and middle-class tax breaks.

Obama’s budget proposal also does not address the two biggest factors driving longterm debt: Social Security and Medicare. Its deficit savings would be achieved through higher taxes, health-care savings and a comprehensive immigration bill that would legalize millions of workers — a bill that has slim changes of materializing in the current Congress.

Republicans on the House and Senate budget committees recently released their own 2016 spending proposals that call for far deeper cuts, though they too bust through the sequestration spending caps with budgetary sleights of hand.

The House version would gut federal programs like food stamps, Pell Grants and Medicaid to slash $5.5 trillion in spending over a decade, while giving the Pentagon $96 billion in extra “emergency” funding next year, well above Obama’s $58 billion request. The Senate proposal is not quite as drastic, but it also aims to cut spending by $5.1 trillion over a decade while significantly boosting defense funding.

Now the wrangling to find an elusive middle ground begins. The two chambers will have to set up a conference committee to resolve their differences. If a unified budget emerges, Republicans can then enact a maneuver known as reconciliation, which could tack on provisions such as repealing ObamaCare, setting up a presidential veto and another potential budget showdown later this year.

Meanwhile, Secretary of State John Kerry has been pushing lawmakers to fund Obama’s diplomatic efforts given the global crises that have been piling up.

In testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Feb. 24, Kerry highlighted several specific features of the administration’s request: $3.5 billion to battle the Islamic State, address the crisis in Syria, bolster regional security and respond to humanitarian emergencies in Iraq and Syria; $3.1 billion for Israel; $639 million for Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia to bolster their democracies and help them resist Russia; $1.4 billion to support rebalancing to the Asian-Pacific region; $1 billion to address the underlying causes of illegal migration from Central America; $5.4 billion to finance interna-

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tional organizations and peacekeeping efforts; $3.4 billion for programs for Afghanistan and Pakistan; $4.8 billion for embassy security; $1.2 billion for public diplomacy and exchanges; $8.2 billion for global health programs; $808 million for clean energy and to curb the impact of climate change; $978 million for the Feed the Future program; $390 million for the Counterterrorism Partnerships Fund; and over $2 billion for democracy, human rights and governance programs.

In his testimony, Kerry described a global order that is “marked both by stark tragedy and by great promise.” He added: “America must lead, but cannot do so on the cheap.The money we devote to the entire range of foreign policy programming, everything from embassy security to our counterterrorism and nonproliferation initiatives, amounts to only about 1 percent of the federal budget, yet it may impact 50 percent of history that will be written about this era.”

He said the State Department is taking the diplomatic lead in assembling the global alliance against the Islamic State and claimed the coalition has halted the group’s momentum.

Kerry also said the administration has supported Ukraine’s recently elected government against illegal intervention by Moscow and attacks from the armed separatists that Russia supports. And he touted sanctions targeting Russia’s financial, energy and defense sectors and said they have “imposed a clear cost on the Russian economy and brought Kremlin leaders back to the bargaining table.”

Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter took several trips to Capitol Hill to defend the president’s defense budget. Carter said there is a bipartisan consensus in the United States on a defense strategy that is based on protecting the homeland, building global security and projecting power to defend U.S. interests. America’s strategic priorities, Carter said, are to rebalance to the Asia-Pacific region; maintain a strong commitment to security and stability in Europe and the Middle East; sustain global counterterrorism efforts; strengthen key alliances and partnerships; and modernize the military.

He emphasized the need for lawmakers to adjust the spending cap that limits spending for defense programs, saying he can’t implement important aspects of the administration’s strategy with current mandatory spending limits. He argued that America’s “friends and potential

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enemies around the world are watching” to see how the defense budget is written.

Carter was for the most part preaching to the choir. Given that the White House, Senate and House have all pushed to raise defense spending, this is one area of the budget that will likely escape the sequestration chopping block.

SECURITY VISION Perhaps the broadest expression of Obama’s foreign policy vision is contained in his new National Security Strategy. The NSS is required by the Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986 and charges each administration to issue a national security strategy annually. From 1987 through 2000, an NSS was submitted every year except in 1989 to 1992.The George W. Bush administration submitted two NSS documents in 2002 and 2006. Obama released his first NSS in May of 2010 and then offered his second NSS this February.

Obama’s new NSS identifies America’s “enduring national interests” as protecting the security of the homeland, U.S. citizens, allies and partners; ensuring a strong, innovative and growing economy in an open international system; promoting respect for universal values at home and around the world; and a defending a rules-based international order guided by American leadership.

The NSS says the United States must prioritize efforts that address the top strategic risks the nation faces.These risks are catastrophic attacks on the homeland and critical infrastructure; threats or attacks against American citizens abroad and its allies; global economic crises or major economic disruptions; proliferation of weapons of mass destruction; the spread of severe global infectious diseases; climate change; major energy market disruptions; and the security consequences associated with weak or failing states.

Obama’s strategic plan argues that the nation’s foreign policy can’t be captured by a phrase or sound bite and must be mindful of the complexity of the international terrain.

“This strategy eschews orienting our entire foreign policy around a single threat or region. It establishes instead a diversified and balanced set of priorities appropriate for the world’s leading global power with interest in every part of an increasingly interconnected world.”

In his transmittal letter for the NSS, Obama said America’s strong economy and withdrawal

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from the ground wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are positive developments that position the nation for the future. But he said serious threats still hover on the horizon: terrorism, cybersecurity, Russian aggression, climate change and outbreaks of infectious diseases.

“We must be clear-eyed about these and other challenges and recognize the United States has a unique capability to mobilize and lead the international community to meet them,” he said. “The question is never whether America should lead, but how we lead.”

Obama said the United States continues to lead from a “position of strength,” but has to “make hard choices among many competing priorities and must always resist the over-reach that comes when we make decisions based upon fear.” The president said that while the nation must be aware of, and responsive to, the dangers it faces, the face of American diplomacy and international engagement should be positive and confident.“I believe that America leads best when we draw upon our hopes rather than our fears,” he declared.

That philosophy of “strategic patience,” whether it comes to Russia, Iran, Syria or Cuba, consistently draws rebukes from Republicans who call Obama’s leadership style hesitant, indecisive and accommodating. But Obama has made it clear that he is out to play the long game of advancing American interests, and Washington must be careful not to respond immediately and reflexively to every crisis and headline that comes its way.

“The challenges we face require strategic patience and persistence. They require us to take our responsibilities seriously and make the smart investments in the foundations of our national power. Therefore, I will continue to pursue a comprehensive agenda that draws on all elements of our national strength, that is attuned to the strategic risks and opportunities we face,” he argued in his NSS. On an ambitiously optimistic note, considering the partisan acrimony that has marked his last six years in office, the president insisted his strategic agenda is achievable, “especially if we proceed with confidence and if we restore the bipartisan center that has been a pillar of strength for American foreign policy in decades past.”

John Shaw is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.

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