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TITLE: Bridging Homeland and Homegrown
SPEAKER: Christopher Hill
EVENT DATE: 05/01/2008
RUNNING TIME: 89 minutes
DESCRIPTION:
Ambassador Christopher R. Hill was the keynote speaker at the launch of the Asian Pacific American Lecture Series. His speech centered on preserving America's relationships with her allies in Asia. He focused specifically on the initial talks and diplomatic outreach to open channels of communication between North Korea and the State Department. Asian-American communities and business corporations can be reassured that diplomatic relations between their specific Asian homeland and their communities here in America will remain strong and connected.
An important goal of the lecture series is to focus on the Asian Division's newest collection: the Asian Pacific American Collection. An initiative to create such a collection was encouraged by Congressman Mike Honda, chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, who felt that APA contributions in American history went unrecognized and an APA collection in the Library of Congress would be a positive reinforcement towards removing that invisibility.
Speaker Biography: Christopher R. Hill was sworn-in as Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs on April 8, 2005. Hill is a career member of the Senior Foreign Service whose most recent assignment was as Ambassador to the Republic of Korea. On February 14, 2005, he was named as the head of the U.S. delegation to the Six Party Talks on the North Korean nuclear issue. Previously, he has served as U.S. Ambassador to Poland (2000-2004), Ambassador to the Republic of Macedonia (1996-1999) and special envoy to Kosovo (1998-1999). He also served as special assistant to the president and senior director for Southeast European Affairs in the National Security Council. Earlier in his foreign service career, Hill served tours in Belgrade, Warsaw, Seoul and Tirana, and on the Department of State's policy planning staff and in the department's operation center. While on a fellowship with the American Political Science Association, he served as a staff member for Congressman Stephen Solarz working on Eastern European issues. He also served as the Department of State's senior country officer for Poland. Hill received the State Department's Distinguished Service Award for his contributions as a member of the U.S. negotiating team in the Bosnia peace settlement, and was a recipient of the Robert S. Frasure Award for Peace Negotiations for his work on the Kosovo crisis. Prior to joining the foreign service, Hill served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon.