RECENT EVENTS

2008

Note: Subsequent to its major event on January 9, 2008 with the Center for U.S. Global Engagement, the Nevada Committee on Foreign Relations (NCFR) agreed to co-sponsor events with the Las Vegas World Affairs Council (LVWAC) pending the merger of the two organizations that occurred on August 1, 2008. The following were those cooperative events that occurred prior to the merger.

3/28 CFR and LVWAC sponsored a luncheon in honor of Her Royal Highness the Crown Princess Margarita and His Royal Highness Radu Prince of Romania at the Golden Nugget, where they both spoke on the abandoned children in orphanages in Romania and the institutional projects which they support. The luncheon was followed by an elegant dinner event at the Las Vegas Hilton arranged under the auspices of Lia Roberts, Honorary Consul of Romania in Nevada, who was and is also a member of the Board of Distinguished Advisors of NCFR.

3/27 NCFR and LVWAC also sponsored a workshop at the Rainbow Library in Las Vegas arranged by NCFR Board member Kathleen Close for Results Education Fund founder Sam Daley-Harris inspired by Nobel Laureate Professor Muhammad Yunus to generate the public and political will to end hunger and poverty in the world.

3/7 The first jointly-sponsored NCFR/LVWAC event was held at the home of Dr. Ronald Kline in Henderson, at which the speakers were Colonel Richard L. Klass, USAF (Ret.), who is Executive Director of the Veterans' Alliance for Security and Democracy, and Catherine Thomasson, M.D., who previously served as President of the national Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) and is currently the President of the Oregon PSR. The topic of both speakers was "Shaky Past: Uncertain Future: U.S. Foreign Policy towards Iraq and Iran."

1/9 TOM RIDGE, former Governor of Pennsylvania and the first U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security (2003-2005), was the keynote speaker at "Impact '08 in Nevada: Building a Better Safer World," a project funded by the Gates and Hewlett foundations and created by the Center for U.S. Global Engagement in Washington, D.C., of which NCFR was a partner along with the World Market Center in Las Vegas, Nevada, where the luncheon event was held with 350 people in attendance. Also speaking on global trade issues was William P. Weidner, President/COO of Las Vegas Sands Corporation, and a panel discussion was held with former Nevada Governor and U.S. Senator Richard Bryan, Starbuck Coffee Company Sr. Vice President Sandra Taylor, and Andrea Koppel as moderator. The event was part of the Center's Impact '08 programs in states conducting early Presidential primary elections and caucuses, including (in addition to Nevada) Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. The emphasis directed to all Presidential candidates was on a fully integrated U.S. foreign policy and national security strategy that includes elevating and strengthening development, diplomacy and other non-military tools of global engagement.

2007

10/19 & 22   DR. BRUNO TERTRAIS,* Senior Research Fellow, Fondation pour la recherché strategique, of Paris, France, who was formerly a committee director for the NATO Assembly in Brussels and on the Delegation aux Affaires strategiques of the French Defense Ministry, spoke in Las Vegas and Reno on the topic, "Transatlantic Relations - a New Beginning?"

9/7   LT. GEN. JOHN ABIZAID (USA Ret.), Former Commanding General of the U.S. Central Command (covering 27 countries including the Middle East), spoke in Reno at a luncheon at Harrah's Hotel to 200 NCFR members and invited guests on the topic, "The Global War on Terror: What's Next?." An article the following day in the Reno Gazette Journal noted that Gen. Abizaid, who had opposed the military surge in Iraq prior to his retirement in March, stated that the U.S. must work harder on diplomatic, political and economic fronts for the surge to succeed in bringing stability to the Middle East. An Associated Press article appeared the following Sunday in the Las Vegas Review-Journal. Gen. Abizaid's first public appearance since his retirement was arranged by NCFR member and Board member Ty Cobb, who introduced Gen. Abizaid at the event.

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