Alumni Today IRD

Noriyuki Shikata serving with the Japanese Diplomatic Corps has been transferred from his post as Director of Status of U.S. Forces Agreement to that of Assistant Press Secretary, Director in charge of the International Press for the Japanese Foreign Ministry.

Noriyuki monitors how Japan-related issues are treated in the international media, liaising with the foreign press, holding press conferences, and accompanying Japan's leaders on their official overseas trips.

Over the last year, Noriyuki has traveled to Mongolia, Finland, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, Beijing and Seoul, Hanoi and the Philippines.

Vili Lazarova is now working at Publicis in Paris as a Consultant in Financial Communications, while finishing her Master's thesis with AGSIRD.

She works with French and international companies around their financial, but also corporate communications. On the financial communications side, her work involves press relations actions around key financial dates and announcements (results, revenues), but also financial operations, such as listings, M&As, business strategy announcements, etc. On the corporate communications side, she also works with the media to raise the profile of Publicis' clients, organizing interviews, press meetings, conferences, etc.

She also works on new business opportunities, participating in financial and corporate communications pitches.

Omar Bandar (2006) was part of a fifteen-member delegation to the West Bank in Palestine, in association with the Cambridge Peace Commission, in November-December 2007. The purpose of the delegation was to promote "People-to-People" relationships in an effort of public diplomacy in the Middle-East. The initiative will build on and expand existing relationships between people and organizations in the Cambridge and Bethlehem communities such as peace and conflict resolution groups, educational institutions, universities, cultural and arts centers, faith-based centers, women's cooperatives, youth groups, healthcare facilities, and media outlets.

Continuing his interest in human rights and social justice, on February 11^th, 2008, Omar will be embarking on a fifty-day European tour of human rights and criminal justice organizations as well as visiting prisons and detention centers in several European countries (France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Latvia, Estonia, Romania, Norway, Italy, and The Netherlands). The purpose of this trip is to learn more about prisoners' and human rights issues on the international scale as well as the criminal justice challenges of specific countries.

On October 24^th-25^th, Nina Sajic travelled to Italy as a member of the official delegation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, where she met with both Pope Benedict XVI and Italian President Giorgio Napolitano.

Nina is Foreign Policy Advisor to H.E. President Nebojsa Radmanovic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and deals mainly with bilateral European relations, the European Union, and the United Nations. The presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina is composed of three presidents, each representing one of the three constitutive peoples of the country. Each president is a primus inter pares, and the delegation to Italy was led by H.E. President Zeljko Komsic.

"My job involves a lot of traveling with my president to meet with other heads of state of the region and monthly trips to Brussels for discussions with officials from the European Commission and Parliament."

Danilo Padilla works for UNESCO in Bangkok where he is Programme Planning Officer and Executive Assistant to the Director. Danny participates in UNESCO's medium-term strategy consultations.

His responsibilities include liaising with the more than 20 U.N. agencies based in Thailand, where he focuses on education-related activities in the Asia-Pacific region. He also serves as coordination officer for activities being implemented by UNESCO's Bangkok office in Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam.

Danilo Padilla joined UNESCO in Paris in 1998, where over the years he served in the Bureau of Human Resources Management, in the Unit for Indigenous Peoples in the Culture Sector, and in the Division for Freedom of Expression in the Communication and Information Sector.

Matthew Bentley is working with UNEP (United Nations Environmental Protection Agency) in Paris on a two-year assignment, after which he will return to Australia to his post with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, within their Agency for International Development (AusAID).

While an M.A. student at AGSIRD, Matthew had interned at UNEP. On completion of his M.A. degree, he had been offered a post in that organization. After moving back to his native country, he has remained involved with UNEP's activities.

Deborah Lizak works at Columbia University as special assistant to Joseph Stiglitz, recipient of the Nobel Prize of Economics in 2001. Her duties include background research on anyone that professor Stiglitz meets. Traveling with him to conferences she attended the World Economic Forum in Davos and the Gore-Sachs event on climate change.

After returning from Paris where he had spent many years, Rao Chelikani started an International Foundation for Human Development (IFHD) in Hyderabad, India. IFHD is an organization that strives to activate civil society for self-management thereby reducing excessive government and state involvement.

Dr Chelikani was President of the Standing Committee of NGOs affiliated to UNESCO and already held a doctorate from the Sorbonne University when he began studying towards his Ph.D. at AGSIRD.

Arnold Obermayr is Deputy Head of Mission and counsellor currently serving at the Austrian Embassy in Bangkok. He took up this position in May 2007 after serving the Austrian diplomatic corps in Japan.