Michael Punke, reproduced with permission
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Michael Punke, 44, has been nominated as the next US ambassador to the World Trade Organization in Geneva. He was one of two people nominated to top posts by US President Barack Obama Thursday 3 September. Barbara Bennett was nominated for the post of chief financial officer at the Environmental Protection Agency.
Punke’s appointment to lead the US negotiations at the WTO must now be approved by the US Senate. He is currently living in Montana with his wife and two children, where he works as an international trade consultant and writer of both fiction and non-fiction. He would replace Peter Allgeier, who has stepped down as ambassador to the WTO. He had been in the post since 2005, but had worked for the Office of the US Trade Representative since 1980.
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - An empty desk in Geneva is receiving more than normal attention: that of the US ambassador, whose unwieldy title is US Permanent Representative to the United Nations and Other International Organizations. The post has been empty since January 2009 when Warren Tichenor left. Tichenor, a Texan and George W Bush appointment, may not have been a household name, but the new US ambassador could well quickly become one, thanks to sharper interest in how the US will work with other countries on several issues, many of them through international organizations based in Geneva.
This is the era of the Obama administration, with its promise of new relationships, and the period of Hillary Clinton at the helm of the US State Department, re-booting the Start talks with her Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov in Geneva in March 2009. Obama told a group of ambassadors in Washington Wednesday 29 July that “I came into office with a strong commitment to renew American diplomacy, and to start a new era of engagement with the world. This must be a moment when we engage on the basis of mutual interest and mutual respect, so that we can build new partnerships for progress.”
Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe (image: Cisac, Stanford University)
One name being bandied about for the Geneva ambassador’s job is that of Obama fundraiser Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe. Le Temps wrote some weeks ago that she will be named, basing the information on “sources close” to President Obama, and IP Watch, an intellectual property industry newsletter, named her as the likely candidate in a 29 July article.
[includes AllAfrica video, world media coverage] Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Africa is back on the world media map for more than poverty and wars: US President Barack Obama’s speech Saturday 11 July in Accra, Ghana, sparked widespread interest, nowhere more than in Africa itself.
Keynote speaker,World YWCA General Secretary Nyaradzayi Gumbonzvanda
The University of Geneva, together with five co-sponsors, kicked off the inaugural programme of the Geneva Forum on Social Change (GFSC) Friday 5 June. Keynote speakers include Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Nobel Prize Laureate and Honorary Doctor 2009 of the University of Geneva, World YWCA General Secretary Nyaradzayi Gumbonzvanda, and Speak-it.org Director, Nick Francis.
The Forum combines documentary film screenings, workshops and panel discussions of the complex social, political and economic challenges presented in the films. The event is organized by the University of Geneva International Organizations MBA (IOMBA) Programme. Geneva Lunch spoke with Forum on Social Change Chair and IOMBA degree candidate, Patrick Huber.
GL: Can you provide some background information on how the Forum was imagined and over what time period?
Maverick Architect Michael Reynolds in Oliver Hodge's "Garbage Warrior." Photo courtesy GFSC and Oliver Hodge
Patrick Huber (PH): This came out of an event last year in Monterrey, California hosted by Independent Television Service (ITVS) out of San Francisco. The Forum was conceived in November of 2008 when ITVS approached the University of Geneva about co-sponsoring a film screening and dialogue.
I was approached as president of the Geneva University chapter of the NetImpact network, an industry network of MBA professionals and students interested in promoting corporate social responsibility. Last year the chapter sponsored a forum on sustainable development which created momentum to discuss what other advocacy efforts the network might promote.
The US Mission to the United Nations in Geneva is keeping step with the rapid pace of change at the White House, publishing a daily “Transition” newsletter that is one of the best ways to track what is going on, who is saying what in the US government. Contact the Mission to subscribe.
