Keynote speakerMr. Terje Roed-Larsen: United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process and Personal Representative of the Secretary-General to the Palestine Liberation Organization and the Palestinian Authority.
Mr. Roe-Larsen began his career as an academic, studying history, philosophy and sociology. He taught Sociology and Philosophy at the Universities of Bergen and Oslo, before establishing the Fafo Institute for Applied Social Science in Oslo in 1981.
As Director of Fafo, he initiated a research project into the living conditions of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The relationships with both Palestinians and Israelis that he established during the period of preparing and implementing this project led to a request by the Palestinian Liberation Organization in 1992, that he help establish a secret channel for negotiations between the Palestinian Liberation Organization and the Government of Israel. Those negotiations concluded with the signing of the Declaration of Principles at the White House on 13 September 1993.
In 1993, Mr. Roed-Larsen was appointed Ambassador and Special Advisor to the Norwegian Foreign Minister for the Middle East peace process. In mid-1994, he was appointed United Nations Under-Secretary-General, Special Coordinator in the Occupied Territories, based in Gaza. He returned to Norway at the end of 1996, and served as Minister of Planning.
In January 1998, Mr. Roed-Larsen was appointed Ambassador, Special Adviser by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, with responsibility for the Middle East peace process. On 21 September 1999, the Secretary-General appointed him in his present position as UN Special Coordinator for Middle East Peace Process.
Speakers and panelists
Dr. M. Nasser Al-Kidwa, Ambassador and Permanent Observer of Palestine to the United Nations
Ambassador Al-Kidwa, who studied medicine at Cairo University and obtained his degree as Doctor of Dental Medicine and Surgery, has been a member of the Palestine National Council (PNC) from 1975 and a Member of the Central Council of the PLO, first from 1981 to 1986, and again from 1999 to present. He was appointed as the Permanent Observer of Palestine to the United Nations in 1991. He has participated in numerous seminars, panel debates and lectures on the question of Palestine and the Middle East Peace Process.
Mr. Jean-Luc Allouche, Editor-in-Chief, Libération, Paris
Mr. Allouche, who was born in Algeria 52 years ago, is currently in charge of Libération’s special issues and the extended Saturday interviews. Preceding the Israeli elections in February 2001, Mr. Allouche did a survey in Israel which was used for a special issue, “The disarray of the Israeli left”. Mr. Allouche also worked for six years as a book editor in Paris.
Ms. Phyllis Bennis, Fellow, Institute for Policy Studies, Washington D.C. and Fellow, Transnational Institute, Amsterdam
Ms. Bennis appears frequently as a commentator/analyst on U.S. and international television and radio programmes. She has been a featured speaker at UN seminars on Palestine in New York, Toronto, Athens, Prague, New Delhi and Madrid.
Ms. Bennis, who is also an Editor of MERIP’s Middle East Report, has written about UN and Middle East issues for almost 20 years. Her newest book is Calling the Shots: How Washington Dominates Today’s UN (2000). Her other books include From Stones to Statehood: The Palestinian Uprising; Beyond the Storm: A Gulf Crisis Reader; and Altered States: A Reader in the New World Order.
Mr. Stephen P. Cohen, President, Institute for Middle East Peace and Development
Dr. Cohen is a leader in the practice and theory of unofficial diplomacy known as Track Two Diplomacy. Since 1975 when he first traveled to Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories, he has pioneered behind-the-scenes efforts in bringing Arabs and Israelis together. He brings to leaders of Israel, the Palestinians and the Arabs, as well as top American officials, original ideas and approaches to advancing peace and peaceful relations.
Dr. Cohen founded the Institute for Middle East Peace and Development in 1979 to serve as facilitator and private intermediary in peace-making and peace-building and has served as its President ever since. He is also the National Scholar of Israel Policy Forum.
Mr. Nabil El-Sharif, Editor-in-Chief, Ad-Dustour (Amman)
Mr. El-Sharif, who studied English literature at Kuwait University and later obtained a Ph.D. from Indiana University, USA, began his professional career as a teacher, first at Al-Zour School in Kuwait and later at Yarmouk University and Jordan University. He joined Ad-Dustour Newspaper in 1988 as its Cultural Affairs Editor. Between 1985 and 1988, he worked as a Columnist for Jordan’s Jerusalem Star newspaper. In 1992, he became the Editor-in-Chief of Ad-Dustour Newspaper.
Mr. El-Sharif has published several books, including two collections of short stories, The Peace Farm (1997) and The Olive Tree (1998).
Sir Ian Gilmour, Member of the House of Lords, UK.
The Lord Gilmour of Craigmillar served as Member of British Parliament from 1962 to 1992. From 1971 – 1972, he served as Minister of State for Defence Procurement, and in 1974 as Secretary of State for Defence. He was the first chairman of the Council for the Arab British Understanding (1967 – 1970). He was President of Medical Aid for Palestinians (1992 – 1995) and since 1995 has served as President of the Foundation of the Al-Quds Medical School. Sir Ian, who has been a Member of the House of Lords since 1992, has written six books on history, politics and economics.
Mr. Hafez Hasan, General Manager and Editor-in-Chief, Al Hayat Al Jadidah, Ramallah, West Bank
Mr. Barghothi, who was born in Palestine in 1950, worked with the Kuwaiti press from 1975 to 1987. He also worked as a columnist for several Arab and Palestinian newspapers. Currently he oversees the publication of Al Hayat Al Jadidah, one of the largest circulated Arabic dailies in the Palestinian Authority.
Ambassador Ibra Deguene Ka, Chairman of the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People
Ambassador Ka was appointed Head of the Senegalese Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York in 1996. Prior to his appointment, Mr. Ka was the Senegalese Ambassador to Switzerland, as well as Senegal’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Office in Geneva. In 1994, he was a member of the United Nations Special Committee charged with investigating Israeli practices in the occupied territories. In 1996, Ambassador Ka was elected as Chairman of the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People.
Ambassador Ka was one of the founding members of the United Nations Association of Senegal. He has received many decorations, including being named a Grand Officer of the German Order of Merit, a Grand Officer of the Tunisian Order of the Republic, Commander of the National Order of Merit of Senegal, Commander of the Star of Honour of Ethiopia and a Commander of the National Order of Gambia.
Ambassador Clovis Maksoud, Director, Center for the Global South, American University, Washington D.C.
A Lebanese national, Dr. Maksoud was the Chief Representative of the League of Arab States in India from 1961-1966. From 1967-1979, he served as the Senior Editor of Al-Ahram and then Chief Editor of Al-Nahar Weekly. Ambassador Maksoud was appointed as the League of Arab States' Chief Representative to the United Nations on September 1, 1979. On August 15, 1990, he submitted his resignation from the League in the aftermath of Iraq's invasion of Kuwait.
Dr. Maksoud is the author of several articles and books on the Middle East and the global south, among them: "The Meaning of Non-Alignment," "The Crisis of the Arab Left," "Reflections on Afro-Asianism," and "The Arab Image."Dr. Maksoud graduated from the American University of Beirut, went on to receive his J.D. from the George Washington University in Washington, D.C. and did post-graduate studies at Oxford University in Britain.
Mr. Robert Malley, Senior Policy Advisor, the Centre for Middle East Peace and Economic development, Washington D.C.
Mr. Malley joined the National Security Council staff in August 1994 as Director for Democracy. He helped coordinate U.S. refugee policy and efforts to promote democracy and human rights abroad. He also played a leading role in U.S. policy toward Cuba. In July 1997, he became Executive Assistant to the National Security Advisor from July 1997 to September 1998, acting as an informal chief of staff for Samuel R. Berger.
Until January 2001, Mr. Malley was Special Assistant to the President for Arab-Israeli Affairs and Director for Near East and South Asian Affairs at the National Security Council. In this capacity, he served as a principal advisor to the President and the
National Security Advisor at the White House on the Middle East peace process. He currently is Senior Policy Advisor at the Center for Middle East Peace and Economic Development.Mr. Malley is a graduate of Yale University, Harvard Law School and Oxford University, England, where he was a Rhodes Scholar. He is the author of The Call from Algeria: Third Worldism, Revolution and the Turn to Islam.
Dr. Naabil Shaath, Minister for Planning and International Cooperation, Palestinian Authority.
Dr. Shaath, who studied in Alexandria, Cairo and obtained a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania, USA, served for a number of years as Director of the PLO Planning Centre in Beirut. He later set up an international management training center in Cairo, which now has branches all over the Middle East.
Gen. (Ret.) Amnon Lipkin-Shahak, former Minister of Tourism and Transport, and Chief of Staff, Israel Defense Forces, Israel
Gen. Lipkin-Shahak graduated from the Military High School for Officers in 1962 and then enlisted into the Israel Defense Forces, serving until July 1998. In March 1991 he was appointed Deputy Chief of Staff of the Israeli Defense Forces and was assigned by the late Prime Minister Itzhak Rabin to head the Israeli military team to the negotiations with the Palestinians for the Gaza-Jericho Agreement. On 1 January 1995, Gen. Lipkin-Shahak was promoted to the rank of Major-General and appointed Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces.
During his term of office as Chief of Staff Gen. Lipkin-Shahak was sent by the Late Prime Minister Itzhak Rabin to Washington for a summit meeting with his Syrian counterpart General Hikmat Al-Shihabi to commence negotiations for security arrangements in preparations for the advancement of the peace process between Israel and Syria.
Gen. Lipkin-Shahak retired from the Israel Defense Forces in July 1998.
On 5 August 1999, Gen. Lipkin-Shahak was appointed Minister of Tourism, and later as Minister of Transport. He was a senior member of the Peace Team led by Prime Minister Ehud Barak and participated in the Camp David round of talks, Sharm El-Sheik and Taba.
Gen. Lipkin-Shahak, who resigned from all political activities after the elections of February 2001, now serves as Chairman of the Board of Tahal Ltd, a subsidiary of Kardan Ltd.
Mr. Israel Shamir, Writer and freelance journalist, Israel.
Mr. Shamir is a leading Russian-Israeli intellectual, writer, translator and journalist. He was born in Novosibirsk, Siberia, a grandson of a professor of mathematics and a descendant of a Rabbi from Tiberias, Palestine. After moving to Israel in 1969, he served as a paratrooper in the army and fought in the 1973 war. After the army, he resumed his study of Law at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, but abandoned the legal profession in pursuit of a career as a journalist and writer.
As a freelance journalist, his varied assignments included covering Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia in the last stages of the war in South East Asia. In 1975, Mr. Shamir joined the BBC and moved to London. After returning to Israel in 1980, he wrote for the Israeli daily Haaretz and Al Hamishmar newspapers and worked in the Knesset as the spokesman for the Israel Socialist Party (Mapam). His most popular work, the Pine and the Olive, the story of Palestine/Israel, was published in 1988.
As the first Palestinian Intifada began, Mr. Shamir left Israel for Russia, where he covered the eventful years of 1989-1993. In 1993, he returned to Israel and settled in Jaffa. He wrote for Russian newspapers both in Israel and Russia and contributed to various literary magazines. In response to the second Palestinian uprising in thirteen years, Mr. Shamir has temporarily abandoned his literary occupation and resumed his work as a journalist.
Mr. Martin Woollacot, Columnist, the Guardian, London
Mr. Woollacot has worked for The Guardian for over 30 years, first as a home reporter and then, from the early 70's as a correspondent abroad, first in Asia, covering the last years of the Vietnam War, the Bangladesh War, the Indian Emergency, and then, from 1978, in the Middle East, based in Cyprus, covering among other stories the Israeli incursions into Lebanon and the Iranian revolution. He later returned to London as assistant foreign editor, then foreign editor, continuing to do occasional foreign reporting. For the last seven years Mr. Woollacot has been the paper's foreign affairs columnist.
Moderator
Mr. Shashi Tharoor, Interim Head, Department of Public Information, United Nations
Mr. Tharoor’s United Nations experience began in 1978 on the staff of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, including two stints at UNHCR Headquarters in Geneva and three-and-a-half years as Head of the UNHCR office in Singapore at the peak of the Vietnamese ‘Boat people” crisis. Later, he served as Special Assistant to the Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations. From 1991 to 1996, he led the team responsible for the United Nations peacekeeping operations in the former Yugoslavia. Mr. Tharoor, who also served as Executive Assistant to Secretary-General Kofi Annan and Director of Communications and Special Projects in the Office of the Secretary-General, was appointed as Interim Head of the DPI on 17 January 2001.
Mr. Tharoor is the author of five books, including, India: From Midnight to the Millennium (1997), a study of Indian politics and society, and The Great Indian Novel (1989), a political satire.
Alternate Moderator
Ms. Thérèse Gastaut, Director, Public Affairs Division, Department of Public Information, United Nations
Ms. Gastaut, who joined the Secretariat in 1967 and DPI in 1975, served as Director of the United Nations Information Centre for Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Liaison Office with the European communities from 1975 to 1983. From 1984 to 1989, she served as Director of the United Nations Information Service at Geneva. From 1990 to 1992 she was the chief of information of the World Health Organization. From 1993 until her current assignment, she was Director of the Information Service at Geneva. Also from 1993 to 1996, Ms. Gastaut was Spokeswoman for the Secretary-General based at Geneva.
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