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From the Far East to the Old West: Chinese and
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Weston S. Konishi Awarded Hitachi Fellowship
Niharika Joe Promoted to Mansfield Foundation Program Director
WASHINGTON, D.C. The Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation today
announced that Director of Programs Weston S. Konishi has been
awarded a prestigious Council on Foreign Relations International
Affairs Fellowship in Japan, sponsored by Hitachi Ltd. Konishi
will henceforth remain affiliated with the Foundation as an adjunct
Fellow. The Foundation promoted Niharika Chibber Joe, currently
associate director of the Mansfield Fellowship Program, to the
position of director of programs, effective April 9, 2007.
During his yearlong Fellowship, Konishi will study Japan’s values-oriented
diplomacy – an idea first unveiled by Japanese Foreign Minister Aso Taro
in his November 2006 policy speech in which he called for the creation of an “Arc
of Freedom and Prosperity” stretching from Europe to Australia. Konishi
will focus his study on how such values as freedom, democracy, human rights
and the rule of law, which currently form an underpinning of the U.S.-Japan
alliance, might be expanded to a network of like-minded nations in Asia through
economic and security partnerships across the region.
Niharika Chibber Joe has been with the Mansfield Foundation since
2000, serving as associate director of the congressionally
mandated Mansfield Fellowship
Program. Previously, Ms. Joe worked as a Japanese language specialist and
researcher for Maruti-Suzuki, Thompson Press, Nippon Denso,
Mitsubishi and Mitsui among
others in India, and the Okazaki Institute and Koransha in Japan. She has
made presentations at international conferences and young leader
fora in the United
States, Japan and China, and she has been a regular contributor to the Japan
Automotive Digest, a Virginia-based weekly newsletter on the worldwide operations
of the Japanese auto industry. She also serves on the application review
and interview committee for the Japan Exchange and Teaching
Programme (JET) in
the United States. Ms. Joe holds an M.A. in International Economics and Japan
Studies from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International
Studies (SAIS) in Washington, D.C. and a B.A.
magna cum laude and an M.A. in Japanese Language and Literature from the
Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, India.
She is fluent in English, Japanese, Urdu, Hindi, Punjabi and Bengali. She
also speaks Nepalese and Korean.
“
We congratulate Wes on receiving this prestigious award even as we are sad
to see him leave,” said L. Gordon Flake, executive director of the Maureen
and Mike Mansfield Foundation. “During the eight years he has been with
the Mansfield Foundation, Wes developed a full range of outstanding programs
and exciting new initiatives, including exchanges with Japanese Diet members
and our Asian Opinion Poll Database. He has a well deserved reputation in both
the United States and Japan as a young leader and insightful commentator on
Japan- and Asia-related issues. We are pleased that he will remain affiliated
with the Mansfield Foundation as an adjunct Fellow. We also welcome Niharika
Joe as our new director of programs and look forward to her leadership of our
exchanges, policy dialogues, research and education.”
The Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation is a 501(c)3 organization
that promotes understanding and cooperation among the nations and
peoples of Asia and the United States. The Foundation honors the
late Mike Mansfield and his wife Maureen. Mansfield served as U.S.
congressman from Montana, senate majority leader and U.S. ambassador
to Japan. Maureen and Mike Mansfield’s values, ideals and
vision for U.S.-Asia relations continue through the Foundation’s
exchanges, dialogues, research and educational programs, which
create networks among U.S. and Asian leaders, explore the underlying
issues influencing public policies, and increase awareness about
the nations and peoples of Asia. The Foundation also supports the
Maureen and Mike Mansfield Center at the University of Montana.
The Foundation has offices in Washington, D.C.; Tokyo, Japan; Beijing,
China; and Missoula, Montana.
Please forward media inquiries to:
Mary-Jane Atwater
Director of Communications
The Maureen and Mike Mansfield Foundation
1401 New York Ave. NW Suite 740
Washington, DC 20005
Telephone: (202) 347-1994
Fax: (202) 347-3941
matwater@mansfieldfdn.org
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