New England Diary

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E.U., NATO, Russia, cities, backstabbers and ports

March 20, 2016
 
 
To members and friends of the Providence Committee on Foreign Relations (thepcfr.org; pcfremail@gmail.com):



This is the last reminder about our next dinner meeting, on Tuesday, March 22, with the very distinguished Andrew A. Michta, professor of National Security Affairs at the U.S. Naval War College and an adjunct fellow with the Center for Strategic and International Studies (Europe Program).
 
He’ll talk about European politics and security, including NATO and the future of the European Union. He has a special focus on Central Europe and the Baltic States. (We hope he talks about the Russian buildup in the enclave of Kalingrad.)
 
In 2013–2014, he was a senior fellow focusing on defense programming at the Center for European Policy Analysis in Washington, D.C. In 2011–2013, he was a senior transatlantic fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMFUS) and the founding director of the GMFUS Warsaw office.
 
He is a member of the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London. 

 

He might want to talk about this:

 

 

In a deal in which German Chancellor Angela Merkel played a large role, the European Union and Turkey have agreed that new asylum seekers – many from Syria -- who arrive in Greece from Turkey will be returned to Turkey.

 

See:

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/19/world/europe/european-union-turkey-refugees-migrants.html?hp=&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT_nav=top-news&_r=0&login=email

 


Dues and dinner cost information may be found at: thepcfr.org. Other membership information may be found there, too.  
 
On Tuesday, April 12, celebrated author, TV documentary maker and former foreign correspondent Hedrick Smith will join us; he’ll talk about Russia, and the current state of America, too.
 
On Wednesday May 11, comes the internationally known expert on cities around the world, Greg Lindsay.
 
Look at:
 
http://www.amazon.com/Aerotropolis-Way-Well-Live-Next/dp/0374100195/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1279805811&sr=8-1
 
He is a contributing writer for Fast Company, author of the forthcoming book Engineering Serendipity, and co-author of Aerotropolis: The Way We’ll Live Next. He is also a senior fellow of the New Cities Foundation — where he leads the Connected Mobility Initiative — a non-resident senior fellow of The Atlantic Council’s Strategic Foresight Initiative, a visiting scholar at New York University’s Rudin Center for Transportation Policy & Management, and a senior fellow of the World Policy Institute.
 
  
On Tuesday, June 7Michael Soussan, former UN whistleblower; acclaimed author; widely published journalist; NYU writing professor, and women's rights advocate, will speak. His satirical memoir about global corruption,  Backstabbing for Beginners: My Crash Course In International Diplomacy (Nation Books / Perseus) is being adapted  for a feature film, starring Ben Kingsley and Josh Hutcherson

He will speak about the subject of his next book TRUTH TO POWER: how great minds changed the world. A brief history of thought leadership.
 
Evan Matthews, a key thought leader at the North Atlantic Ports Association and director of the Port of Davisville, has very kindly offered to talk to us on Wednesday, June 22, on changes in world shipping, including the widening of the Panama Canal and other changes of huge interest to New England ports.