Ambassador John Beyrle presented his credentials to President Parvanov as U.S. Ambassador to Bulgaria on September 8, 2005. A career officer in the senior Foreign Service at the rank of Minister-Counselor, Ambassador Beyrle has held policy positions and foreign assignments with an emphasis on U.S. relations with Central and Eastern Europe, Russia, and the USSR since joining the State Department in 1983.

Ambassador Beyrle's overseas service has included two tours at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, most recently as Deputy Chief of Mission. He was Counselor for Political and Economic Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Prague, and a member of the U.S. Delegation to the CFE Negotiations in Vienna. He served an earlier tour at the U.S. Embassy in Bulgaria 1985-87. His Washington assignments include Acting Special Adviser to the Secretary of State for the New Independent States, and Director for Russian, Ukrainian and Eurasian Affairs at the National Security Council. He served as a staff officer to Secretaries of State George Shultz and James Baker, and as a Pearson Fellow and foreign policy adviser to the late Senator Paul Simon.

Ambassador Beyrle received a B.A. degree with honors from Grand Valley State University, and an M.S. degree as a Distinguished Graduate of the National War College.

Ambassador Elena Poptodorova has been the Ambassador of the Republic of Bulgaria since February 2002. Prior to assuming the ambassadorial post, Mrs. Poptodorova has held a number of government positions and served as a member of parliament for 11 years (1990-2001) as a representative of the Bulgarian Socialist Party. She is a signature figure of the new Bulgarian democracy, playing an active role in policy making and known as one of the liberal and maverick members of her party. In the period of June 2001 to August 2002, she led the Directorate of International Organizations and Human Rights. She served as Spokes of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs immediately before becoming Bulgarian Ambassador to the United States.

Ambassador Poptodorova received her B.A. and M.A. in English and Italian Language and Literature from Tthe Kiment Ohridski University of Sofia, Bulgaria. She has a M.A. in international relations and diplomacy from the University of National and World Economy, Sofia, Bulgaria.

This event is co-sponsored by the Forum on Contemporary Europe and the Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies.

Calendar of the Ambassadors' trip in the US

A film in the San Francisco International Film Festival. Presented in association with the Arab Film Festival. SKYY Prize Contender. West Coast Premiere. Sponsored by the Forum on Contemporary Europe, Mediterranean Studies Program, and Abassi Program in Islamic Studies at Stanford University.

About the Film

Kamel dreams of returning to Italy, where he once baked pizzas, this time leaving Algeria for good and bringing his girlfriend Zina with him. For this they will need papers, so the couple embarks on a journey from the urban center to deserted suburbs in search of the immigrant smuggler who can help them. The couple has grown up among the violence that has plagued Algeria for more than a decade and taken more than 100,000 lives. Ongoing strife between government forces and Islamist opposition is so much a part of day-to-day living that Kamel and Zina ignore the danger they face on the road and turn their quest into a kind of holiday. Director Tariq Teguia calls his debut feature "a slow-motion road movie," but it is a road movie only in abstract. Much of the travel takes place on streets without names or numbers and through a maze of buildings - a symbolic dead end. Short asides into the lives of Islamic fundamentalists and other would-be emigrants limn Algeria's dire situation and underline the desperation behind Kamel's desire to leave. Yet even as the pair's languid odyssey grows ever more quixotic, the drama never quite slips into tragedy, buoyed on by the lovers' uncomplaining acceptance of whatever fate throws them and an embrace of life that contains happiness and the possibility of a brighter future. In similar fashion, Teguia has fashioned a portrait of Algeria stunned and stunted by war that is more hopeful than bleak. - Pam Grady

Showtimes

Friday, April 27 / 9:15 / Kabuki / ROME27K

Saturday, May 5 / 2:00 / Kabuki / ROME 05K

Sunday, May 6 / 8:45 / Kabuki / ROME 06K

Tuesday, May 8 / 6:30 / Aquarius / ROME 08A

For more information, go to: http://fest07.sffs.org/films/film_details.php?id=94

Luis Moreno-Ocampo was unanimously elected by the Assembly of States Parties to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court on April 21, 2003. Between 1984 and 1992, as a prosecutor in Argentina, Mr. Moreno-Ocampo was involved in precedent-setting prosecutions of top military commanders for mass killings and other large scale human rights abuses.

He was assistant prosecutor in the "Military Junta" trial against Army commanders accused of masterminding the "dirty war," and other cases of human rights violations by the Argentine military. Mr. Moreno-Ocampo was the prosecutor in charge of the extradition from investigation and prosecution of guerrilla leaders and of those responsible for two military rebellions in Argentina. He also took part in the case against Army commanders accused of malpractice during the Malvinas/Falklands war, as well as in dozens of major cases of corruption.

In 1992, Mr. Moreno-Ocampo resigned as Chief Prosecutor of the Federal Criminal Court of Buenos Aires, and established a private law firm, Moreno-Ocampo & Wortman Jofre, which specializes in corruption control programs for large firms and organizations, criminal and human rights law. Until his election as Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Mr. Moreno-Ocampo worked as lawyer and as Private Inspector General for large companies. He also took on a number of pro bono activities, among others as legal representative for the victims in the extradition of former Nazi officer Erich Priebke to Italy, the trial of the chief of the Chilean secret police for the murder of General Carlos Prats, and several cases concerning political bribery, journalists' protection and freedom of expression.

Mr. Moreno-Ocampo also worked with various local, regional, and international NGO's. He was the president of Transparency International for Latin America and the Caribbean. The founder and president of Poder Ciudadano, Mr. Moreno-Ocampo also served as member of the Advisory Board of the "Project on Justice in Times of Transition" and "New Tactics on Human Rights."

Mr. Moreno-Ocampo has been a visiting professor at both Stanford University and Harvard University.

Sponsored by the Stanford Law School, the Program on Global Justice, the Forum on Contemporary Europe, the Stanford Film Lab, VPUE, and the Introduction to the Humanities Program.

In 1999, The Honorable William H. Luers was elected President of the United Nations Association of the USA (UNA-USA), a center for innovative programs to engage Americans in issues of global concern. UNA-USA's educational and humanitarian campaigns, along with its policy and advocacy programs, allow people to make a global impact at the local level and encourage strong United States leadership in the UN.

Luers had a 31-year career in the Foreign Service. He served as US Ambassador to Czechoslovakia (1983-1986) and Venezuela (1978-1982) and held numerous posts in Italy, Germany, the Soviet Union, and in the Department of State, where he was the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Europe (1977-1978) and for Inter-American Affairs (1975-1977). He has been a visiting lecturer at the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton, at George Washington University in Washington, DC, and at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. He was also the director's visitor at Princeton's Institute for Advanced Study in 1982-1983.

Luers received his B.A. from Hamilton College and his M.A. from Columbia University following four years in the United States Navy. He did graduate work in Philosophy at Northwestern University and holds honorary doctorate degrees from Hamilton College and Marlboro College.

This event is cosponsored by the Peninsula Chapter of the World Affairs Council of Northern California and the United Nations Association - Midpeninsula Chapter.

A conference on "Political Theologies: The Present of the Religious Past" will bring together at Stanford some of the leading scholars in Medieval Studies from the United States and Europe to reflect on how the medieval religious past informs and shapes our present-day forms of religiosity.

The conference features Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht (Stanford University), Andreas Kablitz (University of Cologne), Joachim Kupper (Free University of Berlin), Stephen G. Nichols (Johns Hopkins University), and many others.

Please see the attached program for more information.

Sponsored by the Department of Comparative Literature, the Department of French and Italian, the Forum on Contemporary Europe, and the Stanford Humanities Center.