SOLD OUT – Ambassador Thomas R. Pickering: Iran – U.S. Relations: Challenges and Opportunities
This event is sold out. Please contact [email protected] with questions.
This evening is a part of the Columbia University Club Foundation Ambassador Series.
Iran – U.S. Relations: Challenges and Opportunities
Join us for a special evening with Ambassador Thomas R. Pickering. After 34 years of non-contact, Iran and the United States are moving to restore differences over Iran’s nuclear program. This talk will address both the obstacles and the possibilities of success in this effort.
Ambassador Thomas R. Pickering
Ambassador Thomas R. Pickering is Vice Chairman at Hills and Company, providing counsel to international US enterprises, and formerly Senior Vice President International Relations and a member of the Executive Council of The Boeing Company, which he joined in 2001.
Holding the rank of Career Ambassador, the highest in the U.S. Foreign Service, Ambassador Pickering’s diplomatic career spans five decades. He has served as U.S. ambassador to the Russian Federation, India, Israel, El Salvador, Nigeria, and the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. He has also served on assignments in Zanzibar and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
From 1997 to 2001, Ambassador Pickering served as U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs. From 1989 to 1992, he was Ambassador and Representative to the United Nations in New York. He also served as Executive Secretary of the Department of State and Special Assistant to Secretaries William P. Rogers and Henry A. Kissinger.
Ambassador Pickering entered on active duty in the U.S. Navy from 1956-1959, and served in the Naval Reserve as Lieutenant Commander. Between 1959 and 1961, he was assigned to the Bureau of Intelligence and Research of the State Department and later to the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, and from 1962 to 1964 in Geneva as political adviser to the U.S. Delegation to the 18-Nation Disarmament Conference.
In 2012, Ambassador Pickering chaired the Benghazi Accountability Review Board at the request of Secretary of State Hillary R. Clinton, which made recommendations on improving security stemming from the attack on the US Mission at Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012, and the loss of the lives of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans.
Ambassador Pickering received a bachelor’s degree, cum laude, from Bowdoin College and a master’s degree from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. Awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to the University of Melbourne in Australia, he received a second master’s degree in 1956. In 1984, he was awarded an honorary doctor-in-laws degree from Bowdoin College, and has received similar honors from 12 other universities.
In 1983 and in 1986, Ambassador Pickering won the Distinguished Presidential Award and, in 1996, the Department of State’s highest award – the Distinguished Service Award. He is a member of the International Institute of Strategic Studies and the Council on Foreign Relations. He speaks French, Spanish and Swahili and has some fluency in Arabic, Hebrew and Russian.
6-6:30pm: Registration
6:30-7:30pm: Program
7:30-8:30pm: Reception
The Columbia University Club Foundation is the generous sponsor of The Columbia University Club Foundation Ambassador Series.
This evening is held in collaboration with the Columbia University Club Foundation, United Nations Association of New York and the Princeton Club of New York.
Cost: Free for members, $15 for guests
Fees for this event will be charged to the member’s account.
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