INSTITUTIONAL HIGHLIGHTS

Accompanying the 2017 U.S. Cherry Blossom Queen & Chaperone - June 4-6

This year marks the 105th anniversary of the donation of 3,000 cherry blossom trees to Washington D.C. by Ozaki Yukio in 1912 when he was Mayor of Tokyo. As in previous years, the 2017 Cherry Blossom Queen, who is selected annually during the National Cherry Blossom Festival in Washington D.C., visited Japan as the U.S. goodwill ambassador.

After meeting with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, the Governor of Tokyo and the House Speaker, the 2017 Cherry Blossom Queen and chaperone visited Ise, Mie Prefecture of Central Japan, accompanied by Mr. Takaaki Ishida, Secretary General of Ozaki Yukio Memorial Foundation which hosted the delegation together with NPO Gakudo Kofu June 4-6, 2017.

Vesna Peric Zimonjic with Katsuhiro Asagiri in Belgrade

Vesna Peric Zimonjic Joins Board of Directors for S-E Europe

The International Press Syndicate (INPS) Group's Multimedia Director Katsuhiro Asagiri, who is also President of INPS Japan, travelled to Belgrade on way back from Vienna to Tokyo from May 13-17, 2017, where he visited our colleague and had some other meetings.

We are delighted that Vesna Peric Zimonjic has agreed to join the INPS Board as Director for Southeastern Europe, comprising Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Kosovo, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, and Slovenia.

Ramesh Jaura with Ambassador Salah Abdel Shafi

Meeting Ambassador Shafi, Mission of the State of Palestine to Austria

IDN-INPS DG and Editor-in-Chief Ramesh Jaura met Ambassador Salah Abdel Shafi from the Mission of the State of Palestine to Austria & Slovenia and the Permanent Observer Mission to UN and International Organisations in Vienna met during the first session of the Preparatory Committee for the 2020 NPT Review Conference from May 2-12 in Vienna.

Encounter with India's Minister of State Piyush Goyal

India's Minister of State for Power, Coal, New and Renewable Energy and Mines was a keynote speaker at the Vienna Energy Forum 2017 on May 11 at Hofburg Palace in the Austrian Capital.

From left to right: Ramesh Jaura, Alyn Ware and Katsuhiro Asagiri

Meeting and Interview with PNND's Alyn Ware

Eminent disarmament campaigner Alyn Ware, Founder and Coordinator of Parliamentarians for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament (PNND) attended the first session of the Preparatory Committee for the 2020 NPT Review Conference from May 2-12 in Vienna. INPS multimedia director and President of INPS Japan joined IDN-INPS DG and Editor-in-Chief Ramesh Jaura at a meeting with Alyn Ware and invited him to a video interview.

Ramesh Jaura (left) with Daryl Kimball (right)

In Vienna with Nuclear Disarmament Expert Daryl Kimball

Daryl Kimball, the Executive Director of the Washington-based Arms Control Association (ACA), was in Vienna in the second week of the first session of the Preparatory Committee for the 2020 NPT Review Conference from May 2-12. IDN-INPS DG and Editor-in-Chief Ramesh Jaura discussed with him the status of negotiations on May 9 and invited him to a video interview which was recorded by the INPS multimedia director Katsuhiro Asagiri.

Ramesh Jaura (left) with the Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui (right)

Encounter with Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui

IDN-INPS DG and Editor-in-Chief Ramesh Jaura had a brief meeting in Vienna with the Mayor of Hiroshima, Mr. Kazumi Matsu, on May 8 during the first session of the Preparatory Committee for the 2020 NPT Review Conference.

UNEP Invites IDN-INPS Correspondent Stella Paul

Award winning Stella Paul, IDN-INPS roving correspondent in South Asia, was part of an international journalists' team invited by the UNEP to Sri Lanka. "The journalists were selected for this trip on the basis of their prior reporting excellence and experience," she says.

She filed for us an absorbing report on a theme that usually escapes general attention, a report on how the world’s only vegetarian sea mammal, the dugong living at a depth of 5-15 meters, feeding on sea grass, is being saved from extinction by resorting to hi-tech such as drones. Dugong's natural habitat is vast – stretching from Eritrea in East Africa to Vanuatu in the Pacific.

Photo: IDN-INPS' Ramesh Jaura (ledt) with UNOSSC Director Jorge Chediek at his office in New York

Getting to Know UN Office for South-South Cooperation

IDN-INPS Editor-in-Chief and Director-General Ramesh Jaura met with Jorge Chediek, Director of the UN Office for South Cooperation (UNOSSC) at his office in New York on February 17, 2017 to acquaint himself with activities of this important constitutent of the UN system.

Among the issues discussed was what South-South Cooperation really means.

Ambassador and Permanent Representative of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Dr. Kairat Umarov with Ramesh Jaura

A Stimulating Meeting at the Kazakh Mission to the UN

IDN-INPS Editor-in-Chief and Director-General Ramesh Jaura had a stimulating meeting with Ambassador and Permanent Representative of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Dr. Kairat Umarov, on February 8, 2017 at the Central Asian country's Permanent Mission to the UN in New York.

Before moving to New York, he was in Washington serving as Ambassador to the U.S. since January 2013 – after serving as Kazakhstan’s Deputy Foreign Minister since 2009. Prior to the Deputy Foreign Minister's post, Dr. Umarov was Ambassador to India and Sri Lanka for five years.