WEATHER ALERT
Ex-Kosovo president tells international judges he's innocent
Read full article: Ex-Kosovo president tells international judges he's innocentFormer Kosovo president Hashim Thaci has insisted he is an innocent man as he addressed a panel of international judges hearing his trial on 10 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Madeleine Albright honored by Biden, other world leaders
Read full article: Madeleine Albright honored by Biden, other world leadersWorld leaders and the U.S. political and foreign policy elite joyously remembered America's first female secretary of state as mourners paid their respects to the late Madeleine Albright.
Albright acted as model, mentor for generations of women
Read full article: Albright acted as model, mentor for generations of womenFormer Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s death from cancer this week sparked American women to reflect on the 84-year-old diplomat’s sweeping influence on their lives, 25 years after Bill Clinton made her the United States’ representative to the world.
Memories of Albright: A legacy of bluntness and conviction
Read full article: Memories of Albright: A legacy of bluntness and convictionFormer Secretary of State Madeleine Albright is being remembered as a woman of conviction and determination who liked to say she told things like they were and not the way she might like them to be.
'She became our voice': Albright hailed by world leaders
Read full article: 'She became our voice': Albright hailed by world leadersAs she pressed the Clinton administration into action against Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic over war crimes in the Balkans, Madeleine Albright would harken back to her own childhood as a refugee from Czechoslovakia who fled the Nazis in war-torn Europe.
Colin Powell: A trailblazing legacy, blotted by Iraq war
Read full article: Colin Powell: A trailblazing legacy, blotted by Iraq warA child of working-class Jamaican immigrants in the Bronx, Colin Powell rose from neighborhood store clerk to warehouse floor-mopper to the highest echelons of the U.S. government.
Biden fills out State Department team with Obama veterans
Read full article: Biden fills out State Department team with Obama veteransBiden will nominate Wendy Sherman as deputy secretary of state and Victoria Nuland as undersecretary of state for political affairs — the second- and third-highest ranking posts, respectively. They were among the 11 officials announced to serve under the incoming secretary of state, Antony Blinken. America is back.”Among the others are:—longtime Biden Senate aide Brian McKeon, to be deputy secretary of state for management. —Derek Chollet, a familiar Democratic foreign policy hand, to be State Department counselor. Price and Porter intend to return to the practice of holding daily State Department press briefings, officials said.
State Dept: Pompeo's wife cleared of travel ethics charges
Read full article: State Dept: Pompeo's wife cleared of travel ethics chargesGeorgian Foreign Minister David Zalkaliani, left, gives flowers to Susan Pompeo as she and her husband, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, arrive at Tbilisi International Airport in Tbilisi, Georgia, Tuesday, Nov. 17, 2020. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, Pool)WASHINGTON – The State Department said Thursday that a report by its independent watchdog has concluded that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s wife did not violate federal regulations or ethics rules by traveling abroad with her husband while he was on official business. Susan Pompeo had attracted criticism for accompanying her husband on diplomatic trips abroad, beginning with a Middle East tour in 2018 that took place during the federal government shutdown. Secretary Pompeo has previously defended his wife's presence on his international trips by noting that she does work with diplomats’ families and is a “force multiplier” in boosting morale at overseas posts. The State Department said the inspector general had cleared her of any impropriety or misuse of taxpayer money on that Mideast trip and seven others she made with her husband.
Biden's choice for UN envoy signals return to US engagement
Read full article: Biden's choice for UN envoy signals return to US engagementThomas-Greenfield joined the State Department more than three decades ago, when Black women were even more of a rarity in the U.S. diplomatic corps than they are today. That makes her the most experienced diplomat of the six people named by Biden for top national security positions on Monday. Her tenure at the State Department rivals that of previous U.N. ambassadors like Richard Holbrooke, John Negroponte and Thomas Pickering, all of them white men. Other than secretary of state, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations is often the most high-profile foreign policy portfolio in a presidential administration. Thomas-Greenfield's immediate predecessors — all women — highlight that dichotomy: Rice, Samantha Power, Nikki Haley and Kelly Craft.
Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright visits University of North Florida
Read full article: Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright visits University of North FloridaJACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Dr. Madeleine Albright, the former Secretary of State who served under President Bill Clinton, spoke to students at the University of North Florida on Wednesday night, giving a lecture at the UNF Arena. UNF President David Szymanski hosted the event, “A Conversation with Madeleine Albright,” which was not opened to the media, however, the university shared photos with News4Jax. It was co-hosted by the World Affairs Council of Jacksonville. Albright, the 64th U.S. Secretary of State, was named the first female secretary of state in 1997 and became, at that time, the highest-ranking woman in the history of the U.S. Government. She received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012.