Speaker biographies

José Miguel Insulza was elected secretary general of the Organization of American States on May 2, 2005, and took office on May 26. He has an accomplished record of public service, most recently serving as his country’s minister of the interior. Insulza, who was elected secretary general for a five-year term, has pledged to strengthen the organization’s “political relevance and its capacity for action.” Insulza began his career in academia, and until 1973 was a professor of political theory at the University of Chile and a professor of political science at Chile’s Catholic University. He also served as political advisor to the Chilean Ministry of Foreign Affairs and to the director of the Diplomatic Academy of Chile. In 1988, Insulza returned from fifteen years of exile and helped lead a political movement toward democratic elections in 1990. Insulza has held a number of high-level government posts under presidents Patricio Aylwin, Eduardo Frei, and Ricardo Lagos.

Roger F. Noriega is a visiting fellow at AEI, coordinating the institute’s program on Western Hemisphere issues. Twice appointed by President George W. Bush (and confirmed by the U.S. Senate) and with a ten-year career on Capitol Hill, Mr. Noriega’s breadth of experience offers strategic vision and practical insight on the Americas. As assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, Mr. Noriega managed a 3,000-person team of professionals in Washington, D.C., and fifty diplomatic posts to design and implement political and economic strategies in Canada, Latin America, and the Caribbean. As U.S. ambassador to the Organization of American States (OAS), Mr. Noriega coordinated complex and sensitive multilateral diplomacy in a thirty-four-member international organization to bolster OAS efforts to promote trade, fight illicit drugs, and defend democracy. Mr. Noriega has held various other positions, including senior policy advisor with the U.S. mission to the OAS; many program management and public affairs positions with the U.S. Agency for International Development and the U.S. Department of State; press secretary and foreign policy advisor for U.S. representative Robert Whittaker (R-Kan.); and research assistant for the secretary of state of Kansas.

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