Speaker Biographies
Thomas Albrecht is the deputy regional representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Washington, D.C. Prior to coming to Washington in October 2005, Mr. Albrecht was the representative of the UNHCR in Ghana. Albrecht joined UNHCR in 1987 and has since worked in a range of refugee situations, predominantly in East Africa, the Horn of Africa, Southern Africa, West Africa, and Eastern and central Europe. These operations related to refugee protection, emergencies, capacity-building efforts, and the advancement of durable solutions to the plight of refugees. Albrecht was posted at UNHCR’s headquarters in Geneva, where he worked in the Department of International Protection. His assignment there included serving as the principal editor of the UNHCR Resettlement Handbook, the organization’s authoritative guide to third-country resettlement policy and practice. These assignments were complemented by missions throughout the world. Albrecht was also involved in designing the new operations management system for the organization.
John R. Bolton currently serves as a senior fellow at AEI. His portfolio includes foreign policy and international organizations. Prior to arriving at AEI, Ambassador Bolton served as the United States permanent representative to the United Nations from August 1, 2005, to December 9, 2006. From May 2001 to May 2005, Ambassador Bolton served as under secretary of state for arms control and international security in the George W. Bush administration. Prior to this, Ambassador Bolton was senior vice president of AEI. He supervised AEI research programs, financial oversight, dissemination of AEI research and publications, public affairs, and general management. Ambassador Bolton has spent many years of his career in public service, and was previously assistant secretary for international organization affairs, Department of State, 1989–93; assistant attorney general, Department of Justice, 1985–89; assistant administrator for program and policy coordination, U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), 1982–83; and general counsel, USAID, 1981–82. Previously a practicing attorney, Ambassador Bolton was an associate at the Washington law office of Covington & Burling, and then a member of the firm from 1983 to 1985.
Mauro De Lorenzo is a resident fellow in foreign and defense policy studies at AEI, where he studies entrepreneurship in developing countries as well as Chinese investment and political influence outside the Pacific region. In 2005, he worked with Afghan construction companies in Kabul, and prior to that was a research associate at both the American University in Cairo and the Makerere Institute of Social Research in Kampala, Uganda, focusing on refugee policy and the wars in Congo, Rwanda, and Burundi. In 2002, he researched and was associate producer of a BBC documentary film about U.S. food aid to Africa and the misdiagnosis of famine.
Kelly Ryan joined the Department of State in April 2002 as a deputy assistant secretary of state in the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration. She directs the bureau’s refugee admissions, migration, and population offices. She aides the assistant secretary in prioritizing and making appropriate foreign assistance funding decisions of nearly $800 million annually. She also works with the assistant secretary in development of U.S. government policies on refugee admissions, migration, and population issues. She led U.S. negotiations with the government of Canada on a “safe third country” agreement relating to allocation of asylum claims, and testified on the agreement before the Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims of the U.S. House of Representatives Committee of the Judiciary. Prior to joining the Department of State, Ms. Ryan practiced law for ten years. From 1998–2002, she served as the chief of the Refugee and Asylum Division of the Immigration and Naturalization Services Office of the General Counsel. There, she directed the division responsible for advising the agency and the Department of Justice on issues involving immigration law and international protection under the U.S. legal system.
Merrill Smith is director of international planning and analysis for the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants. He has been editor of the World Refugee Survey since the publication of the 2003 edition, and is also active in the campaign to end refugee warehousing. He was the Washington representative for Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service from 2000–02. He has a long history of advocacy on Haitian refugee, human rights, and trade issues for Church World Service, the United Nations, and Haiti Advocacy.
Guglielmo Verdirame teaches international law at the University of Cambridge and is currently a visiting professor at Harvard Law School. He is the author, with Barbara Harrell-Bond, of Rights in Exile (Berghahn Books, 2005), “a damning exposé of protection failures of those most responsible for safeguarding refugee rights: the host countries of asylum, contracting NGOs and the UNHCR.” His book UN Accountability for Human Rights Violations is forthcoming from the Cambridge University Press. He was previously a research fellow at Merton College, Oxford (2000–03) and a consultant for various human rights organizations. He practices as a lawyer in the field of public international law.
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