The Foreign Service Journal, January-February 2014

Let’s Get This Party Started! B eginning this month and continuing throughout the year, AFSA and The Foreign Service Journal will be celebrat- ing two anniversaries. In May 1924, President Calvin Coolidge signed the Rogers Act into law, combining the United States diplomatic and consular services to create the U.S. Foreign Service. And in October 1924, the American Foreign Ser- vice Association was formed, and promptly published the premier issue of the Journal . Tomark the 90th anniversary of both institutions, AFSA is organizing a yearlong series of events and activities. These are being designed to deepen public under- standing of diplomacy, development and foreign affairs; bring the Foreign Service community together to celebrate the many accomplishments of the men and women who serve, and have served, at U.S. foreign affairs agencies over the past nine decades; and encourage diversity in the Foreign Ser- vice to show the true face of America in all the countries where our officers, specialists and family members live and serve. The festivities begin with a kickoff reception for the Foreign Service and AFSA’s friends onThursday, Jan. 16. Next will come an AFSA panel discussion and advocacy day to engage key stakeholders on Capitol Hill in February, a special issue of The Foreign Service Journal inMay, and publication this fall of the first book to recount AFSA’s history as a professional association and labor union. Also in the works for our anniversary year are a speaker series, a policy confer- ence and special editions of our annual awards and high school essay contests. And since any 90th birthday deserves joyful celebration, we’ll be hosting a gala event at the State Department inMay. Watch for information about these and other 90th- anniversary activities in upcoming issues of the Jour- nal , or visit www.afsa.org/90. Questions? Please feel free to contact AFSA Executive Director Ian Houston at (202) 944-5505 or houston@ afsa.org . We look forward to celebrating with you! —Kristen Fernekes, AFSA Director of Communications A Crystal Ball for 2014 T he Center for Strategic and Interna- tional Studies has released its 2014 Global Forecast, an evaluation of the pa st year’s events and an attempt to pinpoint hot issues that have potential to unfold in the upcoming year. Part of CSIS’s mission statement is to understand long-term trends and their implications, which this annual analysis accomplishes by featuring a wide array of information and viewpoints. The publica- tion evaluates domestic policy, interna- tional policy and, most importantly, the United States’ struggle to define its role as a global power. This year’s forecast is divided into four sections, each addressing an overarch- ing theme. The first, “Getting Our House in Order,” uses America’s recent political paralysis as the basis for a warning that its credibility and legitimacy are at risk. “Changing Order in the Middle East,” the second section, has a self-explanatory title. It makes the case that the world needs to stop ignoring the region’s inter- nal dynamics if it wishes to gain a better understanding of the troubles there. “Sustaining the Rebalance” focuses primarily on Asia and the economic lever- age the continent’s powerful countries have on the United States. “Nontraditional Security Approaches” concludes the roundup by evaluating regional security, the importance of non-state actors and the role of technology as an inevitable tenet of change. The 2014 Global Forecast features a wide array of interesting perspectives on almost any issue imaginable. —Valerie Sanders, Editorial Intern Policing Interpol T hose of us who enjoy spy stories and police procedurals are accustomed to laudatory references to the work of Inter- pol, the world’s largest international polic e organization. Though the organization’s roots date back a full century to the 1914 International Criminal Police Congress, held in Monaco, it took its current name in 1956. Interpol’s 190 member countries, including the United States, are famous for cooperating to track and capture all sorts of criminals, no matter where they may flee to escape justice. But as Kathy Lally reports in the Nov. 30 Washington Post , the picture isn’t quite that clear-cut. The Fair Trials International advocacy group says Interpol has been used by Russia, Belarus, Turkey, Iran and Venezuela, among other countries, to persecute political oppo- nents. The case of Pyotr Silaev, a 28-year- old Russian who took part in a July 2010 protest in Moscow against the destruc- tion of a suburban forest, illustrates how Interpol can be wrongly used, says Robert Jackman, a Fair Trials spokesman. When police began arresting the demonstrators for alleged hooliganism, Silaev fled to Finland, which accepted him as a political refugee. 14 JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2014 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL TALKING POINTS