Ambassador Thomas Pickering is widely known for his service as the United States Ambassador to the United Nations from 1989 to 1992. This was only one assignment out of a diplomatic career that spanned four decades, during which he also served as the US Ambassador to Jordan (1974–78), Nigeria (1981–83), El Salvador (1983–85), Israel (1985–88), India (1992–93), and Russia (1993–96). Additionally, he served as the Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs from 1997 to 2000. He holds the distinction of being promoted to the Senior Foreign Service rank of Career Ambassador, a rank awarded only to career diplomats with extensive and distinguished service. Prior to his State Department Service he served in the US Navy (1956–59) where he was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant Commander.
Following his career with the State Department he served as Senior Vice President for International Relations at Boeing (2001–06).
Tim Ford is based in Sydney as an international peace and security consultant. He retired from the Australian Army in 2003, following an extensive career in the Australian Defence Force and the United Nations.
During his military career, General Ford served in a wide variety of command, staff, and training appointments in Australia and overseas, including operational service in South Vietnam. He was promoted to Major General in l996 to assume command of the 1st Division and the Deployable Joint Force Headquarters.
From 1998 until 2002, Major General Ford served in a number of high ranking United Nations peacekeeping appointments including as the Head of Mission of the United Nations Truce Supervision Organisation (UNTSO) in the Middle East, and as the Chief Military Adviser in the Department of Peacekeeping Operations at UN Headquarters, New York.
Over the last six years, Tim Ford has undertaken a wide range of projects for the Australian Government, the United Nations, the African Union, and other International Organisations as a mentor, adviser and consultant on international peace and security issues. He has travelled widely to conflict areas, and contributed to a broad range of international investigations, seminars, peace operations training courses and conferences as a “keynote” speaker, subject matter expert and presenter. Tim is a thesis adviser for the UN Peace Operations Training Institute programme and author of their Commanding United Nations Peacekeeping Operations course. He assisted the UN to develop the strategic leadership module of the UN Senior Mission Leadership (SML) Course and has been a mentor for this international course since its inception in 2004. He has presented to a wide number of international organisations on peacekeeping and strategic leadership.
Tim was educated at North Sydney Boy’s High School, the Royal Military College Duntroon, and Sydney University. He is a graduate of the UK Royal School of Artillery, the Indian Defence Services Staff College, the Australian Joint Services Staff College, the US Army War College, and the Australian Institute of Company Directors.
Dr. Durch is Senior Associate and Director of the Future Peace Operations Program of the Henry L. Stimson Center in Washington, D.C.. Prior to joining the Center in 1990, Dr. Durch served as a foreign affairs officer with the US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, Research Fellow at the Harvard Center for Science and International Affairs, and Assistant Director of the Defense and Arms Control Studies program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Since joining Stimson, he has focused on analysis of peace support operations and on tools and strategic direction for US foreign policy. He has been seconded from Stimson as a Scientific Advisor to the US Defense Threat Reduction Agency and to the United Nations as Project Director for the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations (the Brahimi Report). He has lectured extensively on peace operations and has taught at the Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, the Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown, and the Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington.
Recent publications include Improving Criminal Accountability in United Nations Peace Operations , co-authored with Katherine N. Andrews and Madeline L. England. Stimson Report No. 65, rev.1 (Stimson Center, 2009), and Enhancing United Nations Capacity to Support Post-Conflict Policing and Rule of Law , co-authored with Joshua G. Smith and Victoria K. Holt. Report No. 63 (Stimson Center, 2007).
Dr. Durch holds a PhD from MIT and a BSFS from Georgetown.
Ms. Norberg is the International Coordinator of the International Forum for the Challenges of Peace Operations, which is a network of Partner Organizations from all continents and major personnel contributing countries and includes the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. The Challenges Forum is dedicated to enhancing the planning, conduct, and evaluation of multidimensional peace operations.
The preceding process, the Challenges Project, originated as part of Ms. Norberg’s research on comparative approaches to peacekeeping at the London School of Economics (LSE) in 1996. Coordinating Challenges, she was employed by the National Defence College in 1997. Since 2003 she has been a member of the Senior Leadership Team of the Folke Bernadotte Academy, an agency under the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Ms. Norberg was main editor of the Challenges Concluding Reports presented to the United Nations Secretary-General in 2002 and 2006. She has travelled extensively to peace operations and key contributing countries.
Ms. Norberg holds a BSc in International Relations from the LSE, an MA in International Politics from the Université Libre de Bruxelles, and has studied languages at the Moscow State University and Universidad del Pais Vasco. Ms. Norberg received an Honorary Award from the Chief of Defence in 2001 and the Silver Medal from the Royal Academy of War Sciences in 2008.
Cedric de Coning is a Research Fellow with the African Center for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD) and the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI). He was a South African diplomat in Washington, D.C. and Addis Ababa (1988–1997). He served with the UN Transitional Administration in East Timor, as a Civil Affairs and Political Affairs Officer (1999–2000 and 2001–2002), and he worked with the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations in the Training and Evaluation Service (2002).
Cedric is working on the civilian dimension of the African Standby Force (ACCORD), civil-military and peacebuilding coordination (ACCORD), mediation support capacity building for the African Union (ACCORD) and the comprehensive approach and integrated missions (NUPI). His research focus is on the coherence and coordination of complex peacebuilding systems.
Cedric holds a M.A. (Cum Laude) from the University of KwaZulu-Natal and is a DPhil candidate at the University of Stellenbosch. His recent publications include: Civil-Military Coordination in United Nations and African Peace Operations, ACCORD (2007) and the Unintended Consequences of Peacekeeping, UNU Press (2007), which he co-edited with Prof Chiyuki Aoi and Prof Ramesh Thakur.
Harvey Langholtz is the founding director of the Peace Operations Training Institute. He served a full career in the US Coast Guard and retired in 1993 with the rank of Commander. He was on loan from the Coast Guard to the US State Department, where he served on the US Delegation to the United Nations 1991-93 and represented the US in the Special Committee on Peacekeeping Operations. In 1993 he joined the Faculty at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, VA, where he teaches Decision Theory and holds the academic rank of Professor. He has authored several books and articles, among them The Psychology of Peacekeeping and The Psychology of Diplomacy and he is also a Co-Editor of the Journal of International Peacekeeping. He holds an MA from the New School for Social Research in NY, an MS from the US Navy Postgraduate School in Monterey, CA, and Ph.D. from the University of Oklahoma.