2007 Media Releases
Tuesday 4 December, 2007
International conference to debate the impact of Iraq War and the War on Terror on Europe and Asia
The impact of September 11, the Iraq War and the War on Terror on international relations will come under the microscope at an international conference in Melbourne over the next two days (December 6-7).
Hosted by La Trobe University’s Centre for Dialogue and six other prestigious international research institutions, the conference will debate the impact of September 11 and consequent international tensions on the domestic and foreign policies of Europe and Asia, and particularly their alliances with the United States and Islamic countries.
The conference is the third in a series examining the international response to Islam and the United States post-September 11, from the perspectives of Europe and Asia: and how these two emerging centres of regional influence are handling their alliances with the US and the Islamic world.
Titled Europe and Asia Between Islam and the United States: The Lessons from Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon and Iran the conference will draw many of the world’s pre-eminent scholars of international relations from Australia, Europe, Asia and the US.
Delegates will debate three dualities considered critical to shaping Europe’s and Asia’s future place in the world – the juxtaposition of the European and Asian experiences in the context of post-September 11 tensions, and particularly the role of their regional institutions; the relationship between culture and religion, and culture and geopolitics; and the complex nexus between domestic and international dimensions of conflict and dialogue across major religious and cultural traditions.
“There is a major debate taking shape about the geopolitical reconfiguration of Europe and Asia in the context of the United States and its relationship with the Islamic world, an important part of which involves the alliances both these regions have with the US, and the extent to which they can forge distinctive and constructive relationships with the Islamic world,”said Conference Convenor and Director of the Centre for Dialogue, La Trobe University, Professor Joseph Camilleri.
“We expect this conference will bring some of the disparate strands of this debate into sharper focus. This will be the first time these complex significant issues have been so comprehensively analysed in the international arena, and what emerges may have significant implications for Australian foreign policy and the newly-elected Rudd Government,” he said.
Keynote speakers will include:
Hua Liming, a former Chinese Ambassador to Iran, the United Arab Emirates and the Netherlands, from Beijing, an international expert on the politics of the Middle East and Tehran’s nuclear ambitions;
Professor Francois Burgat, Director of the Institute for Research and Study on the Arab and Muslim World (IREMAM) at Aix-en-Provence, France, arguably the world’s leading expert on political Islam;
Professor Stephen Zunes, political analyst and 2002 Peace Scholar of the Year and now a Research Fellow at the US Institute of Peace;
Professor Bertrand Badie, French political scientist, Professor of International Relations at the Institute of Political Studies in Paris, Research Fellow at the International Research Studies Centre (CERI), Paris, and a member of the executive board of the International Association of Political Science (AISP), which has advisory status within UNESCO;
Professor Amin Saikal, AM, Director of the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies, Australian National University), and a member of the Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade’s National Consultative Committee for International Security Issues;
Professor Mustapha K.Pasha, Professor of International relations at the University of Aberdeen, formerly a member of the international consulting firm Washington Policy Analysis Group, currently on the Nominating Committee of the Governing Council of the International Studies Association;
Professor Janusz Symonides, international human rights activist and architect of Poland’s entry to the EU and NATO, Director of the Department of International Law and EU Law at the University of Warsaw, Director of the Department of International Law and International Institutions at Nicolaus Copernicus University, and an Expert on the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
The conference is jointly organised by the Centre for Dialogue, La Trobe University, the Innovative Universities European Union Centre (IUEU), the Contemporary Europe Research Centre (University of Melbourne), the Universita degli Studi di Napoli “L’Orientale”, Naples, Italy, the Institute for Social Ethics (Nanzan University, Nagoya, Japan), the Institute of International Relations, Warsaw University, Poland, and the Cold War Studies Centre, London School of Economics, UK, with support from the French Embassy in Australia and the Republic of Poland Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
It will be opened by La Trobe University Vice-Chancellor Paul Johnson, and preceded bya public forum on The Politics of the Middle East: the Roles of Europe, Asia and Australia, at the Laby Theatre, University of Melbourne, tonight (7.30 pm-10 pm 5 December.) The public forum will provide the public arena for the international conference.
Media inquiries and abstracts:
Larry Marshall, Centre for Dialogue, La Trobe University
T: +61 3 9479 1688 E: l.marshall@latrobe.edu.au
T: +61 3 9479 2479 E: j.oaten@latrobe.edu.au