DiploNews – Issue 248 – 17 March 2014

Asia-Europe Public Diplomacy Training Initiative – call for nominations

The Asia-Europe Public Diplomacy Training Initiative was established by DiploFoundation, the Asia-Europe Foundation, and the National Centre for Research on Europe – University of Canterbury, to help to promote and facilitate skills training for diplomats and civil society actors. The initiative aims to improve public diplomacy efforts between the countries of the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) process. We have launched a call for nominations to all ASEM member countries for an online course (to run from mid-May to mid-July 2014) and a face-to-face workshop (to be held in Geneva, 2-4 July 2014). Please note that enrolment in both of these training opportunities is only possible based on a direct nomination from your ministry of foreign affairs. Please contact Tereza Horejsova for further information.

May online courses on diplomacy

We are now accepting applications for four exciting online courses which start the week of 5 May 2014:

• Bilateral Diplomacy
• Current Issues in the United Nations
• Diplomacy of Small States
• E-diplomacy

Apply by 31 March for Diplo certificate courses. For further information or to apply, click on the titles of the courses above, or visit our courses website. Register now to reserve your place.

Sign up for our courses mailing list to be informed about upcoming courses.

Bilateral Summit Diplomacy: working for success

What are the ingredients for productive summits, beyond atmospherics and sound-bytes? Join our free webinar Bilateral Summit Diplomacy: Working for Success tomorrow, Tuesday, 18th March, 2014 at 14:00 GMT (15:00 CET). The webinar is hosted by Ambassador Kishan S Rana, Professor Emeritus and Diplo's lecturer on Bilateral Diplomacy, 21st Century Diplomacy, and other topics.

To read more and to register please visit the event webpage.

Surveillance discussion at Geneva Human Rights Film Festival

Diplo director Dr Jovan Kurbalija took part in a panel on online surveillance with WikiLeaks’s Julian Assange (remotely from London), during last week’s Geneva Human Rights Film Festival. The session was moderated by Richard Werly.

In his intervention, Mr Assange spoke about the extent and consequences of the interception and surveillance, and the increase in power of this strategic weapon which he believes will not be voluntarily disarmed.

Dr Kurbalija said that the past six months have demonstrated what the symptoms of the problem are. However, we still have to identify the real causes, which he believes lie much deeper than we think.

The session took place after the viewing of the film Yes We Scan, and included time for Q&A with the audience. The webcast of the session is available here.

Discussing Internet governance

How can we grasp the complexity of IG without reducing its healthy diversity, and how can IG be more legitimate? Dr Jovan Kurbalija introduces the IG Restaurant analogy to help us understand the complex language. Vladimir Radunovic digests the March IG briefing, which forms part of the Geneva Internet Platform (GIP), in which the main IG spaces and the expected developments in 2014 were discussed, while Stephanie Borg Psaila talks about the overload of information, and our response to it.

On Diplo’s community platform, Gameli Adzaho explains how BloggingGhana is leading the growth of social media in Ghana, and Hamisi Ramadhani Kisinzah asks whether a net neutrality solution that overcomes technological, social, economic and legal challenges is at all possible.

Follow more IG-related news and discussions on Diplo’s Internet governance channel, and on Diplo’s IG community blog roll.

What's been happening in Diplo's blogosphere

One of the UK FCO's social media leaders, @HMATomFletcher, reckons that ‘we all make many mistakes on Twitter. The biggest one is not being there.’ But when it comes to tweets gone wrong, Pete Cranston has this to say – Twiplo-blunders: they’re fun, and necessary. Do you have any examples of tweets that went wrong in the world of diplomacy? And, speaking of blunders, Arvin Kamberi shares Five things not to do for a webinar; worth a read if you’re considering using webinars to reach your people.

Remember, you too can have your say by commenting on these or any of our blog posts. And, if you’d like to be a guest blogger, let us know.