On May 14, the EastWest Institute (EWI) held its annual board of directors meeting at the Harvard Club in New York City. Bringing together 23 board members—as well as 68 guests from the government, military, business and civil society—the meeting was an opportunity to review the institute's programmatic impact last year, and to discuss new initiatives for 2019. 

H.E. Ambassador Adela Raz, Permanent Representative of Afghanistan to the United Nations, delivered keynote remarks. She underlined the history between the institute and the government of Afghanistan and shared benchmark achievements on the development of Afghanistan's economy, healthcare progress and youth and women's empowerment, as well as providing insight on future challenges to security, peace and elections.

The prorgram continued with an engaging cyber panel discussion on "Technology and Governance." Participants included Lora Saalman, Senior Fellow at the EastWest Institute; Izumi Nakamitsu, Under-Secretary-General and High Representative for Disarmament Affairs at the United Nations; Timo Koster, Ambassador-at-large for Security Policy & Cyber at the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs; and David Sanger, National Security Correspondent for The New York Times.

Ambassador Jonathan Cohen, Acting Permanent Representative of the United States to the United Nations, delivered remarks during a luncheon conversation with EWI President and CEO Cameron Munter. 

EWI is pleased to announce the appointment of two new members of board members: Kathryn Pilgrim, former CNN correspondent and news anchor, and Olivia Fischer, philanthropist at the Planet Heritage Foundation.

Click here to view photos from the event on EWI's Flickr account. 

Photo credit: Kaveh Sardari