Hosted by the College Democrats, International Relations Club, GU Pride and M.E.Ch.A, Senator Bob Casey (D-Penn.) spoke last night to an eager audience of mostly Pennsylvania residents and other interested Hoyas. Casey assumed office in 2007 after defeating incumbent Rick Santorum, who was a Republican presidential contender until recently.

The Senator started his remarks by applauding Jesuit education—he is a Holy Cross alum—and stressing the importance of service. “We need you,” he said, “you will learn so much from the service you provide.”

Casey serves on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and specifically the subcommittee on Near East, South and Central Asian Affairs. Considering that much of United States’ current obligations and concerns abroad fall in this region, the senator nonchalantly remarked, “it’s a pretty busy subcommittee.”

He first discussed the committee’s proceedings in regards to Pakistan. Having visited the country three times, Casey explained: “to say it is a relationship of tension is an understatement.” Highlighting the challenges posed by Pakistan’s troubled politics, Casey pinpointed America’s first priority as “the terrorists elements targeting the central government that has nuclear weapons.” He also stressed the importance of rebuilding “a relationship which is very important for our security.”

On the subject of nuclear development, Casey referenced recent increased sanctions on Iran and urged patience to let them take effect. “It’s not just the launch of the weapon but the development of the capability” that concerns the United States, explained Casey, who fears a regional nuclear arms race should Iran become a nuclear state.

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In a talk Thursday morning in Gaston Hall, Georgia’s President Mikheil Saakashvili spoke about his nation’s recent and radical successes in its battle against corruption.

Opting to speak without notes rather than to deliver the speech he had prepared, Saakashvili fondly recalled the time he spent at Columbia University, lauding the United States for what he saw as the “sense that everything is possible” for immigrants. “Ultimately for us,” he continued, “America is…an inspiration to the people.”

However, Saakashvili painted a grim picture of his own country under and immediately following Soviet rule: afflicted with poverty, crumbling infrastructure, and widespread corruption, he declared that Georgia was at that time “the classical definition of a failed state.”

In 2003, Saakashvili led a protest movement against fraudulent parliamentary elections, eventually culminating in the Rose Revolution. Overwhelmingly elected to the presidency a few months later, Saakashvili and a team of fresh, idealistic Georgian politicians set out on a quest to eradicate corruption in their country, in his telling.

Their bold reforms saw dramatic results. Saakashvili boasted that Georgia, once the nation with the highest crime rate in its area, now vies with Iceland for the title of the safest country in Europe. Georgia’s reliance on Russia for energy has declined, and according to Saakashvili, Georgia’s bureaucracy is the second-most efficient in the world.

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Speaking to roughly one hundred Georgetown staff, students and guests yesterday in Copley Formal Lounge, Turkey’s Ambassador to the United States Namik Tan proudly defended his country’s commitment to Western values of democracy, transparency, the rule of law, respect for human rights and free markets. Hosted by the Institute of Turkish Studies, he also reminded his audience of Turkey’s unique position at the intersection of Europe and Asia.

“The global agenda is currently witnessing important trends,” Tan declared, “The historic transition in the Middle East and North Africa comes to the fore with global ramifications.”

Tan, who has served in Moscow, Abu Dhabi, Jerusalem and Washington in addition to holding senior positions in the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, spent most of his time addressing Turkey’s relationship with the United States and with the European Union. When he did discuss the Middle East, it was often in relation to Western countries.

Describing the US-Turkey relationship, which has become one of the most important bilateral axes in the world in recent years, Tan used three words: “Robust, relevant and resilient.” While acknowledging that the two countries have not and will not agree on every issue, the ambassador emphasized shared values and interests.

Tan also called for a “new regional order” based on democracy, peaceful coexistence, equality and dignity. Referencing Syria, Tan said, “We stand by the legitimate demands of the Syrian people and our goal is to protect the people of Syria.” He expressed Turkey’s desire to see increased stability in Iraq, and emphasized that his government wishes to work with “all the components of the Iraqi people” to ensure shared prosperity and security. He said Turkey would be “an inspiring role model” for other Muslim-majority countries in the region.

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Secretary of State Hillary Clinton chose Gaston Hall today as the venue to introduce a wide-ranging set of policies aimed to protect women and institutionalize their voices around the world.

The first-ever National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security lays out five steps for cooperation and action among numerous governmental agencies to increase women’s security in zones of conflict and implement their voices in government and peacekeeping operations around the world. President Barack Obama issued an Executive Order that directed for the plan’s implementation earlier this morning.

Clinton emphasized, “women are not just the victims of war. They are agents of peace.” Accordingly, the first area of the National Action Plan emphasizes partnering with women in vulnerable regions and countries to prevent conflict before it begins. Women’s health and security issues are often “canaries in the coal mine”, said Clinton, and can act as “early warning systems” to not only highlight where women are being oppressed, but where conflict is likely to occur in the future.

When armed conflict does break out, the second prong of the National Action Plan is designed to strengthen and expand efforts to protect women in conflict zones. Clinton said the plan will compel American diplomats and humanitarian workers across the globe to reach out to “political leaders and local influentials” and “poorly trained soldiers and police” in efforts to combat the use of rape as a war tactic and to provide adequate aid services to women.

The US government will also work to reach out to men and boys at all levels of society to end discrimination—including combating tribal and religious-based gender discrimination. Clinton said that many of these efforts will remain sensitive to local norms and cultures, but “you must draw lines in certain areas.” “Beating women is not cultural,” the Secretary said. “It is criminal.”

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Protest not, lest ye be protested. Tonight, about twenty students gathered in Red Square to condemn the protesters who interrupted General David Petraeus when he spoke in Gaston Hall last Thursday. The students, two of whom held a large American flag for the duration of the counterprotest, read aloud and circulated a letter of apology to Gen. Petraeus and a letter to University President John DeGioia asking him to issue a formal apology to Petraeus for the disruption.

“A great injustice was perpetrated against General David Petraeus, those in attendance of his presentation, and the Georgetown community as a whole on January 21,” junior Will Downes said, reading the letter to DeGioia.

The letter to Petraeus, they said, was drafted in collaboration between several on campus groups, including the the Georgetown Federalist, the International Relations Club, and Georgetown University College Republicans. It asked that and that “university policy be altered so that it does not tolerate the constant and continuous disruption of university sponsored events.”

After the reading the letters out loud, members of the group engaged in some good old-fashioned oratory.

“How is it that a guest at our University could be subject to such disrespect?” Randy Drew (SFS ’10) asked, standing on the planter in the middle of the Square. Drew said the protesters were motivated by “the same spirit which motivates a person in the middle of the night to shout racial epithets, the same spirit which motivates a person to deny a professor the right to teach what he or she believes.”

Members of the crowd hissed softly when Drew mentioned the op-ed that James Reardon-Anderson, a dean in the School of Foreign Service, published in The Hoya comparing the actions of the protesters to Jesus and Martin Luther King, Jr.

Read more, and the letters to Petraeus and DeGioia, after the jump.

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Grad students rejoice! A national report (PDF), which surveyed professors teaching international relations, declared Georgetown’s graduate classes and programs in that subject to be the best there is. According to the Office of Communications:

“Faculty nationwide ranked the top master’s degree programs in international relations for students looking to pursue careers in policy. Georgetown ranked No. 1 in the survey, above second place Johns Hopkins University and Harvard University in third. Tufts and Columbia universities followed in fourth and fifth place.”

Government majors and SFSers don’t have it so bad either, the “biennial report” said. Georgetown took fifth in that category, behind first through fourth place takers Harvard, Princeton, Yale and Stanford, respectively. Story of our life right? If you’re still bitter over that Columbia waitlisting, however, take heart!