Ambassador Hesham Elnakib

The USC Center on Public Diplomacy was pleased to host Ambassador Hesham Elnakib, Consul General of Egypt.

Ambassador Hesham Elnakib spoke on President Obama's Cairo speech one year on; corporate diplomacy opportunities and challenges in the Middle East; regional strategic communications considerations; and public private partnership opportunities..

Ambassador Elnakib graduated from The American University in Cairo with a bachelor’s in political science and a minor in economics, a Master of Arts in international relations from the International Institute of Public Administration in Paris, France, and a Doctor of Philosophy in history, specializing in the history of international relations and foreign policy, from the Institute of Oriental Studies at the Russian Academy of Science in Moscow.

Elnakib embarked on his diplomatic career with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs right after graduation.

During the last 10 years, Elnakib has assumed various positions with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, including director and counselor, North American Department (1997-2000); director of the cabinet of the First Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs (2000-2001); spokesperson and head of press and public diplomacy 2007-2008, and currently as the Consul General at the Egyptian Consulate in San Francisco from 2008 to the present.

Intermittently, he was assigned his third international post (2001-2007) as director, press counselor and spokesperson of press and information office of the Embassy of Egypt in Washington DC, and minister plenipotentiary with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Information.

Elnakib wrote a number of commentaries and letters to the editor of various international journals and magazines, including New York Times, Washington Post and Wall Street Journal; he also wrote a number or articles in El Sayasa El Dawleya in Al Ahram newspaper. He is a member of the Academy of Political Science in New York and the National Press Club in Washington DC.