Ambassador Mahmoud Dirir, who led the 48 member Egyptian public diplomacy delegation to Ethiopia, told WIC that Dr. Essam Sharaf, premier of Egypt, is scheduled to meet with Ethiopian counterparts to discuss relations between the two countries.

When she was appointed as Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy in 2005, Hughes was put in charge of trying to improve the perception of America abroad. "One of the things that we worked in public diplomacy to highlight around the world was the fact that a lot of Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda's victims were, in fact, innocent Muslims."

After digesting the news that Osama bin Laden had been killed by a U.S. Navy Seals team, my first thought was about how his death, and the manner in which it happened, highlights the tension between the visible and the invisible in terms of terrorism and counterterrorism.

In a dramatic, yet sober, Sunday night address to the American people, President Obama announced the capture and killing of Osama bin Laden. He reminded us of the horror, the grief, the tragedy and senseless slaughter of September 11, 2001.

The slow trickle of leaked diplomatic cables from Wikileaks may not be in the headlines as much as it was when it started, but revelations keep pouring out of the website.

One definition of diplomacy is interpretation of domestic policies to the outside world as stated in official documents. Priority in domestic issues is what should be reflected by diplomats. A diplomat as an ambassador for that matter should be a high ranking official to have the confidence in representing their country.

The Sri Lankan government should create within its ministry of external affairs a post of Additional Secretary for Public Diplomacy. In addition to media, counter terrorism, this new division should include two new capabilities - diaspora affairs and NGOs division especially to keep advocacy NGOs such as human rights organisations briefed.

My objective in this article is to educate the public on diplomacy and diplomats. Before defining these two terms, it is not out of place to emphasize the fact that ‘diplomacy’ is the most important and most influential among the five major instruments in the conduct of international relations.