About the Speakers:

Ambassador Thomas C. Hubbard is chairman of The Korea Society and Senior Director at McLarty Associates in Washington, D.C., where he specializes in Asian affairs. A career Foreign Service Officer for nearly forty years, he served as U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Korea from 2001 to 2004, and before that as Ambassador to the Philippines from 1996-2000. Earlier in his career, he served seven years in Japan, and was also Deputy Chief of Mission and acting Ambassador in Malaysia. He held key Washington postings including Philippines desk officer, country director for Japan, and principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for East Asian and Pacific affairs. Increasingly involved in Korean Peninsular affairs in the 1990s, Ambassador Hubbard was a principal negotiator of the 1994 Agreed Framework aimed at ending North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, and headed the first senior-level U.S. government delegation to North Korea. He was also President Clinton’s envoy to promote human rights and democracy in Burma. He received his BA in political science in 1965 from the University of Alabama and has been awarded honorary doctorates by the University of Maryland and the University of Alabama.

David Straub was named associate director of the Korean Studies Program at Shorenstein Asia Pacific Research Center (APARC) on July 1, 2008. Previously, he was a 2007-2008 Pantech Fellow at the Shorenstein APARC, at Stanford University. He is currently writing a book on recent U.S.-Korea relations. Straub retired from the U.S. Department of State in 2006 as a Senior Foreign Service Officer after a 30-year career focused on Northeast Asian affairs. He worked over 12 years on Korean affairs, first arriving in Seoul in 1979. He served as head of the political section at the U.S. embassy in Seoul from 1999 to 2002 during popular protests against the U.S., and played a key working-level role in the Six-Party Talks on North Korea's nuclear program as the State Department's Korea country desk director from 2002 to 2004. After leaving the Department of State, he taught U.S.-Korean relations at The Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies in the fall of 2006 and at the Graduate School of International Studies of Seoul National University in spring 2007.

About the Moderator

Dr. Stephen Noerper is senior vice president of The Korea Society. As a former principal of a boutique international relations firm, professor at New York University, academy president and corporate vice president, Dr. Noerper speaks widely on Korea-U.S. relations, Peninsular security and Northeast Asia foreign policies. Professor Noerper served with the U.S. State Department and as an NGO representative in the United States and Asia. He also taught at American University, Hawaii's Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies, Waseda University, and the National University of Mongolia, where he was a Fulbright Senior Scholar. He has lectured across Korea, East Asia, and Europe. The author of more than fifty publications on Korea and Northeast Asia, Dr. Noerper has appeared on Thomson Reuters, Bloomberg, NBC, National Public Radio, Radio Netherlands, Radio Free Asia, VOA television, and in Joongang Ilbo and other media outlets. The recipient of several international awards, Dr. Noerper is a strong supporter of the arts and enhanced international peace and understanding. He holds graduate degrees from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and the London School of Economics.