NATIONAL DEFENSE UNIVERSITY

CENTER FOR HEMISPHERIC DEFENSE STUDIES

WASHINGTON, D.C. 20319-5066

Press Release

Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, Chile's National Academy of Political and Strategic Studies (ANEPE) win 2nd annual CHDS William J. Perry Awards

Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies (CHDS) Director Richard D. Downie announced Monday that the winners of the second annual William J. Perry Awards for Excellence in Defense Education are Colombian President Alvaro Uribe (individual category) and the Chilean Academia Nacional de Estudios Políticos y Estratégicos, or ANEPE (institutional category).

The presentation of the awards will take place in mid-September.

The award is named after the former U.S. Secretary of Defense, William J. Perry, whose vision resulted in the founding of CHDS.

"We are extraordinarily pleased to have as this year's winners of the Perry Award, a Latin American president who has given lift to the driving dream of democratic security, and to a sister institution whose mission and cadre of experts have done so much to consolidate sound civil-military relations and critical awareness of current and future security and defense challenges, in Chile and around the hemisphere," Downie said. "With this award, we celebrate a new era in Colombia, and the many accomplishments of our common neighbor to the south."

The Center, which since its founding has had close academic ties with the National Defense University (NDU), has been intimately involved in creating expertise and cooperative initiatives in subjects ranging from civil-military relations, defense policy formulation, resource allocation and management, to the nexus between international terrorist organizations and organized crime. Following the Defense Ministerial of the Americas in Williamsburg, Virginia in late 1995, then Secretary of Defense William J. Perry created an academic center to educate and nurture cadres of knowledgeable civilians in the defense and security arenas--CHDS.

In making the announcement, Downie noted that last year's winners of the Perry Award were the creators and director of Peru’s “Strategic Leadership for Defense and Crisis Management Course” (known by the Spanish acronym CEDEYAC), who modeled their course on CHDS' academic content and instructional methodology, adapted to the Peruvian reality.

He also said that retired Gen. Wesley Clark, a former commander of the U.S. Southern Command as well as the ex-Supreme Allied Commander Europe, will serve as master of ceremonies at this year's presentation of the Perry awards.

Eligibility for the Perry award includes a recognized contribution in either academic or policy arena, and extends to practitioners or institutions of defense and security education or policy in the Hemisphere.

For further information, please contact: Martin Edwin Andersen, CHDS chief of strategic communications, at (202) 685-4666, or andersenm@ndu.edu.