To Albania, with Love - Paperback

by Fatos Tarifa (Author), Peter Lucas (Foreword by)

It is not uncommon for diplomats to publish their memoirs after they retire from the Foreign Service. What is unusual for an ambassador, however, is to publicize, after resigning from the service, the chronicle of his day-to-day diplomatic activity both political and public. To Albania, with Love is a collection of these activities during Tarifa's career as the Albanian ambassador to the United States and the Netherlands. Many of the letters included in this volume reveal the methodology of ambassadors in Washington, D.C., and detail the high levels of access Tarifa had developed during his career. This work brings together a selection of Tarifa's letters to high-ranking U.S. and Dutch government officials, lectures, testimonies, public addresses, and remarks. They all illustrate the direction an ambassador's career and activities should take in promoting his country. To be a perceptive visionary who can herald progressive change in the interest of his own country and the broader international community is the goal of a truly accomplished ambassador.

Author Biography

Fatos Tarifa is the former Albanian Ambassador to the United States and currently a Distinguished Visiting Fellow at Eastern Michigan University. He obtained his Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His most recent books include The Balkans: A Mission Neither Accomplished Nor Impossible; The Quest for Legitimacy and the Withering Away of Utopia; Breakdown of State Socialism and the Emerging Post-Socialist Order.