Former U. S. Ambassador to the U. N., Samantha Power will give a lecture on the Abbey Stage, followed by an interview with Fintan O’Toole. Bob Geldof will introduce the evening.

Ambassador Samantha Power

The youngest-ever U. S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Dublin-born Samantha Power has been a leading voice internationally for principled American engagement in the world. One of TIME’s ‘100 Most Influential People’, she has spent half of her career explaining complex geopolitical events as a Pulitzer Prize-winning author, war correspondent, and Harvard professor – and the last eight years helping to shape them. In April, 2017 she returned to teaching, as the Anna Lindh Professor of Practice at Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Law School.

As the 28th U. S. Ambassador to the U. N. under President Obama, Power became the public face of U. S. opposition to Russian aggression in Ukraine and Syria, negotiated the toughest sanctions in a generation against North Korea, lobbied to secure the release of political prisoners, and helped mobilize global action against ISIL. From 2009 to 2013, she served on the National Security Council as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Multilateral Affairs and Human Rights.

Ambassador Power began her career as a journalist, reporting from places such as Bosnia, East Timor, Kosovo, Rwanda, Sudan, and Zimbabwe. At the age of nine, Power emigrated from Ireland to the United States. She earned a B.A. from Yale University and a J.D. from Harvard Law School.