Published: Sept. 17, 2002

The Cultural Events Board of the University of Colorado at Boulder's student government will host a talk by former U.S. Ambassador Dennis B. Ross in the fall semester.

The talk is the second in a two-part series focusing on the Middle East hosted by the University of Colorado Student Union's Cultural Events Board, or CEB. Hanan Ashrawi, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, was the first speaker featured in the series and appeared on campus Sept. 14.

The date of the Ross speech has not been finalized and will be announced later with information on tickets and the location.

Ross served as a special ambassador in the first Bush administration and the Clinton administration and for more than 12 years was instrumental in developing the U.S. role in the Middle East peace process.

In 1995 he assisted the Israelis and Palestinians in reaching the 1995 Interim Agreement. He also successfully brokered the Hebron Accord in 1997, facilitated the Israeli-Jordan peace treaty and worked to bring Israel and Syria together.

In the first Bush administration, Ross was director of the State Department's Policy Planning office, playing a prominent role in developing U.S. policy toward the former Soviet Union. He also worked on the unification of Germany and its integration into NATO, arms-control negotiations and development of the Gulf War coalition.

After more than a decade of serving as the nation's point person on the Middle East peace process, Ross became the director and the Ziegler Distinguished Fellow of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

Ross, who graduated in 1970 from UCLA, wrote his doctoral dissertation on Soviet decision-making and served as executive director of the Berkeley-Stanford program on Soviet International Behavior from 1984 to 1986. He has received UCLA's highest medal, has been named UCLA alumnus of the year, and has received honorary doctorates from the Jewish Theological Seminary and Syracuse University.