Ambassador Vlora Çitaku

“I was not in a position to choose whether I want[ed] to be an artist or actor or astronaut or mathematician or linguist or lawyer. That’s not an option when you’re not free because you fight for life and death. And that’s how I and that’s how everybody in my generation became politically active. We were fighting for freedom.” – Vlora Çitaku, 2017 at the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace & Security

The Dole Institute will host Vlora Çitaku, ambassador of the Republic of Kosovo to the United States, for the 2018 Dole Lecture. The first sitting ambassador to visit the Dole Institute, Çitaku will discuss her career in international diplomacy and her work on behalf of the young Republic of Kosovo. The nation recently marked the 10th anniversary of its declaration of independence from Serbia on Feb. 17, 2008.

Once a refugee with her sisters, Çitaku was separated from her parents and deported by the Serbian military during the Kosovo War in 1999. She would later return following the U.S.-led air campaign in Kosovo and enter politics. She has served in the Kosovo General Assembly and as the nation’s deputy foreign minister, acting foreign minister and consul general of the Republic of Kosovo’s mission in New York City.

This event is co-sponsored by the KU Center for Global and International Studies, the KU Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies, and the KU Office of Graduate Military Programs.