Peter Kovach
Diplomat-in-Residence, UCLA School of Public
Department of State, Public Diplomacy Specialist
Former Counselor for Public Affairs, American Embassy, Islamabad-Pakistan

Peter Kovach of Bethesda, Maryland joined the Foreign Service in 1980. From 2003-2005, he was Director, Office of Public Diplomacy, Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs. Prior to that, he was the Director of the Foreign Press Centers, Director of the (IPI) Secretariat charged with coordinating U.S. Government-wide communication efforts directed at foreign audiences, and also Director of the former United States Information Agency's (USIA) Office of Strategic Communications. Earlier, he was the Policy Officer in USIA's Office of Near Eastern, North African and South Asian Affairs and Branch Chief for the International Visitor Program for the same regions. Kovach has been posted overseas in Japan as Senior Cultural Attaché, in Jordan as Public Affairs Officer, in Morocco as Press Attaché, in Bahrain as Public Affairs Officer and Yemen as Assistant Public Affairs Officer.

Before joining the Foreign Service, Kovach co-starred in and was production advisor for a Japanese Broadcasting Company TV series teaching American English. He taught at Japan's Foreign Ministry Institute and at a Japanese University. He taught history of religion at the University of Massachusetts-Boston, Goddard College and at Wesleyan University. He has also worked as a freelance photojournalist in India and Southeast Asia, a dormitory headmaster at Tufts University, a stevedore and a stonemason. Mr. Kovach received a Masters Degree from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (ABD) where he was Director of the "Fletcher Forum," a journal of international studies. Kovach also holds an MA in Asian Studies from the University of California at Berkeley and a BA in history and religion with Asian specialization from Wesleyan University. He has studied Arabic, Urdu, Turkish, Japanese, French, Hindi, Latin and German and is a trained mediator. Kovach is married and has a 17 year old son.