Foreign Affairs Meeting 10/3/2012

Foreign Affairs Meeting On October 3, 2012, the Foreign Affairs Club met together to discuss future club events, and take the opportunity to discuss about current issues in Mali. The meeting was conducted by Protocol Officer, Andrew Jones. Recruitment Officer, Marie Poudiougou led the discussion about Mali.

The meeting began with announcements concerning future club activities. The Foreign Affairs club weekly meeting held on Wednesdays is canceled next week on October 10th due to Fall Break. Club Advisor, Dr. Baktybek D. Abdrisaev then discussed about the responsibilities of the club members for future events, such as the Call for Papers essay high school competition, Women of the Mountains, etc. He asked for certain skilled sets to help orchestrate events and activities to help contribute to our goals in the Foreign Affairs Club activities. To give us Following his remarks, Marie gave an interesting presentation about Mali in West Africa.

Mali is the 24th largest country in the world with a population of over 15 million people. Mali is made up of the regions Kayes, Koulikoro, Sikasso, Mopti, Gao, Kidal, and Tombouctou.

Tombouctou is the largest region in mali. It’s rich in gold, salt, and knowledge. It is the place where scholars would meet together. Tombouctou is considered as an imaginary area because of how difficult it was to reach. Travelers would have to cross the Sahara Desert.

Because of the distance to reach the city, Tombouctou is considered the most difficult to reach in the world.

Mali has had four presidents so far. The first three presidents acted more as dictators, but the fourth president was democratically elected. Following his term, the third president came back to power, who had led a coup against the second president. Ironically, during his term, he had a coup set up against him.

Following Marie’s remarks about Mali, she showed a video that went into more detail about the history and culture of the country.

Melanie Woodbury