Temur Iakobashvili

Temuri Yakobashvili ( ka, თემურ იაკობაშვილი, also transliterated as Temur Iakobashvili) (born September 3, 1967) is a Georgian political scientist, diplomat, and politician, serving as State Minister for Reintegration since 2008; he was named Deputy Prime Minister in 2009. On November 20, 2010, his nomination as Ambassador to the United States was announced. After change of government in Georgia he resigned on November 8, 2013.

Personal life

Yakobashvili was born into a Georgian Jewish family in Tbilisi. He graduated from the Department of Physics at Tbilisi State University in 1984. He attended diplomatic courses at the universities of Oxford and Birmingham (1998), the Yale University World Fellows Program (2002), and the Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government (2003). He is married to Yana Fremer and has two children, Giorgi Fremer and Miriam Yakobashvili. He speaks Georgian, Russian, Hebrew, and English.Temuri Yakobashvili – Biography
. ''The Government of Georgia''. Retrieved on November 15, 2010.

Professional career

From 1990 to 2001, he worked for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Georgia where he last served as the Director of the U.S., Canada and Latin America Department. He is a co-founder of, and from 2001 to 2008 was Executive Vice-President of, the Georgian Foundation for Strategic and International Studies, the largest think tank in the South Caucasus. He is also a co-founder and member of the boards of the Georgian Council on Foreign Relations and th
Atlantic Council of Georgia
and a member of the board of th
Georgian Institute of Public Affairs
He has authored several publications on national security, conflict management, and foreign relations.

On January 31, 2008, he was appointed by the President of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili as State Minister of Georgia for Reintegration. He is the architect of Georgia'
strategy of engagement
with the Russian-occupied regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which aims to "promote interaction among the divided populations of Georgia, currently separated by occupation lines."

On November 20, 2010, his nomination as Ambassador to the United States was announced. In February 2012, he was awarded the Presidential Order of Excellence.

The victory of the "Georgian dream" at the parliamentary elections in Georgia on October 1, 2012 and the formation of a new government under Bidzina Ivanishvili on October 25 led to changes of the diplomatic staff. So ambassador Yakobashvili took the consequences and announced his resignation on 8 November. As president Mikheil Saakashvili hesitated with approval of new ambassadors, suggested by the new government, it lasted until March 2013 that the successor for Yakobashvili, Archil Gegeshidze, had been appointed.Georgia’s new ambassador to the US
dfwatch, March 20, 2013 (retrieved on April 12, 2013).

References

External links

Georgian Embassy in the U.S.
Ambassadors of Georgia to the United States of America

{{DEFAULTSORT:Iakobashvili, Temur
1967 births
Living people
Diplomats from Tbilisi
Jews from Georgia (country)
Political scientists from Georgia (country)
Government ministers of Georgia (country)
Jewish politicians from Georgia (country)
Politicians from Tbilisi
People of the Russo-Georgian War
Uppsala University faculty
Ambassadors of Georgia (country) to the United States
Alumni of the University of Birmingham
Recipients of the Presidential Order of Excellence