Transcripts
Comments at his Swearing-in Ceremony
by Ambassador Richard E. Hoagland
State Department, Washington, DC
September 10, 2008
Assistant Secretaries, your Excellencies, so many colleagues past and present, family, friends:
I am so pleased to see you here today. You are the people on whom I count, friends and colleagues alike, for wise advice and support.
I want to express my gratitude to President Bush and Secretary of State Rice for nominating me to this important position and, likewise, to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the full Senate for their vote of confirmation.
Ambassador of Kazakhstan Idrissov, thank you so much for attending this ceremony today. I want to say to you, sir, that my goal as the U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Kazakhstan will be to follow in the footsteps of my predecessors to build an ever stronger and more productive relationship of respect and trust between the United States and Kazakhstan.
I would like to take a moment to pay tribute to my family. My father passed away 18 years ago. My mother came to my first swearing-in ceremony in 2003, but now can no longer travel. But she is still, at 88 years old, the matriarch, still presiding over our family home, still keeping alive our traditions back to the 19th century and beyond, when our family, some of whom came to this land before the American Revolution, were farmers, local politicians, businessmen, and entrepreneurs. In short, I am deeply grateful for my traditional family that taught me the bedrock morality that inspired me to think for myself and become the optimistic realist I am today. I am especially grateful to my sister, Deborah, who flew here from New Mexico to participate today. By the way, she’s a senior air traffic controller, and I hope her taking a few days off work won’t overly endanger the planes flying over the United States today.
Kazakhstan is a remarkable country, in landmass nearly the size of Western Europe, and blessed with great hydrocarbon, mineral, and agricultural wealth. But the greatest blessing is certainly the people of Kazakhstan themselves: well educated, pragmatic, tolerant, multi-ethnic, multi-confessional. Under the leadership of President Nazarbayev, in less than two decades of independence, Kazakhstan has emerged as a respected, important, independent player on the world stage. Immediately after independence, Kazakhstan foreswore its nuclear weapons, and ever since has played a leading role in non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. We thank Kazakhstan for that historic and visionary decision.
Likewise, very soon after independence, Kazakhstan undertook serious economic and financial reforms, and opened its doors to foreign investment. As a result, the people of Kazakhstan have seen a dramatic reduction in poverty and an impressive expansion of the middle class.
Earlier this year, the British journalist and author Christopher Robbins published a wonderfully erudite and readable book called Apples are from Kazakhstan that I believe truly captures some of the long history and cultural texture of this important nation. But why such a title? Because, in fact, apples are from Kazakhstan. Apples genetically originated in Kazakhstan, as was proven by the great Soviet geneticist Vavilov, whom Stalin had executed because he didn’t like his scientific views.
Did you know that Kazakhstan was often the destination for internal exiles of the 19th-century Russian Empire and its 20th-century successor Soviet Empire, and where Kazakhs offered their unassuming but open-hearted and humane traditional hospitality to the exiles? Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Leon Trotsky, Aleksandr Solzhenitzyn all wrote glowingly of their time of exile in Kazakhstan. They each fell in love with the land and people of Kazakhstan, as I am sure I will, too.
And did you know tulips, too, originated in the mountain meadows of Central Asia? – long before they were cultivated in Persia, Turkey, and eventually in the Netherlands, where tulip bulbs were the first commodity ever to create a bubble crisis in modern economics; although, Ambassador Idrisov, I don’t think Kazakhstan can be blamed for that particular economic crisis.
Let me tell just one more curious anecdote. From my own recent experience, it would seem Kazakhstan indeed has a very lively press. Soon after I was first nominated, a Kazakhstani tabloid headlined its article, “New U.S. Ambassador Believes in Extra-Terrestrials!” Well, no, that’s not true. But let this be an object lesson in the dangers of the Google search. Why? Because there’s another Richard Hoagland, a former NASA official, who’s apparently gone over to the dark side, and frequently writes for the National Enquirer in the United States about the so-called “U.S. government conspiracy” to hide the fact – he insists – of extra-terrestrial beings on Mars. To the government and citizens of Kazakhstan, I emphasize that’s the other Richard Hoagland.
Now, what is the task? First, above all, we need to be grounded in reality. We need mutually and thoroughly to understand the historical, cultural, and political realities in both our countries – and we need to respect them. Where they are congruent, we will easily prosper together. Where they are not fully congruent – and friends can disagree and still remain friends – we will work to understand each other’s reality with respect. Where we will find points of agreement, we will pursue common goals. Where we will sometimes disagree, we will do so with respect and without recrimination.
In 2010, Kazakhstan will assume the rotating presidency of the OSCE, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, thus confirming its international leadership. In preparation for that historic role, the government of Kazakhstan has begun the task of revising its own election, political party, and mass media laws that will eventually allow ever more citizens to participate in the governance of their own nation. We look forward to the successful completion of that task.
Kazakhstan is a regional leader in attracting direct foreign investment. We look forward to Kazakhstan continuing to strengthen its rule of law, transparency, sanctity of contracts, and institutionalizing international-standards of fairness and predictability of its taxation and regulatory policies.
My fundamental goal as U.S. Ambassador will be to ensure that we, the United States, are a positive partner for Kazakhstan and, certainly, that Kazakhstan is a positive partner for the United States. I will work to bring together the positive forces of international diplomacy to support Kazakhstan’s independence, sovereignty, leadership, and prosperity.
I enormously look forward to the task I have as United States Ambassador to the Republic of Kazakhstan. I firmly believe our two important countries will become ever stronger, more reliable, more respectful partners for the future.
Thank you.