President Zatlers, Honorees from Business, Media & Sports to headline 2009 U.S.-Baltic Gala
March 17, 2009
WASHINGTON, DC – USBF Chairman Maria Kivisild Ogrydziak is pleased to announce the award honorees for The U.S.-Baltic Foundation’s 2009 U.S.-Baltic Confluence: Forum, Exchange and Gala. The USBF gala weekend will take place May 15-16 at the Mayflower Hotel, 1127 Connecticut Ave NW. The Gala has become the premiere annual event in Washington, DC for American friends of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. For additional information or to purchase tickets for the weekend events, please visit www.usbaltic.org.
The honorees for the 2009 gala include:
Baltic Statesmanship Award
President Valdis Zatlers
President Zatlers was elected President by Latvia’s Parliament on May 31st, 2007. Throughout his tenure, President Zatlers has been a tremendous advocate of stronger transatlantic relations. Prior to that, he was Director of the State Hospital of Traumatology and Orthopaedics. He received his medical degree from Riga Medical Institute and practiced medicine since 1979, primarily at Riga City Hospital No. 2 and the State Hospital of Traumatology and Orthopaedics. He is married with three children.
Baltic Outstanding Achievement in Sports and Business Award
Sarūnas Marčiulionis
Sarūnas Marciulionis is a retired NBA basketball player and one of the most successful businessmen in Lithuania. He started his career playing for Statyba Vilnius in the USSR league but was drafted to the NBA in 1987 and played for various NBA teams until 1997. In 1993 he founded the Lithuanian Basketball League and in 1999 the North European Basketball League. His business ventures include the Sarūnas Hotel in Vilnius and he is also President of the Sarūnas Marčiulionis Basketball Academy.
Corporate Social Responsibility Award
DIENA Newspapers
Diena is the largest morning newspaper in Latvia, founded in 1990. The newspaper Diena is a modern national paper which influences the development of society, representing and defending democratic values, and offering various models for life.
Diena is politically independent, and its operations are based on high standards of journalism and business ethics. Diena creates and distributes all-round and high quality news views, entertaining and useful information and it is an important forum for socially and economically active readers.
Baltic Image Enhancement Award
Tiiu Leek
Tiiu Leek was born in Montreal and raised in Toronto, Canada by Estonian refugees who escaped to Canada after World War II. Her impressive and varied career began in the late 1960s, with modeling contracts taking her to England, Europe, the Mediterranean, and the United States. In the 1970s she started her acting career in Canada and moved to Los Angeles in 1977, where her first role was in “The Loveboat.” Since then she has also been a television reporter and appeared on TV in “The Practice,” “NYPD Blue,” “Murder She Wrote,” and others, and in movies such has “Honeymoon in Vegas,” “Airheads,” and Micki and Maude.” She still resides in California with her husband and is active in community service projects.
Baltic Corporate Citizen Award
Egeen
Egeen, founded in 2001, is a transatlantic clinical research organization with headquarters in California and wholly owned subsidiaries in Estonia and Ukraine. It operates all over Eastern Europe from Finland to Turkey and Poland to Russia. Egeen advances the drug development of biotech and pharmaceutical companies through its managed clinical trials in the areas of oncology, urology, and CNS indications.
Special Achievement in Business Award
Jerry Wirth
Mr. Wirth is Partner of R.B. Management. Mr. Wirth’s experience in the Baltics dates to 1992 when he served in the Peace Corps as a business development specialist. In 1996, he founded SIA Celsius Properties in Latvia and more recently SIA R.B. Properties, which provides property management and investment services. Today, Mr. Wirth’s businesses employ over 50 people, with assets valued in excess of USD 20 million. He has been an active Chamber member for eight years. Prior to arrival in the Baltics, Mr. Wirth worked in Corporate Finance for Caterpillar, Inc. in America. He has been an active Chamber member for eight years. Today, he serves as President of the American Chamber of Commerce in Latvia. Mr. Wirth is being honored by USBF because he exemplifies the kind of tangible and moral contributions to Baltic societies made by many American entrepreneurs.
Please contact USBF Office Manager Trevor Dane at trevor@usbaltic.org or by calling 202-785-5056 with questions about the gala event.
The U.S.- Baltic Foundation is an educational resource for U.S. policy-makers and the public. A national organization that unites all American friends of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, USBF develops and implements programs to strengthen democracy and free markets in the Baltics. The Foundation also introduces the Baltics to new American audiences with a series of public affairs programs.
-- 30 --