Trump Administration Awards $70,198 to East-West Center to Support Pacific Islands Awareness Initiative

WASHINGTON – The Trump Administration announced $70,198 in fiscal year 2020 grant funding provided through the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Office of Insular Affairs’ (OIA) Technical Assistance Program (TAP) to support an East-West Center initiative to highlight the Pacific Islands and the relationship between the Pacific Islands and the United States.

“This is a timely venture with the East-West Center here in Washington, D.C., as the Office of Insular Affairs works with other federal partners to support the U.S. territories and the freely associated states,” said Interior Assistant Secretary, Insular and International Affairs, Douglas W. Domenech. “The East-West Center’s initiative will highlight the importance of the U.S.-affiliated insular areas to American national security as well as President Trump’s Indo-Pacific Strategy’s focus on a free and open Pacific. The publication will be posted online and shared with members of Congress and federal policy makers in Washington whose work can have a lasting impact on the island areas.”

“The East West Center is excited to create and utilize this new resource to support the work of government, private sector, and civil society stakeholders in United States-Pacific Islands relations. This will be a unique, usable tool as part of the Asia Matters for America initiative that highlights U.S. relations with the Indo-Pacific at the national, state, and local levels,” said Satu Limaye, Vice President of the EWC and Director of the Asia Matters for America initiative.

• The East-West Center in Washington, D.C., has been awarded $70,198 in fiscal year 2020 Technical Assistance Program grant funding that will be used to research and create a new publication titled, “Pacific Islands Matter for America/America Matters for the Pacific Islands.”  Following the format of the East-West Center’s Asia Matters for America series, the East-West Center proposal aims to print and post online Pacific Islands Matter for America for members of Congress and federal officials in Washington, D.C., early in the year 2021. The East-West Center plans to work closely with the newly created Congressional Pacific Islands Caucus in the House of Representatives and other important stakeholders to develop this brochure.

The OIA Technical Assistance Program is made available each year by Congress to support priorities in support of the U.S. territories and the freely associated states. For more information on grant assistance provided through OIA, please visit: https://www.doi.gov/oia/financial-assistance.

The Assistant Secretary, Insular and International Affairs, @ASIIADomenech, and the Office of Insular Affairs (OIA) carry out the Secretary of the Interior’s responsibilities for the U.S. territories of American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Additionally, OIA administers and oversees federal assistance under the Compacts of Free Association to the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, and the Republic of Palau. Follow and “like” OIA on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/InsularAffairs.

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