Kosovo President Fatmir Sejdiu received the first Distinguished Global Leadership Award on Monday night for his leadership achievements in bridging cultural gaps on an international level.

Sejdiu was honored for his contributions to the “process that evolved, eventually, in the birth of a nation,” said Anthony “Bud” Rock, vice president for Global Engagement at ASU. Rock presented the award to Sejdiu, who was elected president of Kosovo in 2006 and is the country’s only president since declaring independence from Serbia in February 2008, in front of nearly 300 people in the Arizona Room of the Memorial Union on the Tempe campus.

The award was created to honor international leaders and friends of the University who have raised global awareness as a result of their time on campus and in their post-university work, Rock said.

Sejdiu participated in a
semester-in-residence program at ASU in 2003 while he was a law professor at Kosovo’s University of Prishtina. He worked with the W. P. Carey School of Business and School of Public Affairs in his four months at ASU and developed a program in public administration.

“I wish to continue, for my people, the continued support from ASU” in the democratization efforts currently taking place in Kosovo, he said.

Sejdiu visited ASU just six days after the first anniversary of Kosovo’s declaration of independence from Serbia, which has yet to recognize the nation, and will travel from the University to Washington, D.C., to discuss new developments in Kosovo with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Vice President Joe Biden.

Sejdiu said in a speech at the ceremony that Kosovo is determined to establish itself as a democratic homeland for both the Albanians and minority Serbs in the country.

“Kosovo is the best example of a place that after a bloody war … has come back to life like a phoenix,” he said.

Sejdiu’s relationship with ASU and the Phoenix Albanian-
American community is emblematic of the University’s dedication to establishing contact and lasting relationships with world leaders, said Alan Artibise, executive dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

“If anyone ever wonders what we’re doing at ASU, this is what we’re doing at ASU,” he said. “It speaks volumes to the University that we have a leader here establishing ties.”

ASU is home to the Melikian Center, a research center for Eastern European studies with projects in Kosovo and the most heavily funded Albanian language program of any American university.

Stephen Batalden, director of the Melikian Center, said that Sejdiu has come a long way in six years, when he “came to ASU wearing khakis and tennis shoes,” but still continues to maintain close ties with the University and Phoenix because of strength and enthusiasm of the Albanian community here.

“You see an outpouring of love and affection for the president tonight” from the Albanian community, he said.

Valmira Asllani, a biochemistry sophomore who moved to Arizona from Kosovo when she was 10, said the ceremony was an opportunity for the Albanian community to bond.

“I got a chance to meet a lot of other Albanian students who go to ASU that I wouldn’t have met otherwise,” she said.

Sejdiu’s final statement at the award ceremony was a message of solidarity to both his former university and current international ally: “God bless the Arizona State Sun Devils, and may God bless the United States.”

Reach the reporter at trabens@asu.edu.