(Posted September 2, 2003)

HUNTINGDON, Pa. -- James Skelly, senior fellow at the Baker Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, will lecture on ?The Death of David Kelly: Blair Bush and Accountability for the War in Iraq? as part of the Bookend Lecture Series at 4:30 p.m., Wednesday, Sept. 10 in Neff Lecture Hall in the von Liebig Center for Science.

The talk is free and open to the public.

Skelly will explore the implications of the recent suicide of scientist David Kelly, Britain?s leading expert on Iraq and its weapons capabilities. Kelly was found dead near his home shortly after testifying before Parliament?s foreign affairs select committee.

Skelly will discuss the Hutton Inquiry, which is a special investigation assigned to look into Kelly?s death, and how its daily reports are at odds with the information provided by the British government.

Skelly earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Minnesota in 1967 and went on to earn a master's degree in 1981 and a doctorate in 1984, both from the University of California, San Diego.

He has been immersed in a research project gauging European response to the new administration of President George W. Bush.


In 1984, Skelly was named associate director of the University of California's Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation. From 1989 to 1990, Skelly was associate director for international programs at New York University's Center for War, Peace and the News Media. He went on to become a visiting scholar at the Institute of International Studies at the University of California, Berkeley from 1991-1992 under the support of the MacArthur Foundation.

An Irish citizen, Skelly has worked as a faculty member and administrator with several European institutions, including the Irish Peace Institute at the University of Limerick, the European University Center for Peace Studies in Austria, the International People's College in Denmark, and the Universitat Jaume I in Spain. In addition he has lectured in the United States, Europe, Russia, China and Japan.

He is a founder of the Peace Studies Association.

Contact April Feagley at feaglea@juniata.edu or (814) 641-3131 for more information.