296-967

Contact: Hwa-Wei Lee, 614/593-2705, or Salinda Arthur, 614/593-9379

ATHENS, Ohio -- Pedro Miguel Lamport (LAM port), Guatemala's ambassador to the United States, will visit Alden Library on Ohio University's Athens campus Thursday (May 22) to consider designating the library as an official depository for Guatemalan publications.

Among events surrounding Lamport's one-day visit is a free, public colloquium titled "Current Status of the Peace Agreement in Guatemala" from 3 p.m. to 4:15 p.m. Thursday in the Friends of the Library Room, 319 Alden Library. Thirty-five years of internal conflict in Guatemala ended with the Dec. 29, 1996 Agreement on a Firm and Lasting Peace. The agreement brings into effect all previous agreements encompassing military, political, social, economic and environmental issues and binds them into a comprehensive nationwide agenda for peace.

Lamport, who has been ambassador since March 1996, was first coordinator of the Special Commission for Peace in Guatemala from 1994 to 1996. In that capacity, he was a liaison between the private sector and the parties involved in the peace process negotiations.

The primary purpose of Lamport's visit is to meet with Ohio University Dean of Libraries Hwa-Wei Lee to discuss consideration of Alden Library's designation as an official depository for Guatemalan publications.

Alden Library currently is the only known university library in the United States and Canada serving as an official depository for publications of Malaysia, Botswana and Swaziland by designation of their respective governments. Lamport will review the collection of Malaysian publications during his visit.

Lamport also will tour the library and the Athens campus. He will be accompanied on his visit by Guatemalan Minister Counselor Alfonso Quinones.