PUBLISHED:August 06, 2011

International Alumni Updates for 2011

Marriages


Marc Fitoussi (LLM '96) was married in 2011 in Israel. Marc’s classmates Pierre Tourres (LLM '06) and Michael Mueller (LLM '06) were also in attendance. Mahmoud Kittana (LLM ’08) was married on June 25, 2010.
Wells Bennet (JD/LLM ’06) married Debra Coletti in April in Washington, DC. Edward Mallett (LLM '03) married Daisy Joye (Exchange Student 2002-2003); the couple first met at Duke and continued dating after graduation. Sylvester McRae (JD '06) married Erika Villarreal-Zorita (LL.M. '06) on the 15th of January 2011 in Panama City, Panama. Yuji Moriguchi (LLM '10) married his fiancé Riko in September of 2010.

Births


Andres Grunewaldt (LLM '11) is a proud father of a Dominga Grunewaldt, who was born at the Duke hospital in Durham, NC. Sebastian Guerrero (LLM '99) welcomed the birth of his son Lucas, born only two days after a massive earthquake in Chile. Yuri Shima (LLM ’04) had a daughter Yuka. Pei-kan Yang (JD ’06) and his wife Shih-Ming Lo (JD '06) welcomed their third child, a baby girl. Matías Larraín (LLM '08) is a proud father of two twin girls named Laura and Emilia. Yoav Oestreicher (LLM '01) welcomed a daughter Inbar, which means amber in English. Ramon Lafee (LLM '01) had a boy, Diego Ignacio. Takeshi Yamamura (LLM '07) welcomed a girl, Yui. Florian Willi (LLM '04) and his wife Aline announced the birth of their daughter, Ariane Monique in Lucerne, Switzerland. Isabella Hoedl (LLM ’03) gave birth to her daughter Katrina. Luciana de Ocariz (LLM '04) and Thomas Franca (LLM ’04) welcomed their second child, Bernardo, who joins their 2-year-old girl Joana. Hans Kayaert (LLM '08) welcomed the birth of his daughter Frances. Rodrigo Karadima (LLM '03) announces the birth of his son Santiago. Peter Naismith (LLM '05) announces the birth of his daughter, Vivienna Margaret Naismith. Giovanni Graziano (JD '07) became a proud father of a Maria Elisa, who was born at the Cayuga Medical Center in Ithaca, NY. Yuri Matsui Shima (LLM '04) has given birth to a baby girl and is safe in Tokyo with her family. Sebastian Kielmanovich (LLM ’04) announces the birth of his second daughter, Emilia Anna Kielmanovich. Zohar Liss (LLM ’03) is a proud father of a girl. Ricardo Reveco (LLM '06) announces the birth of a new baby, Mercedes. Avaskhan Asanaliyev (LLM ’08) is a proud father of a new baby boy, Akbar. Patrick Voigt (LLM '00) had a baby boy, who true to his international parents, holds no less than three nationalities, being born to a German father, a British mother and on the U.S. soil. Hiroshi Nemoto (LLM '07) and Ai Nemoto (LLM '07) had their first baby. Ying “Wendy” Wang (LLM '06) gave birth to a daughter Miranda. Pedro Pablo Gutierrez Barros (LLM '10) and his wife Sol welcomed a new baby boy whom they named Juan Jose. Gitanjali Workman (LLM '02) gave birth to her daughter, Kavya Jean Workman, in New York. Marco André Alencar (LLM ’04) welcomed the birth of his daughter Catarina.

2010


Aagje De Graeve joined Eversheds’s Brussels office as a commercial and litigation lawyer.
Arthur-Jean Bertin joined Loyens & Loeff at their Luxembourg desk as a mergers and acquisitions associate while simultaneously working on his Ph.D. at the Sorbonne in corporate restructuring.
Ma Mingfei has begun teaching at Dalian Maritime University Law School in Dalian, Liaoning Province, China.
Stuart Duguid has joined Lagardere Unlimited, a sports management company in Washington, DC.
Sinem Sahin has accepted a position with Gide Loyrette Nouel, an international law firm in Istanbul, Turkey.
Vanessa Jacob joined the New York office of Allen & Overy, an international law firm headquartered in London, UK.
Christian Zwick is joining the Austrian law firm Binder Grösswang where he will focus on M&A, corporate and tax work.
Kazuhide Ohya moved to Singapore law firm of Kelvin Chia where he is working as a trainee.
Nir Friedman has recently jointed Cassouto-Noeff & Co., a litigation-focused law firm in Tel-Aviv.

2009


Francisco Prat has recently been hired as a senior attorney at LAN Arilines (Chile), a leading company in the airline industry in Latin America.
Daniel Ribeiro was recently appointed by the Prosecutor General to head prosecution of environmental cases. He has also accepted a teaching position at FGB, one of the most prestigious law schools in Brazil, where he will be supervising an environmental law clinic.
Marie-Amelie Simon is continuing her training at the Paris office of Clifford Chance.
Suebsiri Taweepon has joined Faculty of Law at Chulalongkorn University where he teaches IP law while continuing to work at Tilleke & Gibbins International Ltd. Last year he was recognized as a Leading IP lawyer in Asia for the second time.
Conrad Van Loggerenberg joined the corporate department at Paul, Weiss in New York City, New York.

2008


Carlos Kaplan returned to Sillicon Valley to join KPMG’s International Tax practice.
Avaskhan Asanaliyev is working with Nazarbayev University in Azerbaijan to create a future MBA program in conjunction with Duke Fuqua School of Business. He is also a proud father of a new baby boy, Akbar, born December 30, 2010.
Yusuke Abe continues to work at Clifford Chance’s Tokyo office as a finance attorney.
Halim Jbeily is currently writing a book on doing business in Iraq with a focus on oil and gas project finance.
Jean-Marc Poisson returned to Paris from Hong Kong at the end of 2010 and is practicing with an international law firm headquartered in Paris.

2007


Christian Burghart has recently joined the office of H. Roske & Associates LLP in New York.
Natchapon Padungkittimal has joined the Bangok office of Clifford Chance.
Felipe Benavides was named the “Associate to Watch” by Chambers and Partners for his work at Chilean law firm Cariola Diez Perez Cotapos & Cia.
Raul Sergio Salinas Tijerina continues working a in the Corporate Legal Department of Cemex S.A.B. de C.V., a cement company. He handles financial, banking, restructuring, and capital market transactions as well as various contracts for the company.
Daisuke Watanabe began work as an in-house counsel for Fast Retailing Co., Ltd.

2006


Javier Robalino-Orellana has published Global Administrative Law: Towards a Lex Administrativa (Cameron-May, with Jaime Rodriguez-Arana Munoz). Javier is a professor of administrative and international law at San Francisco University of Quito, Ecuador and visiting professor at Carlos III University, Madrid, Spain. He is a partner at Pérez Bustamante & Ponce Abogados and is involved in the fields of oil and energy, international investment and commercial arbitration. He also is a foreign associate of King & Spalding.
Philippe Laconte joined the Jones Day’s Washington, DC office in April and is studying to take the New York Bar Exam in July.
Philippe Chenu joined the corporate department of New York office of Loyens & Loeff as a senior associate;
Luciano Cruz Morandé has been appointed partner at Arteaga Gorziglia & Cía in Santiago, Chile. Luciano specializes in commercial and financial transactions, primarily in such areas as infrastructure and energy, capital markets and antitrust.
Philippe Laconte has recently accepted a secondment to Jones Day’s Washington, DC office where he will be practicing as part of the antitrust group.
Marion Hartmann is working as an attorney for Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer in Hamburg, Germany while simultaneously finishing her PhD.
Shinjiro Takeda works as a negotiator of the UN Climate Chance at METI, Tokyo and is a proud father of two daughters and a son.
Dadimos Haile is currently working at Avocats Sans Frontières, an international NGO, as the head of their international justice program.
Jason Hollis married Kate Ruddock in November 2010 and recently qualified as a solicitor in England. He is currently taking a year off to ski in Colorado and cycle from Ireland to Indonesia.
Jose Rodriguez has concluded a master of sciences in public policy and administration at the London School of Economics.
Amy Yeung practices entertainment law as Assistant general Counsel at ZeniMax Media Inc, a video game publisher and developer.

2005


Bastiaan Ryckaert became Legal Director for Goodyear in Central Southeastern Europe (CSEE) on September 1, 2010, joining the CSEE Executive Committee. Bastiaan has permanently moved to Slovenia with his wife Elisabeth and their son Adrian.
Zachary Klughaupt has recently joined Schwartz LLC, a boutique New York law firm, as counsel.
Gayathri Gunasekaran has recently transferred to the New York office of Gubson Dunn & Crutcher from the Singapore office.
Thomas E. Felsberg has recently moved to Sao Paulo, Brazil to take the lead on several large-scale capital market projects. He remains the managing partner of the New York office of Felsberg & Associates, to which he commutes on a regular basis.
Ahu Yalgin is now at the London office of White & Case.

2004


Urmas Peiker returned to Estonia to join AS GA Fund Management, a private investment company. He remains very active in sports and for the past three summers participated in L’Etape du Tour in France (one stage of Tour de France for amateurs); he also ran his first ultra marathon - 100km (62.5 miles) cross country in October.
Garrett Weiner joined the Chapman Consulting Group, a Singapore based human resources and consulting company. He is continuing to teach and expand his executive life coaching practice.
Olga Shmakova has joined Integra, an integrated project management and technology services company where she was recently promoted to Vice President for Corporate Governance and Strategic Transactions.
Miki Shapira was recently elected to chair the M&A section of the young attorneys’ forum of the Israeli Bar Association.

2003


Yu Fan joined CITIC Securities International, a China-based investment company, as an in-house counsel.
Arfidea Saraswati started her own law firm Arkset in Jakarta, Indonesia which has grown to 14 attorneys.
Tarja Krehic has recently started a new law firm, Krehic & Lacmanovic Law Office, advising on foreign investments, capital markets, international trade law and corporate matters in Croatia. Tarja started her new venture after seven years of working at Wolf Theiss, the largest law firm in Austria. After graduating from Austral University with the degree of Magister of Corporate Law,
Guillermo Plate is working at Equity Trust, a Fiduciary Services Company based in Buenos Aires. As part of the Latin American and the Caribbean team, Guillermo is responsible for marketing and business development throughout the region, as well as advising high-net-worth individuals and corporate clients on a variety of wealth planning and tax solutions.

2002


Anne Marie Verschuur was appointed counsel to the IP department of NautaDutilh N.V., a law firm in the Netherlands.
Maria Cecilia Villegas Otero is currently completing a Master’s Degree in International Public Policy (MIPP) at Johns Hopkins University.

2001


Fernando Fresco moved to Kuwait and is currently working at Kuwait Foreign Petroleum.
Desiree Sumilang has been promoted to counsel in Allen and Overy’s International Capital Markets Department in Hong Kong. She also is a member of the firm's U.S. Law Group. Desiree represents corporate and sovereign issuers and investment banks in a variety of corporate finance transactions, including SEC-registered offerings, Rule 144A and Regulation S transactions, tender and exchange offers and privatizations.
Heinrich Baelz is working in-house at Bosch und Siemens Hausgeräte GmbH in Munich, Germany. He is responsible for China, African and the Middle East.

2000


George Hacket joined Clifford Chance’s Frankfurt office as a partner in April of 2010.
Sang-Soo Jun assumed a new position as Counsel for Economic Legislation, National Assembly’s Legislative Counseling Office in Seoul, South Korea. In his new position, Sangsoo provides counsel and bill-drafting service for the Members of the National Assembly of Korea.
Patrick Voigt has recently returned from Vienna to accept the appointment to the United Nations Secretariat in New York.

1999


Veronica Zarate moved back to Milana to join Mitrani, Cabellero, Rosso Alba, Francia, Ojam & Ruiz Moreno, an international law firm, focusing on M&A and corporate matters in Asia. She is also a proud mother of two boys, Marco & Allesandro, born September 8, 2009.
Kathleen Gutman (JD) recently finished her Ph.D. in Law from the the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven in Belgium, under the mentorship of Professor Dr. Koen Lenaerts. She is staying at the Institute for European Law of the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven for an additional year to pursue a post-doctoral research project.
Carsten Herresthal has recently accepted life tenure at the University of Regensburg. Professor Herresthal teaches private Law, corporate law and Law of the European Union.
Iurie Lungu is pursuing a J.D. degree at the University of Montreal and is a proud father of his first child.

1998


Verónica Ramírez Briones continues to work as a General Counsel at DAK Americas L.L.C. where she has been overseeing the legal aspects of new business acquisitions in Mexico and Argentina.
Marianne Faessel-Kahn was recently appointed as head of the international affairs at the French Competition Authority, which is based in Paris.

1996


Pakvipa Ahviphan has recently completed her four-year tenure at the Royal Thai Embassy in Kathmandu, Nepal and is currently working at the Department of Treaties and Legal Affairs at the Thailand Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Marc Fitoussi works as an art dealer and collector in Paris. He had the privilege on October 20th to present at the Drouot Auctions House (France's most prestigious and historical Auctions Houses) a full conference-presentation on the Japanese painter, Akira Tanaka.
Adriana De Florio works as an in-house counsel for a developer company in Argentina which belongs to the Libra Grup, an international group of companies with diversified activities in different parts of the world.

1995


Askar Moukhitdinov and his firm Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle LLP, were named as one of the foremost law firms operating in Europe, the Middle East and Africa in Legal 500’s latest EMEA Guide. Askar practices law in Kazakhstan.
Peter Hespel was named partner at the New York office of Pepper Hamilton, LLP, an international law firm. Peter represents corporate borrowers, financial sponsors, portfolio companies, arrangers, agent banks, financial institutions and alternative capital sources. After serving as Vice Minister of Financial Affairs, Economics, and Fiscal Policy in the government of Japan,
Kotaro Tamura has recently left government service to join Yale University as a Senior Fellow at Macmillan Center for International Studies.
Marc Eumann, a judge at the District Court (Landgericht) in Bonn, Germany since 1998, has been promoted to presiding judge (Vorsitzender Richter) at the District Court in Bonn, Germany. He received his commission of appointment from the president of the court, Countess von Schwerin, on January 31, 2011. He is now assigned to preside over the 5th Criminal Chamber, hearing Criminal Appeals Cases from the trial courts.

1994


Junko Funahashi is continuing to work at the World Bank, Legal Vice Presidency office where she focuses on carbon finance emission trading.

1992


Albert Bloomsbury has assumed co-chairmanship of the newly created Committee on International Contract and Commercial Law of the New York State Bar Association (NYSBA) International Section and has recently co-authored an article entitled The Lisbon Treaty’s Impact on U.S.-EU Trade, Investment and Finance.
Tomohiko Kimura is the Head of Legal Japan for Deutsche Bank.
Shaolong Zhu has recently transferred to Beijing office to serve as one of the legal heads of Shell China.

1991


Helle Weeke has been promoted to the Associate General Counsel at Development Alternatives, Inc.

1990


Malene Ehlers Lydholm continues to work in Entertainment and Media Law as the Head of Legal Affairs at Nordisk Film.
Stéphan Alamowitch has joined Olswang, a London-based law firm well known for its media and telecom practices, as a managing partner of their Paris office.

1987


Xuan Yan joined Nielsen as its Greater China President on June 1, 2011. In this new role, he will be responsible for the company’s businesses in mainland China, Hong Kong and Taiwan and lead an organization of roughly 2,000 employees in five offices. The global leader in consumer market information and media measurements, Nielsen is listed in NYSE, headquartered in New York City, and supports its clients in over 100 countries with 38,000 associates.

1986


Filip Klavins has been named a Band 1 leading lawyer in corporate/commercial law by Chambers Global in March, one of four Latvian lawyers to be so honored. He is a principal of Klavins & Slaidins in Riga.

1985


Manuel Sager became Switzerland’s ambassador to the United States in December. He received the appointment after heading the Political Affairs Division of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA), responsible for coordinating thematic foreign policy from 2008 to 2010. During his long diplomatic career he also has served as executive director at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in London (2005-2008); head of communications in the FDFA and the Federal Department of Economic Affairs (2002-2005); and head of the Coordination Office for Humanitarian Law for the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council and the Partnership for Peace (EAPC/PfP) of the Directorate of International Law (2001 to 2002). Sager practiced law in Phoenix, Arizona prior to joining the Foreign Service in 1988.

1983


Brice Jest recently met Arthur Bertin (’10) at their Paris tailor; Arthur was wearing a Duke Law t-shirt.