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Press Release Archive
Release Number: 00086
25-Apr-03
For Immediate Release
Contact: Matt Boxler
Contact Phone: 401-341-2156
Contact E-mail: newsrelease@salve.edu
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PRINCE HANS-ADAM II OF LIECHTENSTEIN TO BE AWARDED HONORARY DEGREE
NEWPORT, R.I. His Serene Highness Hans-Adam II, reigning prince of Liechtenstein and a past recipient of the Path to Peace Award, will be awarded an honorary degree during Salve Regina Universitys 53rd commencement on Sunday, May 18. Prince Hans-Adam is Europes only absolute monarch.
The prince will be in Newport on commencement weekend to accept his honorary degree and to enjoy a visit with his familys longtime friends, former U.S. Sen. and Mrs. Claiborne Pell. The Pells relationship with the princes family stretches back to 1943, when they met Hans-Adams parents, Prince Franz Josef II and Princess Gina. Over the years, the children of both families have enjoyed visits lasting up to a year in length with the respective families, and Prince Hans-Adam served in Washington as an intern in Sen. Pells office.
During his reign as prince, Hans-Adam has worked diligently toward his long-time goal of having Liechtenstein admitted to the United Nations, and one year after his coronation in 1990, the tiny country became the 160th - and smallest - member of the U.N. The prince has since cited this event as his greatest achievement. In 2003 he achieved further success by gaining a resounding mandate from his subjects, when they voted in a constitutional referendum to increase his political control over their country.
Prince Hans-Adam II has made untiring efforts for the promotion of peace at all levels of society. With a world view grounded in respect for human rights and the dignity of the human person, the Prince has devoted much of his energy to the study and promotion of the peaceful self-determination of peoples.
In 1993, he introduced a new Agenda Item to the General Assembly of the United Nations, entitled Effective Realization of the Right to Self-Determination Through Autonomy. Three years later, following a visit to the U.N. by Pope John Paul II, Prince Hans-Adam presented a lecture at U.N. Headquarters revealing his personal efforts at assisting in the world-wide cause of the peace. What is to be done so that humanity breaks out of this violent circle of ideological and perhaps religious wars? The freedom of religion, the rule of law and democracy, have to become the foundations of human society if mankind wants to live in peace and prosperity, he said.
Prince Hans-Adams efforts on behalf of world peace have led, among other things, to the establishment of the Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination at Princeton Universitys Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, which was inaugurated in December 2000. In 2001, he was awarded the Path to Peace Award by the Path to Peace Foundation.
Born on Valentines Day, 1945, the eldest son of Prince Franz Josef II and Princess Gina, Hans-Adam completed primary school in the Liechtenstein capital of Vaduz, before attending secondary schools in Austria and in Switzerland. A training stint at a London bank followed, before he enrolled on a business and economics course at Switzerlands St Gallen College, from which he graduated in 1969.
A financial wizard, Hans-Adam was just 27 when he was entrusted by his father to run the familys vast fortune, which today is estimated to stand at $2 billion. And while Hans-Adam did not officially begin his reign until after his fathers death in 1989, the monarchys extensive executive powers were transferred into his hands in August 1984. The aging Franz Josef continued as head of state, but retained only a symbolic role.
He has retained Franz Josefs tradition of inviting the principalitys 32,000 subjects up to the castle for refreshments on Liechtenstein national day and is said to often jog barefoot in its surrounding woodland to relax. A one-time ski host to Prince Charles, Hans-Adam is also a keen deep-sea diver and a science fiction and archaeology buff.
Hans-Adam and his wife, Princess Marie of Liechtenstein, have four children: Prince Alois, Prince Maximillian, Prince Constantin and Princess Tatjana.
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