WASHINGTON, DC – Accomplished lawyer and human rights activist Kate Nahapetian joined the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) Washington, DC staff this week as Government Affairs Director of the grassroots advocacy organization’s national headquarters.

“Kate is a powerful addition to the ANCA professional staff. We are tremendously pleased that she will be bringing her considerable legal skills, boundless energy, determination and creativity to the vital work of advancing the Armenian American community’s government affairs priorities,” said ANCA Chairman Ken Hachikian. “Along with our board, chapters, activists and supporters across the United States, I want to warmly welcome Kate to the ANCA’s Washington, DC team, and to say how much all of us look forward to working with her in the months and years to come.”

Kate Nahapetian graduated magna cum laude with a degree in International Studies from American University and received a J.D. with a focus on international and human rights law from the University of California at Berkeley School of Law.

She has worked on asylum and migration issues at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the German Council on Foreign Policy in Berlin. She was also a legislative correspondent for Senator Joseph Biden and received a Konrad Adenauer Foundation Fellowship to pursue graduate studies in Germany. At Mental Disability Rights International, she was instrumental in starting a project in Armenia to help develop community-based care for people with mental disabilities. In addition, Kate documented cases of torture in Chile for the prosecution against General Augusto Pinochet and has published two articles on international law. Upon graduating from law school, Kate litigated complex class actions at Milberg Weiss Bershad Hynes and Lerach before working as a Policy Analyst with the Community Relations Service of the U.S. Department of Justice, which mediates ethnic and racial conflicts in the United States.

An active participant and leader in Armenian American community life, growing up, Kate spent summers at AYF Camp Haiastan. During her undergraduate years, she was a member of the Armenian Youth Federation Washington Ani Chapter and participated in the Armenian Relief Society’s Summer Studies program. In 1991, she helped develop the ANCA Congressional election strategy as part of the ANCA Leo Sarkisian Internship program. She continued her activism with the ANC, through participation in the San Francisco, San Diego and Washington, DC chapters.

“I am very excited about coming on board and becoming part of our efforts to represent the Armenian American voice in the nation’s capital,” stated Kate Nahapetian. “There are great challenges ahead and I look forward to working with our grassroots network of dedicated activists to continue moving our shared priorities forward.”

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