Interview with Corine Wegener about the 1954 Hague convention and the US Committee of the Blue Shield working for Ukraine since the full-scale invasion on Feb. 24, 2022

About Corine Wegener

Corine Wegener is the Director of the Smithsonian Cultural Rescue Initiative (SCRI), an outreach program for the preservation of cultural heritage in crisis situations. SCRI’s work has included projects in Haiti, Mali, Nepal, Iraq, Syria, and most recently Ukraine. Wegener has over 20 years of experience as an art historian, curator, and emergency responder for cultural heritage in crisis. As a U.S. Army Civil Affairs officer, she served on multiple deployments, including NATO peacekeeping operations in Bosnia (1997-1998) and as Arts, Monuments, and Archives Officer for the 352nd Civil Affairs Command in Iraq (2003-2004). As founding past president of the U.S. Committee of the Blue Shield, Wegener helped lead the successful campaign for U.S. ratification of the 1954 Hague Convention. As part of an MOU between the Smithsonian and the U.S. Army Civil Affairs and Psychological Operations Command, she co-leads the Army Monuments Officer Training (AMOT) training program. She is a principal investigator for the Conflict Observatory, a U.S. Department of State effort to document war damage to cultural heritage in Ukraine. Wegener has a BGS in Political Science from the University of Nebraska Omaha and MA degrees in Political Science and Art History from the University of Kansas.