Ambassador Fernandez served as a U.S. Foreign Service Officer from 1983 to 2015, and as the State Department's Coordinator for the Center for Strategic Counterterrorism Communications from March 2012 to February 2015. From 2009-2012, he served as U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Equatorial Guinea; prior to that, he was U.S. Charge d'Affaires to the Republic of Sudan (June 2007-May 2009), Director for Near East Public Diplomacy (2005-2007), Director for Iraq Public Diplomacy (2004-2005) and in senior public diplomacy positions at the U.S. Embassies in Afghanistan, Jordan, Syria, and Guatemala.

A career member of the Senior Foreign Service with the rank of Minister-Counselor, he was a recipient of a 2008 Presidential Meritorious Service Award, the 2006 Edward R. Murrow Award for Excellence in Public Diplomacy, and a 2003 Superior Honor Award for his work in Afghanistan, among other awards. His performance garnered Senior Foreign Service performance recognition in 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005, and 2002. Mr. Fernandez has also served as a Foreign Service officer in Iraq, Kuwait, Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, and the United Arab Emirates, and as USIA desk officer for Egypt, Yemen, and Sudan.

He is a graduate of the 46th (2003-2004) Senior Seminar, the State Department's premier senior management course. A graduate of the University of Arizona and the Defense Language Institute, he served in the U.S. Army (1976-1979), having come to the United States as a refugee from Cuba in 1959. He has published in Brookings: Markaz, ReVista: the Harvard Review of Latin America, Middle East Quarterly, and Journal of the Assyrian Academic Society (JAAS), and has lectured and debated on U.S. foreign policynnumerous public venues. Mr. Fernandez speaks fluent Spanish and Arabic.

First conference of the series of public lectures on International Relations and Communication.