Douglas Frantz

Douglas Frantz
Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs
In office September 3, 2013 – October 1, 2015
President	Barack Obama
Deputy	Valerie Fowler[1]
Preceded by	Michael Hammer
Succeeded by	John Kirby
Personal details
Born	1949 (age 66–67)
Alma mater	DePauw University Columbia University

Douglas Frantz is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning former investigative journalist and author, currently serving as the Deputy Secretary-General of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development since November 2015.^[2]

He was forced to resign as Los Angeles Times Managing Editor due to his denial of the Armenian Genocide.^[3][4][5]

Career

Frantz graduated from DePauw University in 1971. He was an investigative reporter for the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune, and the New York Times.^[6]

Frantz served as the Istanbul bureau chief for the New York Times, and the managing editor of The Los Angeles Times from 2005 to 2007. He developed close links to the Turkish government when serving as the Istanbul Bureau chief for the New York Times. Frantz was chief investigator for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.^[7] He is also the former Managing Director of Kroll’s Business Intelligence Washington office.^[8]

From 2013 to 2015, Frantz served as the State Department's Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs.^[9]

Armenian Genocide denial

As the Los Angeles Times Managing Editor, Frantz blocked a story on the Armenian Genocide in April 2007 written by Mark Arax, allegedly citing the fact Arax was of Armenian descent and therefore had a biased opinion on the subject.^[5] Arax, who has published similar articles before,^[3] has lodged a discrimination complaint and threatened a federal lawsuit. Frantz, who did not cite any specific factual errors in the article, was accused of having a bias obtained while being stationed in Istanbul, Turkey.^[5] Harut Sassounian, an Armenian community leader, accused Frantz of having expressed support for denial of the Armenian Genocide and has stated he personally believed that Armenians rebelled against the Ottoman Empire, an claim commonly used to justify the killings.^[3] Arax demanded a public apology from Frantz, which he declined to comment on.^[5] Frantz resigned from the paper not long afterward on July 6, possibly due to the mounting requests for his dismissal. He returned to Istanbul after leaving.^[4][10]

See also

• Anti-Armenian sentiment in the United States

Awards

• 1993; 1998 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting finalist^[11]
• 1993 Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting

Works

• Douglas Frantz, Catherine Collins (2000). Celebration, U.S.A.: living in Disney's brave new town. Macmillan. ISBN 978-0-8050-5561-0.
• Douglas Frantz, Catherine Collins (2003). Death on the Black Sea. Ecco. ISBN 978-0-06-621262-3.
• Douglas Frantz, Catherine Collins (2007). The Nuclear Jihadist. Grand Central Publishing. ISBN 978-0-446-50560-4.
• Douglas Frantz, Catherine Collins (2011). Fallout: The True Story of the CIA's Secret War on Nuclear Trafficking. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-1-4391-8306-9.

References

1. "Valerie Crites Fowler". U.S. Department of State. January 28, 2014. Retrieved November 27, 2015.
2. "OECD appoints new Deputy Secretary-General". Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. October 1, 2015. Retrieved November 2015.
3. LA Observed: Armenian genocide dispute erupts at LAT
4. Managing editor to leave The Times
5. The Armenian Genocide Debate Pits Moral Values Against Realpolitik
6. Frantz, Douglas; Collins, Catherine. "Douglas Frantz". The New York Times.
7. "Douglas Frantz, former Times managing editor, to be chief investigator for Senate panel". Los Angeles Times. January 8, 2009.
8. Pulitzer Prize Winner Douglas Frantz Joins Risk Consulting Firm Kroll
9. "U.S. Welcomes Appointment of Douglas Frantz as Deputy Secretary-General of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)". U.S. Department of State. October 1, 2015. Retrieved November 2015.
10. Genocide Controversy Leads L.A. Times Managing Editor To Resign
11. "The Pulitzer Prizes - Search: frantz". pulitzer.org.

External links

• http://www.npr.org/books/authors/137924273/douglas-frantz
• http://www.depauw.edu/news/index.asp?id=26343