Whitley Bruner, BKI Chairman, provides key expertise to new feature film The Green Zone - March 2010
The Green Zone, starring Matt Damon - Also starring Jason Isaacs, Brendan Gleeson, and Greg Kinnear, directed by Paul Greengrass, released mid-March 2010. BKI Chairman Whitley Bruner was a key consultant to the film, from assistance with developing the screenplay to providing the film's writers with direct access to key officers stationed in Iraq during the time period covered by the film. Bruner also provided accesss to senior Iraqi WMD officials now living in exile. Bruner's Iraq expertise extends back to 1979 when he was CIA Chief of Station in Baghdad. In 1990-91, Bruner headed a special unit formed to organize Iraqi opposition groups and leaders to replace the government of Saddam Hussein, when Iraqi occupation forces were expelled from Kuwait.
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Viewpoints (A Publication of The Middle East Institute) - June 2009
Non-Oil Industries in the Persian Gulf - The six Arab monrchies of the Gulf are wealthy societies which have made remarkable social and economic progress over the last three decades. One only has to look at the pictures of AbuDhabi, Dubai, and other Gulf communities from the early 1970s to see...
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Charles Kestenbaum, BKI President, named Honorary Investment Counselor for Pakistan in the United States of America - May 14, 2009
Government of Pakistan, Ministry of Investment (Board of Investment) - Let me congratulate you that you have been appointed as Honorary Investment Counsellor for Pakistan in United States of America. As an essential part of your appointment/assignment...
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Tradewind (A Publication of the National U.S.-Arab Chamber of Commerce) - June 2007
Going Green in the United Arab Emirates - One of the world's smallest, newest and richest natioins is positioning itself to play an unusually large role in the development of renewable energy technology...
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Intelligence Online - July 20 2007
BK International in Middle East. Combining their experience of the region, former CIA officer Whitley Bruner and an ex Commerce Department aide, Charles Kestenbaum, have just set up BK International, a business intelligence concern specializing in the Middle East and based in Washington and Dubai. Bruner spent nearly 30 years with the CIA's Directorate of Operations, serving successively as station chief in Baghdad during the Iran-Iraq war and then in Algiers and Tunis as well as the West Bank. Bruner later went on to advise opponents of Saddam Hussein and became one of the sharpest critics of Ahmed Chalabi at the agency.
As for Kestenbaum, he worked initially as a correspondent in Beirut and Cairo for NBC News before joining the Commerce Department in the early 1980s and being named trade counsellor in Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Indonesia. After the first Gulf War, Kestenbaum supervised the Rebuild Kuwait program on behalf of the Commerce Department.
After they left government service, Kestenbaum and Bruner took up work in the private sector, both serving on the staff of C&O Resources headed by Sandra Charles, who had been in charge of Middle East affairs on the National Security Council between 1988-92. Early in the current decade, the two were recruited by the co-founder of Diligence, Mike Baker, also an alumni of the CIA. Bruner worked for Diligence Middle East, the firm's subsidiary in Iraq, while Kestenbaum took charge of building up Diligence's businesss in the Middle East. Before striking out to form BK International, the two worked last year for the Lincoln Group which handles the US Army's communications in Iraq.
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International Middle Market Deal Making - "Overseas Buyers Investing in the US"ACG 5th Annual Tri-State Conference, March 25th 2008, New York City BKI President Charles Kestenbaum featured Panel member.
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ACG 5th Annual Tri-State Conference |
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