Speaker biographies

Leon Aron is a resident scholar and director of Russian studies at AEI. Mr. Aron was born in Moscow and came to the United States as a refugee from the Soviet Union in June 1978. He has taught at Georgetown University and has contributed numerous articles on Russian affairs to newspapers and magazines, including the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and The New Republic. Mr. Aron also writes Russian Outlook, AEI’s quarterly essay on economic, political, social, and cultural aspects of Russia’s post-Soviet transition. He is a frequent guest of television and radio talk shows and has been interviewed on 60 minutes, The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, and NPR’s All Things Considered and Talk of the Nation, among others. Mr. Aron is the author of the first full-length scholarly biography of Boris Yeltsin, Yeltsin: A Revolutionary Life (St. Martin’s Press, 2000), and Russia’s Revolution: Essays 1989–2006 (AEI Press, 2007). He is at work on a book about ideas and ideals that inspired and shaped the latest Russian revolution (1987–91), to be published by Yale University Press.

Tuncay Babali is a counselor at the Embassy of Turkey to the United States. Prior to assuming that position in April 2007, Mr. Babali served as a counselor at the Turkish embassy in London from 2006 to 2007, deputy chief of cabinet to President Ahmet Necdet Sezer from 2003 to 2006, vice-consul at the Turkish consulate in Houston from 1999 to 2003, and second secretary at the Turkish embassy in Sofia from 1998 to 1999. He has written extensively on energy related geopolitical issues and his latest book is Caspian Energy Diplomacy: Since the End of the Cold War (Turkish Foreign Policy Institute, 2006).

Giorgi Baramidze is the vice prime minister of Georgia. Since 1992, he has served as a member of the Parliament of Georgia, the minister of Internal Affairs, the minister of Defense, and state minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration. As a member of Parliament, he served as the chairman of the Investigation Commission of the parliamentary Anti-Corruption Committee, the chairman of the parliamentary portion of the Citizen’s Union of Georgia, the chairman of the Defense and Security Committee, and the chairman of the Faction of United Democrats. During military operations in Abkhazia, Mr. Baramidze coordinated humanitarian aid, the evacuation of refugees, and the liberation of hostages. Along with former president Eduard Shevardnadze, Mr. Baramidze was a founding member of the Citizen’s Union of Georgia. From 1998 to 1999 he was an associate researcher at the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown University, where he focused on U.S. government policy and political, military, and security issues in the Caucasus. During his time at Georgetown, he also worked in the Senate Committee on Armed Forces with Senator Carl Levin (D-Mich.).

Zeyno Baran is a senior fellow and the director of the Center for Eurasian Policy at the Hudson Institute, where she studies strategies to thwart the spread of radical Islamist ideology in Europe and in Asia and to promote democratic and energy reform processes the region. Previously, she directed the international security and energy programs at The Nixon Center and the Georgia forum and the Caucasus project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. For more than a decade, Ms. Baran has written extensively on Caspian oil and gas pipeline projects and has frequently traveled to the region. In recognition of her prominent contribution to the development of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline and the South Caucasus gas pipeline projects, she was awarded with the Order of Honor by then-President of Georgia Eduard Shevardnadze in May 2003. Ms. Baran has published numerous studies and articles on European energy security, testified before the U.S. Congress, and drafted reports for the European Parliament. In July, she was awarded the Lithuanian Millennium Star for promoting solidarity among the European states in the field of energy security. 

Stephen Biegun is as a corporate officer and vice president of international governmental affairs for Ford Motor Company and was a foreign policy adviser to Senator John McCain’s (R-Ariz.) presidential campaign. Mr. Biegun serves on the executive committee of the Washington International Business Council and the US-ASEAN Business Council and serves as chairman of the National Association of Manufacturers World Trade Organization Action Group. Prior to joining Ford, Mr. Biegun served as national security adviser to former Senator Bill Frist (R.-Tenn.) Mr. Biegun worked in the White House from 2001–2003 as executive secretary of the National Security Council (NSC), serving as a senior staff member to the National Security Advisor, Condoleezza Rice, and performing the function of chief operating officer for the NSC.  Mr. Biegun was a foreign policy adviser for fourteen years to members of both the House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate. During this time, he also held the position of chief of Staff of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations from 1999-2000 and, from 1994-1998, he was the committee’s senior professional staff member for European affairs. Mr. Biegun also served as a staff member of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs from 1994 to 2000. From 1992 to 1994, Mr. Biegun served as the resident director in the Russia for the International Republican Institute.

Daniel Fried was sworn in as assistant secretary of state for Europe and Eurasia at the U.S. Department of State on May 5, 2005. Previously, Ambassador Fried served as a special assistant to the president and senior director for European and Eurasian Affairs at the National Security Council (NSC) since 2001. He served as the principal deputy special adviser to the secretary of state for the New Independent States from May 2000 until January 2001. He was ambassador to Poland from November 1997 until May 2000. Ambassador Fried served on the staff of the NSC from 1993 until 1997, first as a director and then as special assistant to the president and senior director for Central and Eastern Europe. At the White House, he was active in designing U.S. policy on European-Atlantic security, including NATO enlargement and the Russia-NATO relationship. He served as a political counselor in the U.S. Embassy in Warsaw from 1990 to 1993. From 1987 to 1989, he served as the Polish desk officer at the State Department. He also served at the U.S. consulate general in Leningrad from 1980 to 1981; as a political officer at the U.S. Embassy in Belgrade from 1982 to 1985; and in the Office of Soviet Affairs at the State Department from 1985 to 1987. He began his career with the State Department in 1977 in the economic bureau.

Petr Gladkov is currently on leave from the presidential administration of the Russian Federation, having most recently served as special assistant in the General Department for Domestic Affairs. Perviously, he served as the deputy director of the Department for Mass Communications, Culture and Education in Russia from 2004 to 2005. From 2002 to 2004 he was the deputy director of the Department for Russian Diaspora in the General Department for Foreign Policy and from 2000 to 2002 he was an adviser to the deputy chairman of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of Russia. Mr. Gladkov was a visiting professor at the Moscow State Institute for International Relations and Middlebury College, director of the Gorbachev Foundation’s Global Security Project, head of the Presidential Advisory Council (1992–93), president of the Russian Science Foundation (1993–96), editor of  USA: Economics, Politics, Culture magazine (1996–97 and director general of Literaturnaya Gazeta (1997–98).

Thomas Graham joined Kissinger Associates, Inc., as a senior director in 2007. Previously, he was a special assistant to the president and the senior director for Russia on the National Security Council (NSC) staff from March 2004 until February 2007 and director for Russian affairs from June 2002 until February 2004. During his five years on the NSC staff, he was a key White House interlocutor with the Putin government. From t 2001 to 2002, he served as the associate director of the policy planning staff of the U.S. State Department. From 1998 to 2001, Mr. Graham was a senior associate in the Russia and Eurasia program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and was a frequent commentator on Russian affairs and U.S.-Russian relations. His articles have appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and in European and Russian publications. From 1984-1998, he was a foreign service officer; his assignments included two tours of duty at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, where he served as the head of the political unit and as the acting political counselor. He is the author of Russia’s Decline and Uncertain Recovery (Carnegie Endowment 2002) and the coauthor of U.S.-Russian Relations at the Turn of the Century (Carnegie Endowment, 2000).

Fiona Hill is a national intelligence officer for Russia and Eurasia at the National Intelligence Council and she is currently on leave as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Ms. Hill is a frequent commentator on Russian and Eurasian affairs, and has researched and published extensively on issues relating to Russia, the Caucasus, Central Asia, Eurasia conflicts, and energy and strategic issues. Prior to joining Brookings, Ms. Hill was director of strategic planning at the Eurasia Foundation in Washington, D.C. From 1991 to 1999, she held a number of positions directing technical assistance and research projects at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.

Marcin Kaczmarski is an analyst for the Russian department at the Centre for Eastern Studies in Warsaw and an assistant professor at the University of Warsaw’s Institute of International Relations. His research focuses on Russian foreign and security policy, in particular U.S.-Russian and EU-Russian relations. He is an author of two books on missile defense and Putin’s foreign policy. He has published numerous papers, including “The European Union and Russia 2004-2007,” “Kosovo Before the Final Decision: Regulating Kosovo’s International Status—Historical & Political Conditions and Prospects for Future Developments,” and “An Asian Alternative? Russia’s Chances of Making Asia an Alternative to Relations with the West.”

Petr Kolar is the ambassador to the United States from the Czech Republic. Previously, he served as ambassador to Ireland from 1999 to 2003 and ambassador to Sweden from 1996 to 1998. From 1998 to 1999 he was an adviser for European integration and the Balkans to President Vaclav Havel and from 2003 to 2005 he was the deputy minister of foreign affairs for bilateral relations. Ambassador Kolar has also worked as a foreign policy editor, commentator, and correspondent for a number of Czech newspapers and magazines, including Metropolitan, Telegraf, Lidová Demokracie, and Kosmopolitan 2000. In 1999 he was a lecturer on European integration and the Balkan conflicts at Charles University in Prague. In 1993 he was a guest researcher at the Norwegian Nobel Institute in Oslo and he participated in an international research project entitled “The Superpowers and International Systems.”

Andrei Kortunov is the president of the New Eurasia Foundation in Moscow. He also serves as the president of the Information Scholarship Education Center and is a member of the educational board of the Open Society Institute. Until recently, he served as deputy director and head of the foreign policy department at the Institute for the US and Canadian Studies at the Russian Academy of Sciences. Formerly the head of the Moscow Public Science Foundation and an adviser to the Committee of International Relations of the State Duma of the Russian Parliament, Mr. Kortunov works extensively with the global academic community. He was a syndicated columnist for RIA Novosti and has appeared on ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, CNN, the BBC, ITN, the CBC, and numerous Russian television programs. He has taught at the University of California, Berkeley, the University of Miami, and the Moscow State University of International Relations, among others.

Taras Kuzio currently teaches at the Institute of European, Russian and Eurasian Studies at Carleton University in Ottowa and is the president of Kuzio Associates. Previously, he was a visiting professor at the George Washington University, a senior research fellow at the Centre for Russian and East European Studies at the University of Birmingham, and the head of the NATO Information Office in Kiev. Mr. Kuzio coauthored the U.S. National Security Assessment on Ukraine and delivered testimony to the Senate Committee on International Relations and the Helsinki Commission. Mr. Kuzio is the editor of the bimonthly magazine Ukraine Analyst, which addresses contemporary politics, international affairs, business, and energy in Ukraine. He has written fourteen books, five think tank monographs, and he has guest edited six special issues of academic journals. His scholarly writing includes twenty-five book chapters and sixty political science articles on post-Communist, Ukrainian, and European politics.

Fyodor Lukyanov has been editor-in-chief of Russia in Global Affairs—Russia’s leading journal on global development issues—since its inception in 2002. Mr. Lukyanov is a member of the Russian Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, an independent organization providing foreign policy expertise. He is a frequent commentator for a number of media outlets, including the business daily Vedomosti, the Moscow Times, Segodnya, Moskovskie Novosti, Vremya MN, Vremya Novostei, the Echo of Moscow radio, and Gazeta.ru. He also frequently comments on Russian foreign policy for international media. Mr. Lukyanov has an extensive background in media and has worked as a correspondent and editor for the Voice of Russia radio station and Russia’s Channel 3 television station.

Stephen Sestanovich is the George F. Kennan Senior Fellow for Russian and Eurasian studies at the Council on Foreign Relations and the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Professor of International Diplomacy at Columbia University. From 1997 to 2001, Ambassador Sestanovich served as ambassador-at-large and special adviser to the secretary of state for the former Soviet Union. Previously, he was vice president for Russian and Eurasian affairs at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and director of Soviet and East European studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Between 1981 and 1987 he was a member of the State Department’s policy planning staff and the National Security Council staff. In 2005, he was the director of the Council on Foreign Relations’ task force on U.S. policy toward Russia chaired by former Senator John Edwards and former Representative Jack Kemp.

Vladimir Socor is a senior fellow of the Jamestown Foundation. He writes a daily analytical article for the Eurasia Daily Monitor. An internationally recognized expert on the former Soviet-ruled countries, he covers Russian and Western policies in Eurasia, focusing on regional security issues, secessionist conflicts, energy policies, and NATO-related developments. Mr. Socor is a frequent speaker at U.S. and European policy conferences and think tank institutions and he is a guest lecturer at the NATO Defense College and at Harvard University’s Black Sea security program. Previously, he was an analyst with the Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Research Institute.

Andrei Zolotov is the founding editor of Russia Profile, an adviser to the chief editor of RIA Novosti, and until June 2009 is a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University. A native of Moscow, he began his career in journalism as a translator and fixer at the Moscow bureau of the Christian Science Monitor. He went on to serve as Moscow correspondent for the Geneva-based news and features agency Ecumenical News International (ENI). In 1997, Mr. Zolotov joined The Moscow Times, where he covered politics, media, and religion as a senior staff writer. Also in 1997, he was named the John Templeton European Religion Journalist of the year. Two years later, he was awarded a Carnegie Media Fellowship at Duke University. His coverage of the takeover of NTV and TV-6 television companies, as well as other aspects of Russia’s media policies earned him a reputation as an expert on media issues. Mr. Zolotov is also recognized as an expert in Russia’s religious affairs and global developments related to Orthodox Christianity. In 2003, he left The Moscow Times and ENI to develop Russia Profile, which he has served as editor since its inception.

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