Donald N. Jensen (@donaldnjensen @USIP) is a senior advisor for Russia and Europe at the U.S. Institute of Peace. He joined USIP after four years with the Center for European Policy Analysis, where he was a senior fellow and editor in chief. Dr. Jensen writes extensively on Russian domestic politics and Russian foreign and security policies. He also specializes in the domestic and foreign policies of other post-Soviet states, especially Ukraine, Georgia, the Baltic republics and information warfare. He is also an adjunct professor at the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences at Johns Hopkins University. A former U.S. diplomat, Jensen provided staff support for the START, INF and SDI treaty negotiations and was a member of the first ten-man U.S. inspection team to inspect Soviet missile bases under the INF Treaty in 1988. While posted at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow in 1991, he witnessed firsthand the end of the USSR.
Kurt Volker (@kvolker @CEPA) is a leading expert in U.S. foreign and national security policy with over 35 years of experience in a variety of government, academic, and private sector capacities. He served as U.S. Special Representative for Ukraine Negotiations from 2017 to 2019, and as U.S. Ambassador to NATO from 2008-2009. Ambassador Volker is the Founder and President of Alliance Strategic Advisors, LLC, which provides strategic advice and services to a diverse range of business clients with interests in Central and Eastern Europe. He is concurrently a Distinguished Fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis, a Founding Partner of the American University of Kyiv, and a Senior International Advisor to BGR Group. From 2012-2019, Amb. Volker was the founding Executive Director of The McCain Institute for International Leadership, a part of Arizona State University based in Washington, DC. He previously served as an Independent Director of CG Funds Trust and the Wall Street Fund.
Nataliya Bugayova is a non-resident Russia Fellow at the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), where she had previously led ISW's Russia and Ukraine research team. Her work focuses on the open-source intelligence analysis of the Kremlin’s decision-making, information operations, and global campaigns — including in the former Soviet Union and Africa. Nataliya is the author of “How We Got Here with Russia: The Kremlin’s Worldview” and "Putin's Offset: The Kremlin's Geopolitical Adaptations Since 2014." Her written work and interviews have been featured in media outlets including Foreign Policy, PBS NewsHour, NBC News, The Hill, BBC, and others. Nataliya currently serves as the Director of Strategic Intelligence at a US technology company Vertical Knowledge. Prior to ISW, she was the Chief Executive Officer of the Kyiv Post, Ukraine’s independent English-language publication. She also served as an adviser on cooperation with international financial institutions to former Ukrainian Economy Minister Pavlo Sheremeta, appointed after the pro-democracy Euromaidan Revolution in February 2014. She holds a Master's in Public Policy from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.
Leon Hartwell (@LeonHartwell) is a Senior Associate at LSE IDEAS and a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA) in Washington DC. His research interests include conflict resolution, genocide, diplomacy, democracy, the Russia-Ukraine war, and the Western Balkans. Previously, Hartwell was the Senior Advisor of the Central and South-East Europe Programme (CSEEP) and the 2022 Sotirov Fellow at LSE IDEAS, and CEPA’s Acting Director of the Transatlantic Leadership Program. From 2012 to 2013, he was also the Senior Policy Advisor for Political and Development Cooperation at the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Zimbabwe, where his work included government and civil society engagement, political reporting, peace building projects, and supporting human rights defenders. In 2019, Hartwell completed a joint doctoral degree summa cum laude at Leipzig University (Germany) and Stellenbosch University (South Africa). His thesis analyzed the use of mediation in the resolution of armed conflicts. Hartwell has published extensively in professional scholarly outlets and mainstream media ranging from the Negotiation Journal (Harvard-MIT-Tufts) and Oxford University Press to War on The Rocks. He speaks Afrikaans, English, Dutch, and Latvian, which he studied at the U.S. Foreign Service Institute.