Dr. Mustafa Alani is Senior Advisor and Program Director, Security and Terrorism Studies, Gulf Research Center. His research focuses on security developments in the Gulf region, with particular emphasis on Iraq and Iran, and on Islamist terrorist and fundamentalist groups.

Since 1988, Dr. Alani has acted as consultant and advisor to numerous official and non-governmental institutions on political and security developments in the Middle East. Until September 2004, he was a consultant and fellow at the Middle East Security Program of the Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies (RUSI) in London.

He is the author of Political Kidnapping: An Operational Methodology (Dubai: Gulf Research Center, 2004); Operation VANTAGE: British Military Intervention in Kuwait (London: LAAM, 1990); co-author of “Saudi Arabia: The Threat from Within,” Jane’s Intelligence Review (no. 12), Jane’s Sentinel Annual Report on Saudi Arabia (1996), and of The Future of Iraqi Oil (New Venture Guide: Robertson Research International, 1998). He has also authored numerous articles and reports on security developments in Iraq, Iran and the GCC.

He holds a Ph.D. in Politics from the University of Exeter, an M.A. in International Relations from Keele University and a B.A. in Politics from the University of Baghdad.