Born in Makkah, Saudi Arabia in 1959, Abdulaziz O. Sager studied International Relations and holds an M.A Degree from the University of Kent at Canterbury with the thesis The External Factors Threatening Political Stability in the GCC States. He is currently working on a research program entitled:”Gulf Security, Dynamics, Perceptions and Policies, 1971-2003: A comparative study of the GCC States.”

Sager is the Chairman and founder of the Gulf Research Center. He is also President of Sager Group Holding in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia which is active in the fields of information technology, aviation services and investments.

Sager was appointed as a member of the Makkah Province Council in November 2003. He also serves on the advisory boards of the Arab Thought Foundation and the Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF). He is also a member of the advisory group for the 4th Arab Human Development Report for the United National Development Programme (UNDP).

Dr. Mustafa Alani is a Senior Advisor at the GRC and Program Director in Security and Terrorism Studies. He is also an Associate Fellow at the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies in the United Kindgom. His research focuses on security developments in the Gulf region, with particular emphasis on Iraq and Iran, and on Islamist terrorist organizations and fundamentalist groups. Since 1988, Dr. al-Ani has acted as consultant and advisor to numerous official and non-governmental institutions, and has spoken in front of the House of Commons on a number of issues.

He is the author of 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), of 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 PhD in Politics from the University of Exeter, an MA in International Relations from Keele University and a BA in Politics from the University of Baghdad.

Saleh A. Almani is professor of Political Science and Dean, College of Law and Political Science, King Saud University, in Riyadh. He serves as a senior consultant to the GCC Secretariat in Riyadh, and on the Board of The Institute for Diplomatic Studies in Riyadh, as well as The Institute of Public Administration. He has published two books and about twenty five scientific papers, as well 14 chapters in edited books. He writes on Gulf security and the international relations of the Arabian Gulf , has delivered papers and presentations at regional and international forums, such as Kuwait University, King Fahad University of Petroleum and Minerals, Georgetown, Harvard and Michigan, The LSE, as well as The UNESCO in Paris, and served as an Editor of King Saud University Journal (Administrative Sciences). He is married with two children and writes a weekly column for Okaz Newspaper in Jeddah, as well as A-Ittihad Newspaper in Abu Dhabi.

Dr. Abdullah K. Alshayji is a Professor of International Relations and the Chairman of the American Studies Unit at Kuwait University. He is a Specialist in Gulf and US Politics. He served as Special Advisor to the Speaker of the Kuwaiti Parliament and to its Foreign Relations Committee from 1992-1996. He acted as Counselor and Head of the Kuwaiti Information and Media Bureau at the Kuwaiti Embassy in Beirut, Lebanon from 2001-2004. Dr. Alshayji is a lecturer since 2005 at the Kuwaiti Army Staff and Command College offering lectures to senior army officers from Kuwait and 16 other countries on topics related to strategic and security issues of Iran and Iraq and Crisis Management Seminars. Dr. Alshayji holds a Ph.D. from the Government Department of the University of Texas at Austin, USA (1988). He received his Masters and B.S. in Political Science from Oklahoma State University, USA.

Dr. Alshayji has published a book entitled “KUWAIT CEASELESS QUEST FOR SURVIVAL IN A HOSTILE ENVIRONMENT”. Dr. Alshayji has also published numerous articles in both Arabic and English languages in academic journals on issues related to elections and the Kuwaiti parliamentary experience, democratization and the Kuwaiti National Assembly, the External and Internal Factors Affecting Political Reforms in the GCC states and Gulf Security and US Foreign Policy. He has conducted studies on the US Strategy in the Gulf region, NATO initiatives and Kuwait-Iraq relations, as well as GCC-Iran relations. Dr. Alshayji has also attended, participated in, and chaired panels at over seventy conferences all over the world. Dr. Alshayji’s views, interviews and analyses have appeared in many publications in the Arab world and the West. Dr. Alshayji organized and led the first group of 12 Kuwaiti “Opinion-Makers”, composed of leading Academics, as well as Think-Tank and Media personalities that visited NATO Headquarterrs in Brussels on an invitation from the NATO Public Diplomacy Division. Dr. Alshayji is a regular guest and analyst whose views have been aired on many news outlets and satellite TV networks in the Arab World and in the West. He is a columnist for Kuwaiti, GCC and Pan-Arab newspapers.

Professor Philippe Burrin is Director of the Graduate Institute of International Studies - HEI (as of January 2008, the Graduate Institute of International Studies and Development Studies, a new institute created from HEI and the Graduate Institute of Development Studies). His main research interests are Facism, Nazism, Antisemitism, Military Occupation, and Modern Empires. He is a member of the HEI's Faculty since 1988 and his main teaching domains cover the History of International Relations (19th and 20th centuries), the World Wars, and the History of Political Ideas and Movements. He was Visiting Professor at the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris (Elie Halévy Chair) and at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt, and Fellow at the Center for European Studies, Harvard University and at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin. His main publications are: La dérive fasciste. Doriot, Déat, Bergery 1933-1944, Paris, Editions du Seuil, 1986 (pocket edition with a new foreword, 2003); Hitler et les Juifs. Genèse d'un génocide, Paris, Editions du Seuil, 1989; La France à l'heure allemande 1940-1944, Paris, Editions du Seuil, 1995; Fascisme, nazisme, autoritarisme, Paris, Editions du Seuil, 2000; Ressentiment et apocalypse. Essai sur l'antisémitisme nazi, Paris, Editions du Seuil, 2004; 6 juin 1944, avec Jean-Pierre Azéma et Robert O. Paxton, Paris, Perrin / Mémorial de Cen, 2004.

Dr. Farid el Khazen
Professor
American University Beirut
Lebanon

Farid Khazen holds a PhD in International Relations from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. He is a Member of Parliament in Lebanon since 2005 and a Professor of Political Science at the American University of Beirut since 1988. He was chairperson of the Department of Political Studies and Public Administration at AUB from 200-2005. He is the author of over 25 articles on Lebanese and Arab politics published in academic journals in Europe and the United States. His books include The breakdown of the State in Lebanon, 1967-1976 (Harvard University Press and I.B.Tauris, 2000); Political Parties in Lebanon : the Limits of Democratic Practice in Party Politics (Beirut: LCPS, 2002); Lebanon’s First postwar Parliamentary Election: An Imposed choice (Oxford: Centre for Lebanese Studies, 1988); The Communal Fact of National Identities: The Making and Politics of the 1943 National Pact (Oxford: Centre for Lebanese Studies, 1991).

Dr. Christian Koch is the Research Director for International Studies at the GRC thus combining the various international and foreign relations issues of the GCC States. His particular interest and specialty is that of GCC-EU Relations and the overall development of the Gulf’s ties with the European Union and its member states. His responsibilities range from managing the research staff and devising the research agenda, arranging the Center's outreach programs and working with the Chairman to establish the GRC's work plan. He was formerly the Head of the Strategic Studies Section at the Emirates Center for Strategic Studies and Research (ECSSR), a position he held for 6 years.

Dr. Koch has authored and edited well over 30 published articles and books in both English and German, many of which have been syndicated in local and international newspapers. His books include: A Window of Opportunity: Europe, Gulf Security and the Aftermath of the Iraq War, editor with Felix Neugart (Dubai: Gulf Research Center); Unfulfilled Potential: Exploring the GCC-EU Relationship, editor (Dubai: Gulf Research Center); and Gulf Security in the Twenty-First Century, editor with David Long (London: I.B. Tauris). He received his doctorate in political science in 1999 from the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität in Erlangen-Nürnberg with a dissertation on the role of voluntary association in the political development of Kuwait.

Rajendra Kumar Pachauri is the Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The IPCC, established by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Program, is the leading body for the scientific assessment of climate change and was the joint winner of the Nobel Peace Prize 2007.

Dr. Pachauri has been the head of The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), since its establishment in New Delhi 25 years ago. TERI is an Indian institute of excellence involved in scientific and technological research and strategic thinking in fields such as energy, environment, climate change, conservation of natural resources and sustainable development.

Since 1992, Dr. Pachauri is also the President of the Asian Energy Institute. He recently joined the board of the Global Humanitarian Forum, founded by former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, and is also a member of the board of directors of the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES). Currently, he is also a member of the Indian Prime Minister’s Advisory Council on Climate Change.

Honoured as ‘Officier De La Legion D’Honneur’ by the government of France in 2006, Dr. Pachauri is also the recipient of one of India’s highest civilian awards, Padma Bhushan. The author of 23 books, besides several articles, Dr. Pachauri holds Ph.D.s in industrial engineering and economics from the North Carolina State University, USA.

Ambassador Fred Tanner
Director
Geneva Center for Security Policy
Switzerland

Born on 6 June, 1951, Theodor H. Winkler studied political sciences and international security at the Universities of Geneva and Harvard University and at the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva. He obtained in 1981 a PhD in political sciences with a thesis on nuclear proliferation.

Winkler joined the Swiss Department of Defence in late 1981 as an international security expert. In 1985 he was appointed Representative of the Chief of Staff for Politico-Military Affairs, in 1995 Head of the newly created Division for International Security Policy. In 1998 he was promoted to the rank of Deputy Head, Security and Defence Policy.

Winkler has been, on 13 June 2000, appointed by the Swiss Federal Council Director of the Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF) and promoted to the rank of Ambassador.

Winkler’s professional affiliations include membership in the Council of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (London), the PfP Consortium of Defence Academies and Security Studies Institutes, the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, DCAF Brussels, and the International Coalition Women Defending Peace as well as membership in the international Advisory Boards of the Swiss Institute of World Affairs, the Bonn International Centre for Conversion, and the Centre for International Security Studies Hungary and several other academic and international bodies.

Winkler is married and has two daughters.