Togzhan Kassenova, an expert on nonproliferation issues regarding weapons of mass destruction, with a regional focus on Central Asia and Southeast Asia, joined the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace as an associate in the Nuclear Policy Program. Kassenova will focus on building links with expert communities in countries that are emerging as new leaders in reforming the global nuclear order. Additionally, she will concentrate on strategic trade management and civilian nuclear energy programs.

Kassenova serves on the UN Secretary General’s Advisory Board on Disarmament Matters. She is a member of the Steering Committee of the Fissile Material Working Group, the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific and a non-resident fellow of the Pacific Forum-Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Making the announcement, George Perkovich, vice president for studies and director of the Nuclear Policy Program, said:

“Togzhan is a wonderful addition to the nuclear policy team, bringing with her exceptional experience and expertise in a variety of nuclear policy topics. To achieve progress in nuclear disarmament and to strengthen the global nonproliferation regime, we will depend more and more on collective action and on active collaboration of stakeholders from all the different parts of the world. Togzhan’s work on emerging powers in the international system will be of growing importance in the context of a changing nuclear order and we are delighted that she will become a member of Carnegie’s Nuclear Policy Program.”

Kassenova added:

“I am thrilled to join Carnegie’s Nuclear Policy Program, the leading institution for policy thinking on nuclear issues. I look forward to working with expert communities in countries that are emerging as new, important players in the field of nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation. It gives me great pleasure to know that I will have a chance to contribute to Carnegie’s mission of finding solutions to difficult policy problems. ”

Carnegie’s Nuclear Policy Program is an internationally acclaimed source of expertise and policy thinking on nuclear industry, nonproliferation, security, and disarmament. With thirteen experts covering nuclear policy issues in the United States, Russia, China, Europe, Northeast Asia, South Asia, and the Middle East, it is a preeminent program in its field.

NOTES 

 

Togzhan Kassenova is an associate in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment and a Stanton Nuclear Security Fellow. She specializes in weapons of mass destruction nonproliferation issues, with a regional focus on Central Asia and Southeast Asia; strategic trade management; and civilian nuclear energy programs.

Kassenova serves on the UN Secretary General’s Advisory Board on Disarmament Matters. She is a member of the Steering Committee of the Fissile Material Working Group, the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific and a non-resident fellow of the Pacific Forum-Center for Strategic and International Studies. 

Prior to joining the Carnegie Endowment, Kassenova worked as a senior research associate at the University of Georgia’s Center for International Trade and Security in Washington, D.C., as a postdoctoral fellow at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, and as an adjunct faculty member at the Monterey Institute of International Studies. She was previously a journalist and professor in Kazakhstan. 

Kassenova is the author of From Antagonism to Partnership: The Uneasy Path of the U.S.-Russian Cooperative Threat Reduction (2007). She has published widely in scholarly and policy journals, including Nonproliferation Review, Disarmament Forum, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, and China and Eurasia Forum Quarterly

Kassenova is a native of Kazakhstan.

Press Contact: Karly Schledwitz, +1 202 939 2233, pressoffice@ceip.org