Panel Discussion
Beijing’s Balancing Act: China and Russia’s Ties and Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine
Zoom Webinar
Friday, April 1, 2022 | 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM ET
Join us on Friday, April 1st at noon ET for a panel discussion between Susan Thornton, Senior Fellow and Visiting Lecturer in Law at the Yale Law School Paul Tsai China Center, Director of the Forum on Asia-Pacific Security at the National Committee on American Foreign Policy, and Nonresident Senior Fellow at The Brookings Institution; Dr. Thomas Graham, Distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and Cofounder of the Russian, East European, and Eurasian studies program at Yale University; and Professor Alexey Maslov, Professor of East Asian Studies, Director of the Institute of Asian and African Studies under Мoscow State University, Acting Director of the Institute of Far Eastern Studies of Russian Academy of Sciences, professor of the School of Asian Studies at HSE University (Russia) to learn more about China and Russia relations amidst the invasion of Ukraine and beyond.
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SPEAKERS:
Susan Thornton
Susan A. Thornton is a retired senior U.S. diplomat with almost three decades of experience with the U.S. State Department in Eurasia and East Asia. She is currently a Senior Fellow and Visiting Lecturer in Law at the Yale Law School Paul Tsai China Center. She is also the director of the Forum on Asia-Pacific Security at the National Committee on American Foreign Policy and a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.
Until July 2018, Thornton was Acting Assistant Secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs at the Department of State and led East Asia policymaking amid crises with North Korea, escalating trade tensions with China, and a fast-changing international environment. In previous State Department roles, she worked on U.S. policy toward China, Korea and the former Soviet Union and served in leadership positions at U.S. embassies in Central Asia, Russia, the Caucasus and China.
Thornton received her M.A. in International Relations from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies and her B.A. from Bowdoin College in Economics and Russian. She serves on several nonprofit boards and speaks Mandarin and Russian.
Thomas E. Graham
Thomas E. Graham is a distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. He is a cofounder of the Russian, East European, and Eurasian studies program at Yale University and sits on its faculty steering committee. He is also a research fellow at the MacMillan Center at Yale. He has been a lecturer in global affairs and political science since 2011, teaching courses on U.S.-Russian relations and Russian foreign policy, as well as cybersecurity and counterterrorism. Graham was special assistant to the president and senior director for Russia on the National Security Council staff from 2004 to 2007, during which he managed a White House-Kremlin strategic dialogue. He was director for Russian affairs on the staff from 2002 to 2004.
Graham served as an advisor to Kissinger Associates from 2008 to 2021. He was a Foreign Service officer for fourteen years. His assignments included two tours of duty at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow in the late Soviet period and in the middle of the 1990’s during which he served as head of the political internal unit and acting political counselor. Between tours in Moscow, he worked on Russian and Soviet affairs on the policy planning staff at the U.S. Department of State and as a policy assistant in the office of the under secretary of defense for policy.
Graham serves on the Kennan council of the Kennan Institute of the Wilson Center and on the advisory board of Russia Matters, a project of the Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs with the goal of enhancing the understanding of Russia among policy-makers and the interested public. He also serves on the editorial board of the US-Canada Journal of the USA-Canada Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
Graham holds a BA in Russian studies from Yale University and an MA in history and a PhD in political science from Harvard University.
Alexey Maslov
Alexey Maslov, Ph.D., Professor of East Asian Studies with the main focus on Chinese culture and modern socio-political development. Director of the Institute of Asian and African Studies under Moscow State University, Acting Director of the Institute of Far Eastern Studies of Russian Academy of Sciences, professor of the School of Asian Studies at HSE University (Russia)
PHOTOGRAPH BY HOST/RIA NOVOSTI/GETTY
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