CNIS Staff

The founder and the current president of CNIS is Dr. Leila Alieva. Dr. Alieva was also the former Deputy Director (1991-1994) and Director (1994-1996) of Baku-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. She has held fellowships at Harvard University (1993-1994), Woodrow Wilson Center (Kennan Institute) (1995), UC Berkeley (2000), and SAIS (Johns Hopkins University) (2001). Dr. Alieva was an advisor to the President of EBRD, as well as to the leading oil companies in Baku. She also was a National Coordinator of the Human Development Report for UNDP (1997) and served on the board of Open Society Institute in Baku (1998).

The co-founder of CNIS is Dr. Aydin Balayev.

Program Chairs
Leila Alieva (security studies and integration processes)
Aydin Balayev (politics, sociology, conflict studies)
Idris Aliyev (history and archeology)
Orxan Mamedzade (oil history)
Fikret Jafarov (environmental issues)

Researcher:
Ilgar Hasanli

Project Manager
Vurgun Ayyub

Program Assistant
Ziba Murtuzova

Financial Manager
Gulyana Habibova