Advisory Board
John Lloyd
Wojciech
Przybylski
Dr. Slobodan G. Markovich
Dennis Deletant
Dennis Deletant served as Visiting Ion Rațiu Professor of Romanian Studies in the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, Washington DC from August 2011 to July 2020. He is Emeritus Professor of Romanian Studies at University College, London, where he taught in the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, between 1969 and 2011, and was Professor of Romanian Studies at the University of Amsterdam (on secondment from UCL) between 2003 and 2010.
He was appointed to the board of the British Government’s ‘Know-How Fund for Central and Eastern Europe’ in 1990 and was actively involved in its work in Romania and in the Republic of Moldova until 1999 when the board was disbanded. The establishment of the Fund was influenced by the desire of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher that Britain should play a leading role in helping the nations of the former Soviet bloc to make the transition from communism to democracy, through the transfer of expertise, economic and political. For his work on the Fund, he was made an officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1995. He was awarded ‘Ordinul pentru merit’ (Order of Merit) with the rank of commander for services to Romanian democracy on 1 December 2000 by President Emil Constantinescu of Romania and ‘The Star of Romania’, Romania’s highest civilian honour, by President Klaus Iohannis on 26 October 2016 for his activity in the promotion of Romanian history, language and culture.
He is the author of several monographs and volumes of studies on the recent history of Romania, among them Ceauşescu and the Securitate: Coercion and Dissent in Romania, 1965-89, London: Hurst & Co., 1995; New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1996; Communist Terror in Romania: Gheorghiu-Dej and the Police State, 1948-65, London: Hurst & Co.; New York: St Martin’s Press, 1999; Hitler’s Forgotten Ally. Ion Antonescu and his Regime, Romania, 1940-1944, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006; and British Clandestine Activities in Romania during the Second World War, London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016. His most recent study in English, Romania under Communism: Paradox and Degeneration, was published in October 2018 (Oxford; New York: Routledge).
RICHARD RALPH CMG CVO
PhD Radu
Albu-Comănescu
Radu Albu-Comănescu, PhD in History and Lecturer at the Faculty of European Studies of the Babeş-Bolyai University in Cluj-Napoca, Romania. Teaches “EU Governance and Theories of European Integration”, “European and International Negotiations” and “Cultural Heritage Management”. Fields of research extend to the history of Europe ; history of political and religious thinking ; cultural, economic and public diplomacy, as well as governance, state-building and networks of power. Active in various NGOs and think-tanks dedicated to public policies. Member of the executive board of the Ratiu Democracy Centre. At times, columnist for “Ziua de Cluj”, Romania’s largest regional newspaper.
Alison Mutler
Alison Mutler studied Romanian literature and language at the University of London and graduated in 1987. She first reported from Romania, Bulgaria and Moldova before communism ended, and was in Romania, working for British television station ITV during the 1989 anti-communist revolt. She moved to Romania in 1991 and joined the Associated Press which she left last year after 25 years. She has been president of the now defunct Foreign Press Association. She is now a correspondent for Romanian startup news site, universul.net. She occasionally freelances for Coda Story and Radio Free Europe among others.
Ovidiu Vanghele
Ovidiu Vanghele started his career in 2002 at MEDIAFAX Agency. During his ten years in the press agency he gradually became interested in more detailed subjects, closer to investigative journalism. He then joined the Pro TV news team. Less than a year later, he chose to leave mainstream media, founding the Center for Investigative Media, the entity he heads ever since. In the last seven years, Ovidiu published several press investigations tracing millions of euro spent pointlessly, illegally or simply stolen. His best known investigations focused on the abuses from mental health centers, the Romanian Academy monetary frauds, the National Railway Company’s contracts. Most of these also became judiciary investigations. He has spent almost the entire 2016 documenting, together with Ana Poenariu (Rise Project), the series “Toți oamenii generalului”, tracking the personal and financial development of Gabriel Oprea. In 2017, together with Vlad Stoicescu (dela0.ro), he set up a journalism platform aimed to better understand the relationship between the Churches in Romania and state institutions. Funded by its readers, the online project “Let there be light!” is, to many, an example of how journalism can survive in these tough times. He also teaches journalism at the University of Bucharest.
Vlad Zigarov
Vlad Zigarov is European Affairs Associate at LSE IDEAS and senior adviser on foreign policy at the European Union in Brussels. He holds an MSc in International History from LSE and an MA from the School of Slavonic and East European Studies at UCL. He previously studied Philosophy, History, and International Affairs at the University of Bucharest and worked for various state and private organisations in Romania, the UK and Belgium.
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