Dr. Richard Youngs is director general of FRIDE. He is also assistant professor at the University of Warwick in the UK. Prior to joining FRIDE, he was EU Marie Curie research fellow at the Norwegian Institute for International Relations, Oslo (2001-4), and senior research fellow at the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (1995-8). He has a PhD and an MA in International Studies from the University of Warwick and a BA in Social and Political Science from the University of Cambridge. His research focuses mainly on democracy promotion and democratisation, European foreign policy, energy security, and the MENA region. He has written several books on different elements of European external policy and published over forty articles and working papers, while writing regularly in national and international media.