Nuclear Issues

Former Deputy Secretary of Energy Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall is joining Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs as a Senior Fellow, the Center announced today. Sherwood-Randall, who has served in the White House and Departments of Energy and Defense, is returning to the Center where she worked in the 1990s to help establish two pioneering projects – the Strengthening Democratic Institutions Project with Graham Allison, who this month stepped down as the Center’s director, and the Preventive Defense Project with Ash Carter, the former Secretary of Defense who is the new Belfer Center director.

Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, former Deputy Secretary of Energy who has served in high-level positions at the White House and Pentagon, joined Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center as a non-resident Senior Fellow in July. Sherwood-Randall is returning to the Kennedy School where she previously collaborated with Ash Carter, the Belfer Center’s newly appointed director, and Graham Allison, who stepped down as Center director this month. We asked Sherwood-Randall to give us some background on her Harvard connections, why she returned, and what she hopes to accomplish as a Senior Fellow.

​In an off-the-record discussion titled "The Iran Nuclear Deal and Beyond: The Evolution of European Foreign Policy,"​ Helga Maria Schmid, Deputy Secretary General for Political Affairs of the European External Action Service​, ​spoke openly to an audience of HKS faculty, fellow, and students about ​​the EU's important role as "honest broker" throughout the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) negotiations on preventing Iran's nuclear program.

Leading up to and during the 2016 Nuclear Security Summit, Belfer Center experts released reports, published commentary, and provided insight and analysis into global nuclear security. In advance of the Summit, the Project on Managing the Atom set the stage for discussion with the report Preventing Nuclear Terrorism: Continuous Improvement or Dangerous Decline?

An in-progress compilation of the expert commentary and analysis is available here.

Olli Heinonen is of the opinion that the first report that the UN nuclear watchdog presented about Iran’s nuclear program after the implementation of the nuclear deal (JCPOA) was expected to be more detailed in order to reach a “broader conclusion”.

An interview with Karim Sadjadpour, Senior Associate of the Middle East Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, on the Iran-Saudi rift.

The Project on Managing the Atom (MTA) at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government seeks Student Associates for the summer of 2016. These internships provide opportunities for undergraduate or graduate students to meet experts in nuclear policy, attend lectures and seminars, and assist MTA project faculty, staff, and fellows with their research. MTA will provide a modest hourly wage or academic credit for the internship.

Just one week after “implementation day,” when Iran completed its nuclear commitments and the nuclear-related sanctions were lifted, Martin B. Malin, Executive Director of the Project to Manage the Atom at Harvard University’s Belfer Center, spoke about the current state of non-proliferation affairs in the Middle East with Michael Moran, Visiting Media Fellow on Peace and Security at Carnegie Corporation of New York.