Middle East & North Africa

Vladimir Putin took a step closer to president-for-life status this week in Russia, winning a fourth term as president with more than 76 percent of the vote and not a single meaningful challenger against him. Today, President Donald Trump — whose campaign is still being investigated for potential collusion with Russia — said he called Putin to congratulate him and plan for a meeting in the “not-too-distant future.” In the room during that phone call was Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, who has been accused of war crimes in Yemen. Former U.S. ambassador to NATO, Nicholas Burns, also a former undersecretary of state, joined Jim Braude to discuss.

David W. Miliband, president and CEO of the International Refugee Committee, discussed the global refugee crisis with Kennedy School professor Nicholas Burns at an Institute of Politics event Thursday evening.

At the event, entitled “The Refugee Crisis and What Can Be Done About It,” Miliband and Burns, who served as the Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs during the Bush administration, discussed ongoing humanitarian challenges in Syria, connecting the issue to a broader “forgotten crisis” of global population displacement.

Nick Burns talks with CNN's Don Lemon about the UN vote on Jerusalem and Trump's 'peculiar' relationship with Putin. 

Violet riots continue in Jerusalem after embattled U.S. president Donald Trump moved to recognize it last week as the capital of Israel, indicating that this issue is indeed a regional and world flashpoint. It generated huge news coverage, both negative and positive, even as any Arab states have condemned the move, along with certain elements of the E.U. We spoke with Robert M. Danin of the CFR and the Belfer Center at the Harvard Kennedy School on the local and global politics around Jerusalem — and what the (delayed) recognition of Jerusalem would means for Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinians and Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israelis.

Nick Burns, Harvard Kennedy School professor & former under secretary of State for political affairs, and Sarah Stern, Endowment for Middle East Truth president, discuss President Trump's decision to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem and officially recognize Jerusalem as the capital.

Nick Burns, Harvard Kennedy School professor & former under secretary of State for political affairs, and Sarah Stern, Endowment for Middle East Truth president, discuss President Trump's decision to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem and officially recognize Jerusalem as the capital. Nicholas Burns, who served as U.S. ambassador to NATO and was the State Department's third-ranking official during George W. Bush's presidency, called the decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital "deeply unwise."

President Trump recognized Jerusalem as the capital of Israel on Wednesday, breaking with decades of precedent, sparking an uproar among world leaders, with some experts saying it jeopardizes prospects of Middle East peace.

Former ambassador Nicholas Burns, Harvard Kennedy School professor, predicts a 'fractured' Iraq for the next five or ten years.

President Trump promised voters that he would strike “a great deal” with Russia and its autocratic president, Vladimir Putin. Now nearly six months into his presidency, Trump is set to finally meet Putin at a summit this week in Hamburg — severely constrained and facing few good options that would leave him politically unscathed.

In this installation of Conversations in Diplomacy, Congressman Seth Moulton, Representative of the Sixth District of Massachusetts, military veteran, and graduate of the Harvard Kennedy School, discusses the most serious threats to U.S. national security with Ambassador Nicholas Burns, Faculty Director of the Future of Diplomacy Project.