Andreas Persbo is the Director of the Open Nuclear Network, previously serving as the Research Director of the European Leadership Network from November 2019 to September 2022.
Before joining the ELN, Andreas served as the Executive Director of the Verification Research, Training and Information Centre (2009-2019), where he’d previously served as a research and senior researcher (2004-2009) with a regional focus on Iran and South Asia.
He was one of the founding members of the UK-Norway Initiative on Verified Warhead Dismantlement. After completing district court service in Sweden (2001-2003), Andreas moved to the UK and worked as an analyst at the British American Security Information Council (2003-2004). After military service with the Swedish Signals Regiment, he completed two tours of duty as a United Nations Peacekeeper: first in Lebanon and then in Former Yugoslavia (1990-1993).
Andreas holds the equivalent of a Master of Laws from Stockholm University where he, following an internship at the United Nations, chose to write his masters’ thesis on the concept of good faith in Article VI of the 1968 Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty. He supplemented his training with a diploma in Nuclear Law (tres bien) from the University of Montpellier I in France. He’s also studied economics, politics and sociology.
His specific interests are West-Russia relations, NATO, as well as ways to regulate and control the spread and use of weapons of mass destruction. Andreas serves as the Swedish delegate to the International Law Association’s Committee on Nuclear weapons, non-proliferation & contemporary international law.
Author of more than 40 papers and reports, his latest three publications are “Latent Nuclear Power, Hedging, and Irreversibility” in Pilat, J.F, ed. Nuclear Latency and Hedging: Concepts, History, and Issues: Woodrow Wilson Institute, 2019. “Compliance science: the CTBT’s global verification system.” The Nonproliferation Review 23, no. 3-4 (March 10, 2017): 317-28; and Persbo, Andreas, ‘Verification requirements’ in Loodgard, Sverre, ed. Stable Nuclear Zero: The Vision and Its Implications for Disarmament Policy. S.l.: Routledge, 2016. Print.
