Podcast

This week on War & Peace, Olga Oliker and Elissa Jobson are joined by Bert Koenders, former Dutch minister of foreign affairs and current Crisis Group trustee, to discuss how the war in Ukraine has changed Europe and what the EU can do to adapt.

War & Peace is a podcast series from the International Crisis Group, in which Olga Oliker and Elissa Jobson interview experts about all things Europe and its neighbourhood, from Russia to Türkiye and beyond. Their guests shed new light on everything that helps or hinders prospects for peace. Episodes from past series of War & Peace can be found here: Season 1, Season 2 and Season 3.

This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood is joined by Ali Vaez, Crisis Group’s Iran director, to discuss the China-brokered Saudi-Iranian deal, Iran's evolving foreign relations and its fast advancing nuclear program.

This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood is joined by Amanda Hsiao, Crisis Group's China expert, and Stephen Pomper, Crisis Group’s chief of policy, to discuss China's involvement in Ukraine, the U.S. downing of the Chinese spy balloon and risks of confrontation over Taiwan.

This week on War & Peace, Olga Oliker and Elissa Jobson are joined by Richard Gowan, Crisis Group’s UN director, and Brian Finucane, Crisis Group’s senior adviser for the U.S., to talk about the prospects of a crime of aggression tribunal for Ukraine.

This week on The Horn, Alan is joined by Liesl Louw-Vaudran, Crisis Group’s senior adviser to the African Union (AU), to discuss the 2023 AU Summit and the challenges and opportunities facing the continental union amid shifting geopolitics.

This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood and Olga Oliker, Crisis Group's Europe and Central Asia director, discuss the latest fighting in Ukraine, the mood in Kyiv, Moscow and Western capitals, and where the war might be headed a year into Russia’s full-scale invasion.

This week on War & Peace, Olga Oliker and Elissa Jobson are joined by Sam Sokol, reporter at Haaretz, to discuss the impact of the war in Ukraine on the country's Jewish communities, accusations of anti-semitism in Ukraine and Russia and their relationship to the real thing, and Ukraine-Israel relations.

This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood speaks with Crisis Group’s trustee, Lagos-based lawyer and human rights activist Ayo Obe, and Crisis Group's Senior Adviser Nnamdi Obasi, about Nigeria’s forthcoming elections, held amid deteriorating security and a currency crisis.

This week on The Horn, Alan is joined by Abdi Latif Dahir, East Africa correspondent for The New York Times, to discuss how tweets are disrupting succession politics in Uganda and the challenging task of covering the vast and diverse political landscape of East Africa.

This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood speaks with Mark Malloch-Brown, president of Open Society Foundations and former UN Deputy Secretary-General, about the war in Ukraine and protecting open societies in a more dangerous world.

This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood speaks with Mairav Zonszein and Tahani Mustafa, Crisis Group’s Israel/Palestine experts, about the past week’s violence, which follows the deadliest year in the West Bank and Jerusalem for almost two decades.

This week on The Horn, Alan is joined by Professor Guma Kunda Komey to discuss Sudan’s arduous path toward restoring civilian rule following a framework agreement between the military and a coalition of major civilian actors in December 2022.

This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood speaks with Richard Moncrieff, Crisis Group’s interim Great Lakes project director, about an incident in which Rwanda's army shot at a Congolese fighter jet, raising fears that tensions between Kinshasa and Kigali could boil over. 

This week on War & Peace, Olga Oliker and Elissa Jobson are joined by KIMEP University Professor Nurseit Niyazbekov to talk about what has happened since last January's deadly protests in Kazakhstan, prospects for political reform and the future of Kazakhstan-Russia relations.

What conflicts is Crisis Group particularly worried about in 2023? This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood is joined by Crisis Group’s President & CEO Comfort Ero and Chief of Policy Stephen Pomper, to talk about our annual flagship publication “10 Conflicts to Watch”.

This week on The Horn, Alan speaks with Omar Mahmood, Crisis Group's senior analyst for Eastern Africa, about the government offensive backed by local clans that is making gains against Al-Shabaab in central Somalia, and what comes next. 

Please find below recordings of Crisis Group’s expert panels, events and presentations related to our field research and policy work. Most are video recordings but there are some audio versions too. We hope all are a podcast-like way to listen in to our public discussions and catch up with any of our events that you may have missed.

This week on War & Peace, Olga Oliker and Elissa Jobson are joined by former EU top diplomat Catherine Ashton to discuss the state of international diplomacy, the EU’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the future of Europe.

This week on War & Peace, Elissa Jobson is joined by Berkay Mandıracı, Crisis Group’s Senior analyst for Türkiye, to discuss the latest escalation in Türkiye’s PKK conflict, its development in recent years and how it relates to Türkyie’s domestic politics.

This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood speaks with Renata Segura and Diego Da Rin, Crisis Group’s Latin America experts, about whether foreign forces can help tackle Haiti’s spiralling gang violence, political gridlock and latest cholera outbreak.

This week on The Horn, Alan speaks with Molly Phee, the U.S. top diplomat to Africa, about how the U.S.’s strategic priorities for Africa have evolved and its diplomacy in the Horn of Africa.

This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood speaks with Olga Oliker, Crisis Group’s Europe-Central Asia director, about the war in Ukraine, what the winter months might hold, prospects for diplomacy and NATO policy. 

This week on The Horn, Alan Boswell is joined by Crisis Group consultant Richard Moncrieff to discuss recent developments in the conflict in the eastern DR Congo, tensions between Kinshasa and Kigali as well as regional and international efforts to address the crisis.

This week on War & Peace, Olga Oliker and Elissa Jobson speak with Pauline Bax, Crisis Group’s deputy Africa program director, about Russia’s influence in Africa, its significance and how it could affect peacemaking efforts on the continent.

This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood speaks with Crisis Group’s Middle East experts Joost Hiltermann and Dina Esfandiary about the World Cup in Qatar, regional politics and friction between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia.

This week on Hold Your Fire! Richard Atwood is joined by Pekka Haavisto, Finland's Foreign Minister, to talk about the war in Ukraine, the future of Europe’s security architecture and peacemaking in the Horn of Africa and Middle East.

This week on War & Peace, Olga Oliker and Elissa Jobson talk with Brian Milakovsky, an expert on economic development in eastern Ukraine, to take a closer look at Russia’s occupation of territories in the Donbas and what’s next for residents of areas now liberated by Ukraine.

This week on Hold Your Fire!, Richard Atwood talks to Murithi Mutiga, Crisis Group’s Africa director, about last week’s cessation of hostilities between the Ethiopian government and leaders from Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region, and whether it can end what has been a horrific war.

This week on The Horn, Alan speaks with Michael Woldemariam, professor at the University of Maryland, about the tumultuous relations between Eritrea and Tigray and how the historical grievances between both sides have shaped the recent conflict in northern Ethiopia.