FORA.tv Speaker - Alexei Pankin

Alexei Pankin is a leading political and media analyst and journalist in Moscow. He writes a popular column for The Moscow Times on political and media developments and contributes to many other publications. He founded Russia's first media management magazine, and developed Russia's first Western-style op-ed section for Izvestia. Earlier, he had been a media expert at the Soviet Academy of Sciences, close advisor to the last Foreign Minister of the USSR (his own father, Boris Pankin, a member of Gorbachev's cabinet), and was deputy editor of International Affairs, the leading foreign policy journal in Russia. He also directed an EU-funded media monitoring project, and administered media development grants on behalf of the United States government and the Soros Foundation.