Eldar Mamedov

Eldar Mamedov is a non-resident fellow at the Quincy Institute and a member of the Pugwash Council on Science & World Affairs, a Nobel Peace Prize–winning Track II diplomacy organization committed to pursuing a world free of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction.

Eldar has more than 30 years of professional foreign policy experience. As a Latvian diplomat from 1994–2003, he served in his country’s embassies in Washington D.C. and Madrid, Spain, where he focused on Latvia’s integration to NATO and the E.U.

From 2007–2024, Eldar served as a foreign policy adviser in the European Parliament in Brussels, Belgium and Strasbourg, France, where he accrued deep expertise in the E.U.’s relations with Iran and countries in the Persian Gulf and South Caucasus. During this time, Eldar drafted and negotiated parliamentary motions on relations with these countries, organized multiple missions to Iran and the Persian Gulf, and participated in backchannel diplomacy.

Eldar is a regular contributor to Responsible Statecraft, The American Conservative, and Eurasianet.org, where he writes on E.U. foreign policy and the Middle East. Eldar has also produced publications for The National Interest, the Stimson Center, and Amwaj.media, and has provided his expertise to CNN International, Politico, Al Jazeera, El Pais, Deutsche Welle and other international outlets.

Eldar is fluent in English, Spanish, Russian, and Latvian.

Hovik Manucharyan

Hovik Manucharyan is an information security engineer who moved from Seattle to Armenia in 2022. He co-founded the ANN/Groong podcast in 2020 and has been a contributor to Groong News since the late 1990s.

Disclaimer: The views expressed by Hovik Manucharyan on the ANN/Groong podcast are his own and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of his employer or any other organization.

Asbed Bedrossian

Asbed Bedrossian is an IT professional, and for years oversaw the central IT enterprise infrastructure and services at USC. His decades of experience spanned across IT strategy, enterprise architecture, infrastructure, cybersecurity, enterprise applications, data center operations, high performance computing, ITSM, ITPM, and more.

Asbed founded the Armenian News Network Groong circa 1989/1990, and co-founded the ANN/Groong podcast in 2020.