Matthew Bryza is a nonresident senior fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Turkey Program and managing Director for Straife. He is also a former nonresident senior fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Global Energy Center. He currently serves on the boards of energy and telecommunications companies operating from the greater Caspian region to Texas. Bryza is also a board member of the Jamestown Foundation.
Bryza was formerly director of the International Centre for Defense and Security in Tallinn, Estonia, where he founded its energy security and cybersecurity programs.
In 2012, Matthew completed a twenty-three-year career as a US diplomat, culminating as US ambassador to Azerbaijan. Earlier, he served as deputy assistant secretary of state and director on the National Security Council Staff at the White House for US relations with Turkey, Cyprus, Greece, Central Asia, and the South Caucasus.
From 1998 to 2001, Bryza was the deputy special advisor to the president and secretary of state on Caspian Basin Energy Security. Bryza also served in the US missions to Russia and Poland.
He is a frequent commentator in media outlets including CNN International, Al Jazeera, the BBC, Fox News, the Financial Times, the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, and the Chicago Tribune, as well as numerous outlets in Turkey and the South Caucasus. He is the recipient of Estonia’s Cross of Terra Mariana and Georgia’s Order of St. George. He received a bachelor’s degree in international relations from Stanford University and a master’s degree from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.