Ionela Maria Ciolan is a Research Fellow in the Europe in the World Programme. She works mainly on NATO policies, NATO-EU relations, as well as EU Security and Defence Policy.

Before joining EPC, Ionela worked as a Foreign Policy and Security Researcher and Teaching Assistant at the National University of Political Studies and Public Administration (Bucharest), where she focused on the European Neighbourhood Policy, Eastern Partnership, EU-Russia relations, transatlantic relations and NATO issues. Ionela previously gained experience as a Fulbright Scholar at the University of California-Berkeley, and through her work at CEPA think tank (Washington D.C.), European Parliament (Brussels) and the Centre for EU-Russia Studies, University of Tartu (Estonia).

Ionela is a grantee of the OSCE and U.N. Office for Disarmament Affairs Scholarship for Peace and Security (2019), a New Security Leader of the Warsaw Security Forum (2018), and a Professional Fellow of the U.S. Department of State (2015).

Apart from her policy and academic work, for 9 years, she was the initiator and coordinator of the human rights activists’ movement of Amnesty International in Romania.

Ionela Maria Ciolan holds a BA in International Relations and European Studies from “Babeș-Bolyai” University (Romania), a MA in International Relations and European Integration from the National University of Political Studies and Public Administration (Romania), with a scholarship at the University of Bologna (Italy). She is currently finishing a PhD programme focused on great power competition and multilateralism in the Eastern Partnership (with case studies on Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova).