Samir Puri Keynote Speaker

Dr Samir Puri is a war studies lecturer, bestselling author, and former UK diplomat. He is an expert in explaining how history meets geopolitics while bringing a global perspective to the subject.

Samir Puri started his career working as a defence analyst at RAND and the UK Foreign Office, where his assignments covered counter terrorism and policy support to peace processes.

Over his course in government service, Samir served as an international observer at five Ukrainian elections, including the Orange Revolution in 2004. Soon after the first Donbas war began in 2014, Dr Puri was deployed to spend a year in East Ukraine, where he worked along both sides of the frontline as part of an international ceasefire monitoring mission. In 2017, Samir was seconded to the Commonwealth Secretariat to author its strategy on countering violent extremism and from 2018-2019, took on the role of Assistant Head of Research at the Ministry of Defence’s think tank DCDC.

After government service, Samir Puri became a lecturer at King’s College London, where he taught MA courses on Counter Terrorism, Contemporary Warfare and Conflict, Security and Development. Samir also taught courses on Strategy & Policy at Cambridge and Johns Hopkins.

Samir Puri remains a visiting lecturer at King’s College and in 2020 was appointed Senior Fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in Singapore, where he currently resides working on Asian geopolitics. Aside from lecturing, in 2020, Samir also served as an advisor to Downing Street’s Race Commission providing insights on how imperial legacies influence Britain.

With his extensive background in academia and public service, Samir Puri authored numerous books. His latest book, Russia’s Road to War With Ukraine: Invasion Amidst the Ashes of Empires, was written based off his first-hand experience at several of the major events.

Samir Puri presents an engaging narrative on the wars, unpacking the risk and instabilities that dominate today’s news headline and as a result, his analysis of the Russian and Ukraine war has been widely sought after by the BBC, Al Jazeera, Bloomberg, CNN, the Wall Street Journal and other media outlets.

Dr Puri holds a PhD from Cambridge University, an MA in War Studies from King’s and a BA in History and Politics from Warwick University.