Alex Tiersky has been the Director of the Defence and Security Committee of the NATO Parliamentary Assembly since February 2007.

From 2004 to 2007 Alex Tiersky served as Foreign Affairs Officer and Presidential Management Fellow at the U.S. Department of State.  He held various positions with responsibility for U.S.-Russian strategic nuclear issues, conventional arms control and other political-military affairs in Europe, as well as at NATO headquarters in Brussels.  He also held a Legislative Fellowship in the Office of Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL), supporting the Senator’s work in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Previously, Alex Tiersky worked for three years at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York and Washington D.C. as a researcher in the National Security program.  From 1998 to 2001, he was the Assistant Director for the Global Reporting Network at New York University’s Center for War, Peace, and the News Media.  He also worked for a short time with the U.S. Government Accountability Organization’s International Affairs and Trade team. 

Alex Tiersky holds a Master’s in International Affairs from the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) at Johns Hopkins.  He also holds degrees from the Institut d’Etudes Politiques (Sciences Po) in Paris, and Tufts University in Boston.  He studied briefly at Eberhard-Karls Universitaet in Tuebingen, Germany.   

Alex Tiersky is bilingual (English/French), and conversant in Italian and German.  He has authored a number of articles on Defence and Foreign Affairs issues.

Alex Tiersky is married to Anouk Savineau, a Belgian national.  He has competed in the World Championships of Ultimate Frisbee in Scotland, Hawaii, and Australia, and in national championships in the United States, England, France and Germany.

In his personal capacity, Tiersky recently published in the Fletcher Forum of World Affairs' Winter/Spring issue: Obama and NATO: Facing the Afghan Challenge and Russian Resurgence.

NATO’s fractured response to the 2008 Georgia-Russia conflict and continuing questions over membership, force deployment, and burden sharing in Afghanistan highlight the Alliance’s struggle to respond to the most significant challenges it has faced since the end of the cold war. Alex Tiersky argues that the Obama administration must leverage the President’s popularity in Europe and capitalize upon a unique set of tools and opportunities to lead the Alliance forward and ensure its continued success.