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Much of the world has been watching the rapidly developing situation in Afghanistan with a mix of shock and anguish. Bryce Klehm spoke with five experts to get a sense of how the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan is being perceived around the world. You’ll hear from Madiha Afzal, the David M. Rubenstein Fellow in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution, on Pakistan; Suzanne Maloney, the vice president and director of the Foreign Policy program at Brookings, on Iran; Yun Sun, the director of the China Program at the Stimson Center, on China; Joy Neumeyer, a writer and historian of Russia and the Soviet Union who has also worked as a journalist in Moscow, on Russia; and Constanze Stelzenmüller, the Fritz Stern Chair on Germany and trans-Atlantic Relations and a senior fellow in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution, on Germany.



Jen Patja is the editor and producer of the Lawfare Podcast and Rational Security. She currently serves as the Co-Executive Director of Virginia Civics, a nonprofit organization that empowers the next generation of leaders in Virginia by promoting constitutional literacy, critical thinking, and civic engagement. She is the former Deputy Director of the Robert H. Smith Center for the Constitution at James Madison's Montpelier and has been a freelance editor for over 20 years.
Bryce Klehm is a third year law student at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. He is a former associate editor at Lawfare.
Madiha Afzal is a fellow in the Foreign Policy Program at the Brookings Institution. Her work focuses on Pakistan, Afghanistan, and U.S. policy toward both countries. She was previously David M. Rubenstein Fellow in the Foreign Policy Program and an assistant professor of public policy at the University of Maryland, College Park. Afzal is the author of “Pakistan Under Siege: Extremism, Society, and the State” (Brookings Institution Press, 2018).
Suzanne Maloney studies Iran, the political economy of the Persian Gulf and Middle East energy policy. A former U.S. State Department policy advisor, she has also counseled private companies on Middle East issues. Maloney recently published a book titled "Iran's Long Reach: Iran as a Pivotal State in the Muslim World."
Yun Sun is a Senior Fellow and Co-Director of the East Asia Program and Director of the China Program at the Stimson Center. Her expertise is in Chinese foreign policy, U.S.-China relations and China’s relations with neighboring countries and authoritarian regimes.
Joy Neumeyer is a journalist and historian of Russia and Eastern Europe. She received a PhD in History from the University of California, Berkeley (2020) and was a Max Weber Fellow at the European University Institute in Florence.
Constanze Stelzenmüller, an expert on German, European, and transatlantic foreign and security policy and strategy, is a Senior Fellow in the Center on the United States and Europe at Brookings. She held the 2019-2020 Kissinger Chair on Foreign Policy and International Relations at the Library of Congress and served as the inaugural Robert Bosch Senior Fellow in the Center on the United States and Europe from 2014 to 2019. Prior to Brookings, she was a senior transatlantic fellow and Berlin office director with the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF).

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