Biography

He is the Executive Director of Islamabad based independent think tank, the Centre for Research and Security Studies (CRSS), which he established in December 2007 with the support of Heinrich Boell Stiftung (Germany). The Centre is a research and advocacy endeavor, primarily focusing on security and governance issues in Pakistan.

He has decades’ long journalistic, research and advocacy experience in security issues relating to Pakistan. He has presented papers at international security and counter-terrorism conferences/seminars in Brussels, Berlin, New Delhi, Kabul, New York, Washington, Hague, Riyadh and Rome from January 2010 to April 2011.

He is selected for a two month Asia Leaders Fellowship Programme by the International House of Japan and Japanese Studies and Intellectual Exchange Department of Japan Foundation in Japan (the programme is currently underway).

Books

Imtiaz Gul, The Unholy Nexus: Pak-Afghan Relations under the Taliban (Islamabad: Vanguard Books, 2002).

Imtiaz Gul (ed.), Liberalism and Islam (Kabul: Friedrich Naumann Stiftung, 2002).

Imtiaz Gul, The Al-Qaeda Connection – Taliban and Terror in Tribal Areas (New Delhi: Penguin-Viking India, 2009).

Imtiaz Gul, The Al-Qaeda Connection – Taliban and Terror in Tribal Areas, revised edition (Penguin Books US/UK, 2010).

Imtiaz Gul, The Search for Osama bin Laden (Penguin-India, forthcoming).

Journalistic Career

Besides reporting for the Urdu, English and Hindi language services of Deutsche Welle (DW), Germany’s foreign languages’ broadcaster from 1989 to 2009; Imtiaz Gul has also been
broadcasting with the CNN (USA) from 1998 to 2000. He also worked for Hong Kong-based
Star World TV, Japanese National Broadcasting Corporation NHK, the National Public
Radio in the United States. He regularly writes for, among others, Foreign Policy Magazine and Wall Street Journal of USA, The Friday Times and Pulse (weekly) and Daily Express Tribune of Pakistan. His writings mainly encompass local and regional security issues.

Moreover, along with offering advice as consultant to foreign diplomatic missions and development sector organisations, Gul regularly appears as a security analyst on several national and international TV channels like GEO News, Express TV, Dunya TV, AAJ TV, DAWN TV and the Doha-based Al-Jazeera English/Arabic satellite TV channel, to impart his expert opinions relating to areas such as Afghanistan, Pak-Afghan tribal regions and the Kashmir militancy, which he has been extensively covering since 1998.

In his journalistic and security expert capacity, Mr Gul has traveled extensively across the globe including United States, Canada, Switzerland, Germany, France, Belgium, Netherlands, United Kingdom, Italy, Spain, Rumania, Hungary, Central Asian Republics of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Russia, India, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Norway , Denmark, Japan, Palestine, Israel, Egypt, Libya, and U.A.E.

Teaching Experience

He taught German language courses at the National University of Modern Languages (NUML), Islamabad during 1988-89 sessions. He occasionally delivers lectures on Afghanistan-Pakistan relations, militancy and terrorism related issues at Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad, Peshawar University and Institute of Management Sciences, Peshawar.

Education

He holds a masters degree in German Language and graduated with Economics, Statistics and English as majors.

Languages

He is fluent in English, German, Pashto, Urdu, Punjabi and Dari.