Former Bulgarian Defense Minister and Member of Parliament
Monday, October 4 at 11:00 a.m.
Join us for an exciting meeting with a Bulgarian Defense Minister and current Member of Parliament in a time of turmoil in Eastern Europe.
The Iron Curtain has lifted, but the loss of Crimea, hybrid war in Ukraine, and continued cyberattacks signal Russia’s discontent with Eastern European nationss seeking to maintain their independence on freedom’s forge.
Will Bulgaria’s increased trade and defense links to the West, its NATO membership, and its purchase of American F16s guarantee its freedom? A former Defense Minister, Velizar Shalamanov, a Member of Parliament and head of the Bulgarian delegation to the Parliamentarian Assembly of NATO offers his perspective regarding the future of this geostrategic region.
About Velizar Shalamanov
After 19 years in military, followed by an academic career in the Academy of Sciences, Dr. Shalamanov has had several tours of public service: Deputy Minister of Defense (1998-2001), Minister of Defense (2014), Director Demand Management in the NATO’s IT and Cyber Agency (2009-2017), member of the 45th and 46th Parliaments of Bulgaria (Vice Chair of the Defense Committee).
In 2019 he was elected as a Chair of the NATO Communications and Information Agency Supervisory Board facilitating the consensus among 30 nations. Since 2018 Velizar has been the deputy director of the Institute of Information and Communications Technologies, focusing on consolidation of the academic cyber capacity in Bulgaria and EU (under H2020 project) and study of best practices for effectiveness, efficiency and cyber resilience of IT organizations, the role of IT in institutional change management. The IT and change management / innovation-related research work of Dr. Shalamanov started in 1984 as a project manager, head of section and sector in defense institute, leading intelligent planning and assessment systems development, followed by some projects in space research, institutional change management, integrated command and control / emergency management systems, and computer assisted exercises. He defended his PhD thesis in Kiev (1991) and became Associated Professor in 1998. Since 1993 Dr. Shalamanov is a member of the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association (AFCEA Int.) with a HQ in Washington (member of the Board and Executive Committee for 5 years) and as a deputy minister represented Bulgaria in co-founding of the PfP Consortium (1999) and Geneva Center for Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF, 2000), where he served 12 years as a member of the International Advisory Board.
