Christine van den Toorn, Senior Advisor CDNR
Director, Institute of Regional and International Studies
Ms. van den Toorn is the Director of the Institute for Regional and International Studies at the American University of Iraq, Sulaimani, where she taught Middle East history for four years. She has conducted fieldwork all over the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, with a particular focus on disputed territories in Ninewa and has delivered talks, moderated panels and been interviewed about her research. She is a reporter for Iraq Oil Report and has published articles with them as well as other leading publications like Inside Iraqi Politics, Daily Beast and Niqash. Ms. van den Toorn has also conducted baseline reports and social impact assessments for major international oil companies operating in the Kurdistan region of Iraq, working with teams of student researchers from AUIS.
Ms. van den Toorn received her M.A. in Middle East History from the University of Virginia and served in the United States Peace Corps in Morocco. She has studied Arabic at Middlebury College and Georgetown University, as well as at the University of Damascus in Syria and the French Institute for Near East Studies in Damascus.
For a list of her publications, please click here.