Experts & Staff

Vessela Tcherneva

Deputy Director

Areas of expertise

EU foreign policy; Western Balkans and Black Sea regions; transatlantic relations; regional studies; energy

Languages

Bulgarian, English, German, Russian

Biography

Vessela Tcherneva is deputy director of the European Council on Foreign Relations. Her topics of focus include EU foreign policy and the Western Balkans and Black Sea region.

Between January and July 2022, she held the position of Foreign Policy Advisor to the Bulgarian Prime Minister Kiril Petkov. From 2010 to 2013, she was the spokesperson for the Bulgarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and a member of Foreign Minister Nickolay Mladenov’s political cabinet. Previously, she was secretary of the International Commission on the Balkans, chaired by former Italian Prime Minister Giuliano Amato and former German President Richard von Weizsäcker; supervising editor of the Foreign Policy Bulgaria magazine; and political officer at the Bulgarian Embassy in Washington, DC. Tcherneva holds an MA in Political Science from the Rhienische Friedrich-Wilhelm Universität in Bonn.

Hashim Thaci should resign

The indictment for war crimes against Kosovo President Hassim Thaci helpfully upends the poorly conceived US initiative to reconcile Serbia and Kosovo. But it fatally delegitimates Kosovo’s current leadership

After the French veto: The new scramble for the Western Balkans

Without a credible path to EU membership, the Western Balkans could easily succumb to the lure of regional nationalism – and to generous Russian, Turkish, and Chinese offers in the EU’s own back yard

Publications

Articles

The future of the European Political Community

As Europe’s leaders meet in Moldova, the potential of the European Political Community to contribute to security and foster connection across the continent is becoming ever clearer

Easy prey? Russia’s influence in Bulgaria

Newly released investigations have shed light on how corruption and the weak rule of law in Bulgaria enable Russian influence to thrive

Pandemic trends: Serbia looks east, Ukraine looks west

Public attitudes in Ukraine and Serbia raise pressing questions about EU enlargement. If member states are to sustain this process, they will need to base it on a shared sense of belonging

The end of tit-for-tat politics in Bulgaria

In an environment in which European and American interests are not always the same, it is short-sighted and dangerous for Bulgarian leaders to question their country’s geopolitical alignment

Podcasts

Events

In the media