Dr. Teng Jianqun

Military Commander

China

Dr. Teng Jianqun is a senior research fellow and director of the Department for American Studies at the China Institute of International Studies. From 1979 to 1992, he served in the People’s Liberation Army — first in the navy and later in the Academy of Military Science, where he served as assistant research fellow and editor-in-chief of the “World Military Review.” Teng has written extensively on arms control, disarmament and nonproliferation including “An Assessment of U.S. Non-proliferation Policy” and “Choices and Challenges of China’s Nuclear Disarmament.”

Mr. John Thornton

Civic Leader

United States

Mr. John Thornton is an American business leader with a keen understanding of globalization and the need for international cooperation. A former president and co-chief operating officer of the Goldman Sachs Group, he is currently a professor and director of global leadership at Tsinghua University in Beijing.

Amb. Roland Timerbaev

Diplomat

Russia

Ambassador Roland Timerbaev sat on the advisory board of the Center for Policy Studies, where he previously served as the chairman of the executive board until 2010. He was a member of the Soviet diplomatic service for 43 years, serving his last post as permanent representative of USSR/Russia to international organizations in Vienna. He also served in the Soviet Mission to the UN. Timerbaev took part in drafting many key international nuclear agreements, including the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the Peaceful Nuclear Explosion Treaty and the IAEA safeguards system, arms control and nonproliferation negotiations. He is viewed throughout the world as one of the fathers of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), the cornerstone document of the nonproliferation regime, and has played an active role in six NPT Review Conferences.

Timerbaev passed away in August 2019.

Amb. Tibor Tóth

Diplomat

Hungary

Ambassador Tibor Tóth is the executive secretary of the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization. He previously served as Hungary’s ambassador and permanent representative to the United Nations in Geneva and in Vienna. In those capacities, he represented Hungary at the Conference on Disarmament and the International Atomic Energy Agency. From August 2005 to July 2013, Tóth served as executive secretary of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization. He is also the former Hungarian deputy state secretary of defense responsible for international affairs. During more than 30 years of work in international disarmament, he also chaired the Biological Weapons Convention negotiations on an implementation and verification regime.

Amb. Ilter Türkmen

Diplomat

Turkey

Ambassador Ilter Türkmen was a former Turkish diplomat and former foreign minister of Turkey. During his diplomatic tenure, he served as the Turkish ambassador to Greece and Russia, and as Turkey’s permanent representative to the United Nations. He was the commissioner general of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency and the UN secretary-general’s special representative in Thailand. After retiring from duty in 1991, Türkmen served as a consultant to a number of foundations, institutions and news sources.

Türkmen passed away on July 6, 2022.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Civic Leader

South Africa

Archbishop Desmond Mpilo Tutu was an Anglican priest who became the first black general secretary of the South African Council of Churches in 1979. As general secretary, he spoke strongly against apartheid, leading to strong counter reaction by the South African government. A month after winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 1984, Tutu was elected the first black Anglican bishop of Johannesburg, and in 1986 he was elected archbishop of Cape Town, the highest position in the Anglican Church in South Africa.

In 1994, after the end of Apartheid and the election of Nelson Mandela, Tutu was appointed chairman of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission to investigate Apartheid-era crimes. His stance of forgiveness and reconciliation has become a celebrated international example of conflict resolution.

Tutu passed away on December 26, 2021.

ACM (ret.) Shashindra Pal Tyagi

Military Commander

India

Retired Air Chief Marshal Shashindra Pal Tyagi served as the chief of the air staff of the Indian Air Force from 2004 to 2007. Tyagi was commissioned as a fighter pilot in the Indian Air Force in 1963. He held many important staff appointments in the Indian military, including director of air defence, assistant chief of the air staff (intelligence), assistant chief of the air staff (operations) at Air Headquarters and senior air staff officer, HQ Central Air Command. He is one of the few officers to command three separate Air Commands in the Indian Air Force: the Central, South Western and Western Air Commands.

Tyagi is a member of the Global Zero Commission on Nuclear Risk Reduction and the Global Zero Commission.

Gen. (ret.) Ehsan ul-Haq

Military Commander

Pakistan

Retired General Ehsan ul-Haq is a former Pakistani military officer now serving as chairman of the advisory board at the Centre for Pakistan and Gulf Studies. He joined the army in October 1969 as an air defense officer and rose to the position of corps commander, Peshawar. In 2001, ul-Haq was appointed head of the Inter Services Intelligence Directorate, the intelligence body of Pakistan. He was appointed chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 2004 where he served until he retired from the military in 2007.