Elizabeth Wood
Carol Saivetz 
Toghzan Kassenova

Toghzan Kassenova

Senior Fellow | Center for Policy Research, SUNY-Albany

Dr. Togzhan Kassenova is a Washington, DC-based senior fellow with the Project on International Security, Commerce, and Economic Statecraft (PISCES) at the Center for Policy Research, SUNY-Albany and a nonresident fellow in the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She is an expert on nuclear politics and financial crime prevention. She currently works on issues related to proliferation financing controls, exploring ways to minimize access of proliferators to the global financial system. Kassenova holds a Ph.D. in Politics from the University of Leeds and is a Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist (CAMS). From 2011 to 2015 Kassenova served on the UN secretary general’s Advisory Board on Disarmament Matters. Kassenova is the author of Atomic Steppe: How Kazakhstan Gave Up the Bomb (Stanford University Press, 2022).

Answers

Did the Soviet military do a lot of nuclear testing?

Did the Soviet military expose their population to radiation?

How did racism play into the Soviet’s decision on where to test nuclear weapons?

How did the people of Kazakhstan fight back against Soviet testing?

What are the lasting effects of Soviet nuclear testing?

Where did the Soviet military conduct their nuclear weapons tests?