Anne Witkowsky served as the Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations (CSO) from January 2022-January 2025.  In this capacity, she led the Bureau’s efforts to prevent conflict and promote stability in fragile and conflict-affected states, including support for peace negotiations.

  

From 2021-2022, she co-led a senior level task force on support for democracy and countering authoritarianism, as a non-resident Senior Fellow at Freedom House.

 

Previously she served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Stability and Humanitarian Affairs in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy, from 2014-2016.  Prior to that role, Ms. Witkowsky held leadership positions in the State Department’s Bureau of Counterterrorism, as Acting Principal Deputy Coordinator from 2012-2013, and as the Deputy Coordinator for Homeland Security and Multilateral Affairs from 2009-2013.

 

From 2000-2007 she was a Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, where she led high level task force projects and contributed to publications on national security.

  

Earlier Ms. Witkowsky held the position of Director for Defense Policy and Arms Control on the White House National Security Council staff from 1993 to 2000.  In this role she was responsible for conventional armed forces treaty negotiations in Europe and other related European security matters.  She began her government career in the Office of the Secretary of Defense for Policy, where she served in both the Office of Russia, Ukraine and Eurasian Affairs, and in the Office of European Security Negotiations. She joined the federal government as a Presidential Management Intern.

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She has lectured on national security decision making for professional development programs and at both the graduate and undergraduate levels at universities.

 

Ms. Witkowsky holds a Bachelor of Arts in Russian and East European Studies from Yale University, which included a semester at Leningrad State University in the USSR.  She earned a master’s degree in public administration with a concentration in international security from the Harvard Kennedy School.

  

She has been recognized with a number of awards, including State Department Superior and Meritorious Honor Awards, the Department of Defense Medal for Distinguished Civilian Service, and the Secretary of Defense Medal for Outstanding Public Service. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.