Gala Riani

Gala is head of S-RM's Strategic Intelligence practice, advising clients on the global (geo)political, security and operating landscape. Gala began her career working for the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) as a political advisor to the KRG’s Nordic representative in Stockholm and as an advisor to the Minister of Sports and Youth in Erbil. She subsequently joined IHS Global Insight as a Middle East and North Africa (MENA) analyst and later managed the company’s MENA regional desk. She spent five years with Control Risks, leaving that company as a director in the Global Risk Analysis department. Before joining S-RM in 2020, Gala worked as an independent political risk and due diligence consultant covering MENA and Sub-Saharan Africa.

Gala has a BA in Social and Political Sciences from Cambridge University, an MSc in Theory and History of International Relations from the London School of Economics and Political Science and is a graduate of the United World College of the Atlantic. Gala speaks Kurdish, Swedish and basic Persian.