M. Ashraf Haidari is a Fellow with New America’s Future Security Program. He is the Founder and President of Displaced International (DI) and previously served as the Ambassador of Afghanistan to Sri Lanka, as well as the Director-General of the South Asia Cooperative Environment Program (SACEP) from 2018 to 2022. Before that, he was the Director-General of Policy and Strategy at Afghanistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 2015 to 2018. Earlier in his career, Haidari served as Afghanistan’s Deputy Chief of Mission (Minister-Counselor) to India for three years and, prior to that, as the Deputy Assistant National Security Advisor for Policy and Oversight. He also completed more than two terms at the Embassy of Afghanistan in the United States, holding key positions such as Chargé d’Affaires, Deputy Chief of Mission, Political Counselor, and Acting Defense Attaché.
Haidari is a writer and a frequent TV and radio commentator on Afghanistan, as well as regional and international affairs. He has held senior research and visiting fellowship positions at prominent international think tanks, including the Institute of National Security Studies of Sri Lanka (INSSSL), New America (NA), the Afghan Institute for Strategic Studies (AISS), the Observer Research Foundation (ORF), and the Delhi Policy Group (DPG). He holds a Master of Arts in Security Studies (International Security and Development) from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service (SFS) in Washington, D.C., and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and International Relations from Wabash College in Indiana. During 2002–2003, he was an SFS Fellow in Foreign Service and earned a graduate certificate in Refugees, Migration, and Humanitarian Emergencies from the Institute for the Study of International Migration.
Since 2023, Haidari has taught at the SFS as an adjunct faculty member and serves as a World in 2050 Senior Fellow at the Diplomatic Courier. His contributions have been recognized with numerous awards, including the 2021 Roots of Peace Global Citizen Award for his humanitarian diplomacy in promoting peace and prosperity through the revitalization of agriculture and agribusiness in war-torn countries from Afghanistan to Vietnam.