Muhanna Al Lawati

Research Fellow

Research MEA Centre for Foreign Policy and Geostrategic Engagement Defence & Security Foreign Policy

Muhanna Al Lawati is a Research Fellow at the MEA Institute for Strategic Studies, where his research focuses on Gulf security dynamics and U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. He is also an Economic and Legal Affairs Officer at the World Trade Organization, working on trade policy and accession processes for countries across the Middle East, Africa, and the Caucasus.

His research interests include sovereign wealth funds, great power competition, the geopolitics of energy, and the intersection between international trade and global security.

Originally from Oman, Muhanna was the first Omani and GCC national accepted into the WTO Accessions Internship Programme. He has participated as a Young Leader at the IISS Manama Dialogue and served as a National Delegate at the Doha Forum. He holds an MA from the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies (IHEID) in Geneva and a BA from the University of Toronto, with academic training in security studies and the political economy of the MENA region.