Political scientist Raimundas Lopata was born on April 10, 1965, in Vilnius.

In 1990, he graduated from the History faculty at Vilnius University. In 1994, he defended his Doctoral thesis at Vytautas Magnum University. He has worked on probation in USA, Great Britain, Holland, Finland and other countries. Since 1994, R. Lopata has worked in the Institute of International Relations and Political Science (IIRPS) at Vilnius University. He started his career as a research fellow for the IIRPS and in 1995; he was appointed the vice-director of the Institute for Studies. Since 1999, R. Lopata has headed the institute.

Prof. Raimundas Lopata is also the chairman of the Board of Lithuanian foreign policy and the chairman of the board at the Centre of Strategic Research. He also is the chairman of the European Humanities University’s International Relations’ Master’s program’s advisory board and the chairman of the Association of Academic Institutions and the non-governmental organization of the Republic of Lithuania and the Russian Federation’s Kaliningrad region.

He is a member of the editorial staff of the magazine Politologija (Political Science), an associate editor of the magazine Lithuanian Foreign Policy Review and a Lithuanian Association of Political Scientists’ board member.

His scholarly interests include: international relations and foreign policy: the balance of power, Atlantic issues, regional, state and Lithuanian-Russian relations and the development of Kaliningrad region.

In 2004, the publishing house “Versus aureus” published the work of Prof. R. Lopata, The President’s spin.

The photo is from the author’s personal archive.