Director of the Center for Energy Security Studies at the International Strategic Research Organization (USAK). He is a contributor to the German Marshall Fund’s “On Turkey Series” and one of Turkey’s prominent foreign policy monthlies "Analist". He is also the co-editor of the academic journal “Review of International Law and Politics”. Özertem’s research interests are security, political economy, energy, elite politics, Russia, the Caspian Basin, and Turkish Foreign Policy.