Mr Ashton Robinson

Ashton Robinson was born in Waratah, NSW, and eduacted at ANU where he graduated with a Masters in African history.

He had an initial career in the then Department of Foreign Affairs in Canberra. Most of his subsequent experience in Government was with the Defence intelligence Organisation, the Iraq Survey Group in Baghdad and the Office of National Assessments (ONA) - part of the Prime Minister's portfolio - where he dealt with long term strategic matters, including terrorism, transnational crime, illegal migration and Africa. His Iraq experence formed the basis of his book Meeting Saddam's Men.

In the 1980s, Ashton published as Assistant Editor three volumes of documents relating to Australian foreign policy in the 1940s. He was an occasional lecturer in History at Wollongong, Sydney and La Trobe universities an on strategic issues at the Australian Defence Force Academy and the Australian Command and Staff College. He has also lectured at all the Australian single service staff colleges, the Australian Army Research Centre and the university of Seychelles.

From 2016 to 2023 he was an Honorary Fellow at the School of Social and Political Sciences at University of Melbourne. His research interests cover sovereign risk in Africa, financial intelligence and governance, with a focus on Seychelles reflected in his book Rene and Postcolonial Seychelles.

In 2023 he joined the Strategic and defence Studies Centre at ANU.

He blogs for the Lowy Institute's Interpreter.

He is married to Cathy Robertson and has a daughter Sigrid.

M.A. (ANU)

Seychelles

Africa

Indian Ocean island states and strategic issues

sovereign risk

financial intelligence

Iraq