CDC Romania - Ovidiu Simina

Ovidiu SIMINA, PhD - Head of International Relations, Communication and Training

LindedIn Academia.edu IMISCOE IMPACTIO ResearchGate.net
Contact: ovidiu.simina @ migratie.ro

Supporting the training unit of CDC Romania since the creation of the organisation in May 2018, Dr Ovidiu Simina became its Head of Training in November 2019, shortly after the end of his secondment as national expert (training manager) within the European Security and Defence College (ESDC) in Brussels (2015-2019). Since August 2024, he is the Head of International Relations, Communication and Training.

A senior research fellow at the Timișoara based Center for Migration and Security Studies (SISEC) which he co-founded in 2006 as a research unit focusing on migration and mobility studies, Dr Simina primarily covers migration security nexus and strategic communications in the broader security and defence environment.

At the CDC Romania, Dr Simina is responsible with both in-house and external CSDP related training, and the development of public communication strategy, management of Association's image promotion policy, coordination of public communication, management of social media accounts and website. He supports our members before their deployment and establishes training activities in co-operation with various partners. Also works on the new courses design, curricula development and implementation of the lessons learnt in future training projects, as well on publications, strategic communication and public relations. Dr Simina acts as liaison with the academic world and the civil society, representing CDC Romania in scientific conferences or meetings, or in relations with national and international partners. He is currently preparing a publication (peer reviewed journal) for which he will act as Senior Editor.

Before focusing on training at both national and European level, Dr Simina had a career in law enforcement which took him from migration policing in units on the western border of Romania to the corridors and halls of the Romanian Parliament and the offices of the top management of the Ministry of Interior HQ in Bucharest, as well to the office of the Romanian Ambassadors in Japan and China, also representing Romania as the top diplomat of his country in the economic capital of P.R. China - Shanghai. He has been exposed to professional experiences in multinational and multiculural environments, working both inside the European Union and in Third Countries. After six year as advisor on legislative matters and international relations to a secretary of state/deputy minister of the Romanian Ministry of Interior, he spent two years as home affairs attaché - police and migration liaison officer in Tokyo. After this diplomatic experience, Dr Simina embraced the crisis management environment in the position of strategic planner (capability development, strategic plans, negotiations, forces deployment to external missions, in-house training) and later on moved to Brussels to work in CSDP training within the EU crisis management structures, as seconded national expert (2015-2019). Between December 2020 and August 2022, he was deployed as HR Training Officer within the EU Advisory Mission (EUAM) Ukraine in Kiev (also working in Orhei, Rep. of Moldova, and then in Rzeszów, Poland, following the evacuation of the Missions HQ in the aftermath of the war in Ukraine). Between August 2022 and June 2024, he has been seconded to the Romanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs as Consul at the Consulate General of Romania in Shanghai, P.R. China, where he was in charge with the management of the diplomatic office, as Acting Consul General of Romania (Gerant intérimaire) from 21 September 2022 to 10 December 2023.

Dr Simina is Law graduate (Law Faculty, Police Academy, Bucharest (1998), holds a MA in High European Studies (The School of High Compartative European Studies - SISEC, West University of Timișoara (2005), has been an Erasmus student (Université de Science et Technologies de Lille) and has earned his PhD in Economics from the West University of Timișoara (2012) with a thesis analysing migration and the labour mobility at EU level, with focus on the socio-economic consequences of the illegal migration. Among the various training he attended, he graduated the first series of Strategic Management of Home Affairs (post-graduate course) at the Romanian National College of Home Affairs (Bucharest, 2008-2009), the 7th CSDP High Level Course 2011-2012 'Konrad Adenauer' at the European Security and Defence College (Brussels, Berlin, Paris and Sofia, 2011-2012), the Senior Police Officer Planning and Command Course for Crisis Management (52/2013) with CEPOL and CoESPU (Vicenza, 2013), the Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Stabilisation course “Cooperation and coordination in post-conflict environments” of the Romanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Bucharest, 2014), the Higher Command Crisis Respond Operations Course at the Crisis Management and Disaster Response Centre of Excellence (Sofia, 2015), the Advanced train the trainer for Learning and Development resource persons, European Commission (Brussels, 2016), the Peace Support Operations Course of Crisis Management and Multinational Operation Department, UNAP (Bucharest, 2020) and European Project Management with Pixel Associatione Culturale (Kiev, online, 2021).