Nino Egadze is a strategic communications specialist and the Founder of the Design Institute in Tbilisi.
With over 20 years of experience in branding, marketing, and strategic communications, Nino has worked with global brands including Philip Morris International and Red Bull. She currently serves as a strategic consultant for Maib Bank in Moldova.
For the past eight years, Nino held senior leadership roles at TBC Group, serving as both Marketing Director and Marketing & BrandX Director. In these roles, she oversaw branding, customer experience, design, marketing strategy, communications, ecosystem development, and CSR initiatives. She also led the group’s market expansion into Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan.
Nino is an alumna of Harvard Business School, a Fellow of the Rumsfeld Foundation, and a graduate of the Leadership for Advanced Development program at Stanford University.
Throughout her career, she has successfully led and executed over 1,000 social projects across four countries, demonstrating a deep commitment to driving impactful, purpose-driven initiatives.

Nino Nanitashvili is a technology evangelist with more than 12 years of management and consulting experience in the tech & startup industry. Currentl,y she supports Google for Startups Accelerator programs across Europe and Israel. Nino has worked with private, non-profit, and government institutions and has consulted with international organizations including the World Bank, United States Agency for International Development, Asian Development Bank, the United Nations Development Program, Grameen Creative Lab and Google. Furthermore, Nino serves as a mentor, youth educator, and advocate for women and girls in both the Georgian and global tech ecosystems. She is one of the creators of the Grace Hopper Award that celebrates and encourages diversity in the ICT industry. Nino's academic background lies in entrepreneurship, social sciences and public policy, including her MSc in Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship from the London School of Economics and Political Science. Nino's work has been recognised by and showcased via Forbes 30 Under 30, TEdx, One Young World, Emerging Young Leaders Award, Women in Computing Social Impact Award and more.

Nivine Sandouka is the Regional Director with the Alliance for Middle East Peace (ALLMEP). She is leading in the field of peace programming, and gender mainstreaming. Previously, she worked with the German Association for Development Cooperation – AGIAMONDO, as well as Oxfam GB, CARE International, IPCRI, and the Regional Organization for Peace Economics and Security – ROPES. She also runs an online-based initiative called ‘Judi- from me to you’ that aims to connect women together and volunteers in several civil society organizations.

To pursue her passion she is the Board Director of a newly established NGO called ‘Our Rights- Hoqoqona’ in Jerusalem, focusing on the civic and political rights of Palestinians in East Jerusalem, especially women. In addition, she currently sits as a board member for ‘The Jerusalem Center for Women’. She gives lectures to many international and national groups focusing on the political situation and East Jerusalem. She often participates in conferences, including J Street and Cannan Project in Berlin among others. She has written many articles focusing on the situation of women in EJ, youth, and finally around normalisation for the Palestine Israel Journal.

Oleksandra Matviichuk is a Ukrainian human rights lawyer and civil society leader.

Oliver Bullough is an award-winning journalist and author from Wales, and the author of Coda's oligarchy newsletter. He specialises in writing about financial crime and the former Soviet Union, and his most recent books have been Butler to the World and Moneyland.

Özlem Cekic is the founder and chair of Bridgebuilders, Denmark’s first Centre for Dialogue Coffee, which works to prevent hate and violence through conversation. She is also a former Danish parliamentarian, author, and internationally recognized speaker on bridge-building, inclusion, and dialogue.
Born in Turkey in 1976, Özlem lived in Finland for two years while her parents worked at the Turkish Embassy in Helsinki, before the family settled in Denmark in the early 1980s. She was the first in her family to attend high school and later trained as a nurse, working from 2000 to 2007 in psychiatric care with children, refugees, and individuals facing addiction. In 2003, she became the first woman with an ethnic minority background elected to the board of the Danish Nurses Organisation, where she also led a network advocating against discrimination in healthcare.
From 2007 to 2015, Özlem served in the Danish Parliament as one of its first female politicians with a Muslim immigrant background. After leaving parliament, she began a new chapter as a public speaker and advisor, working in Denmark and internationally to build bridges across divides—between ethnic communities, institutions, and political viewpoints.
In 2018, she became only the second Dane to give a TED Talk, viewed by more than two million people, and her story was featured in a BBC documentary seen by approximately five million viewers.
Özlem has written several books for both adults and children. Her most recent work, Overcoming Hate Through Dialogue: Confronting Prejudice, Racism, and Bigotry with Conversation and Coffee, has been translated into English and Korean. Her work has earned her numerous honors, including Denmark’s democracy awards, the 2007 SOS Racism Friendship Prize, the “Kurds of the Year” award from President Masoud Barzani, and the “Political Firebrand of the Year” prize in 2016.
She lives in Denmark with her husband, Devrim, and their three children: Furkan, Yasmin Aze, and Yusuf.

Pablo Jiménez Arandia is the 2024 AI Accountability Fellow at the Pulitzer Center. He is an investigative reporter and freelance journalist based in Barcelona, covering the intersection of technology, social justice, and human rights.
Since 2020, Pablo has reported on the use of algorithms and AI systems in the public sector, such as prisons, welfare policies, and law enforcement. He has worked with Lighthouse Reports, AlgorithmWatch, and other organizations on several algorithmic accountability projects. He has also produced two documentary podcasts on the topic.
Pablo contributes to some of Spain's major media outlets, including El País and El Confidencial.

Paul Caruana Galizia is an award-winning investigative reporter at the Financial Times. His journalism has triggered parliamentary inquiries, the dismantling of a multi-billion pound hedge fund, and Amazon, Disney, and Netflix dropping projects with one of the world's most successful authors. His book about his mother Daphne, A Death in Malta, won the Cornelius Ryan Award.

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Peter McIndoe is a performance artist and storyteller, best known as the creator of Birds Aren’t Real — a viral movement that has captivated the internet with billions of views. His work has been featured on the front page of The New York Times and has sparked global conversations about misinformation and media literacy.
Peter has delivered talks at TED and the Nobel Prize Summit, where he explored the power of collective myth-making and the role of performance in social commentary. His current focus is pioneering internet cinema as a medium across multiple projects.

Phil Chetwynd is the Global News Director of Agence France-Presse (AFP). He leads a newsroom of 1,700 journalists based in over 150 countries. Phil has been responsible for AFP's editorial strategy prioritizing on-the-ground human storytelling in multimedia formats, the development of a world-class video service and an award-winning pivot on climate coverage. He has also made AFP a leading voice in the battle against disinformation.
During a long career at AFP, Phil occupied the posts of Global Editor-in-Chief and Chief Asia Editor. He was also a foreign correspondent working in Asia and the Middle East. He began his career in British newspapers. He sits on the World Editors Forum and the board of Reporters Without Borders.

Phoebe McIndoe is an award-winning radio journalist and co-producer of the podcast Telling Stories which featured in Bello Collective's top 100 Outstanding Podcasts. Her work has featured at international festivals including Prix Marulic, HearSay and XMTR. Her recent series County Lines was awarded a silver ARIAS and was featured at DIG's festival for outstanding international journalism.

Platon is one of the world's most renowned portrait photographers, having photographed more world leaders than anyone else in history, including six American presidents. He has photographed over 30 covers for TIME Magazine, including their 2008 Vladimir Putin Person of The Year cover which was awarded 1st prize at the World Press Photo Contest, and most recently, their 2024 Donald Trump Person of The Year.

In 2008, Platon signed on as staff photographer to the New Yorker, winning a Peabody Award and two National Magazine Awards for his photo essays. He has published four books with subjects ranging from the power of world leaders to the dignity of those who serve in the US Military. In 2013, Platon founded The People’s Portfolio, a non-profit foundation dedicated to celebrating emerging leaders of human rights and civil rights around the world. The People’s Portfolio creates a visual language that breaks barriers, uplifts dignity, fights discrimination, and enlists the public to support human rights around the world.

Platon is currently on the board for Arts and Culture at the World Economic Forum. Platon’s life’s work is the subject of a Netflix documentary, Abstract: The Art of Design. His first film, My Body Is Not A Weapon, features survivors of wartime sexual violence and 2018 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Dr. Denis Mukwege. Platon’s archive of prominent African American civil rights leaders and cultural leaders was acquired by the Smithsonian in 2020.

Platon headlined at TED Vancouver in 2022, promoting curiosity over judgment. Platon’s second film, Portrait of a Stranger, was made in partnership with the United Nations, honoring the voices of refugees from around the world. Platon’s new book, The Defenders, was made in collaboration with The People’s Portfolio and celebrates human rights activists from around the world, published May 2024.

A Scotsman turned global storyteller, Quentin Sommerville has built a career reporting on the world's most dangerous hotspots.
His early days as a Shanghai and Beijing correspondent honed his skills for navigating across cultures, while his three-year stint as the BBC’s Afghanistan correspondent brought him face-to-face with the human cost of conflict.
Through his insightful reporting, he gives a voice to those living in the midst of turmoil, offering viewers a glimpse into the dark reality of war.
He’s won multiple awards for his war reporting from Iraq, Syria, Libya and Ukraine. Most recently he’s reported from the war in Ukraine, the uprising in Myanmar, and the drugs trade along the US Mexico border. Through his insightful reporting, he gives a voice to those living in the midst of turmoil, offering viewers a glimpse into the dark reality of war.
Quentin Sommerville been based in Beirut for the last decade. He studied at Edinburgh University and grew up in Stirling and Glasgow.

Rachel Cockerell is an author and historian, born and raised in London. Her first book, Melting Point: Family, Memory and the Search for a Promised Land, is the story of a forgotten project which brought 10,000 Russian Jews to Texas pre-WWI. Told entirely through interwoven primary sources, it has been called 'miraculous' by Zadie Smith and 'genre-bending' by Anne Applebaum. Melting Point is published by Farrar, Straus & Giroux (6 May 2025). Rachel Cockerell has spoken about her work on CNN, the BBC, and at TEDx.

Rachel Corp is Chief Executive Officer of ITN, overseeing one of the largest independent production companies in the UK. ITN currently creates more than 50 hours of television each week and amasses over 7 billion views of digital content annually.

ITN produces Emmy- and BAFTA-winning news programmes and content for the UK’s commercial public service broadcasters—ITV, Channel 4, and Channel 5—alongside award-winning factual programming for global streamers, international broadcasters, major brands, and digital platforms.

Prior to becoming CEO, Rachel was Editor of ITV News, where she led the team behind celebrated exclusive and original reporting both in the UK and internationally.

Rena Effendi is a filmmaker, writer, an award-winning documentary photographer and author of two monographs “Pipe Dreams: A Chronicle of Lives along the Pipeline” and “Liquid Land”. Her photography has been described as having a deep sense of empathy with a quiet celebration of the strength of the human spirit. She is the laureate of the Prince Claus Fund award and has been shortlisted for the prestigious Prix Pictet award in Photography and Sustainability.

She spoke at the World Economic Forum in Davos twice and is a member of its Cultural Leadership network. Effendi’s work has been exhibited at the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Saatchi Gallery, İstanbul Modern, Venice Biennial and NYC MOMA. Rena Effendi is a National Geographic Explorer and a frequent contributor to the National Geographic Magazine.

Rishad Patel is the co-founder of Splice Media. For over twenty years, he has worked as a product and design professional, building media strategy, products, and branding for audiences across multiple platforms and formats in Singapore, India, New Zealand, Europe, and the United States.
Rishad has served as a design consultant for MIT and ETH, and as an editorial consultant for news media companies in Singapore, New Zealand, and India. He also co-founded an app startup in San Francisco.
He writes a weekly newsletter on media product and design, mentors people on media entrepreneurship and designing products for revenue — and genuinely wants to help you build something meaningful.

Ryan Broderick is a freelance writer and podcaster specializing in web culture and technology. He writes Garbage Day, an award-winning newsletter that explores the daily joys and horrors of internet culture. His work has also appeared in Fast Company, The Verge, and Foreign Policy. And yes—he’s also met every famous internet cat.

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Ryan Powell is the Head of Innovation and Media Business at the International Press Institute (IPI), where he leads funding, training, and advisory programmes for independent media around the world. He supports media organizations in developing diversified income streams, audience-centric distribution, and future-proofed editorial formats.
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In 2024, he co-authored a book on revenue generation and editorial innovation, introducing pricing strategies, value propositions, and management approaches for ad-, content-, and service-based revenue models. Previously, Ryan Powell led product and publishing divisions at an Austrian magazine and advised media organizations on revenue generation and product strategy. He has published and reported for CNN International, the World Bank, the Center for International Media Assistance, and others across Dar es Salaam, Berlin, Istanbul, Accra, and Vienna.
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Powell holds an MPhil from the University of Oxford and a BA from Suffolk University.

Salomé Jashi is a documentary filmmaker and co-founder of the Documentary Association Georgia, as well as Sakdoc Film, where she primarily produces her films. Her film Taming the Garden premiered at the Sundance Film Festival's World Cinema Documentary Competition and the Berlinale Forum in 2021, and was nominated for the European Film Awards. Jashi’s earlier work has received awards at Visions du Réel, Jihlava IFF, FIC Valdivia, and Zagrebdox, among others.
Her body of work includes feature-length and short documentaries, both as director and producer. She is also the recipient of the Berlin Art Prize and the European Cultural Award KAIROS Prize in 2024. A fellow of the DAAD Artists-in-Berlin Program, Salome Jashi teaches documentary filmmaking and leads workshops across Europe and Asia.

Sam Gill is the President and CEO of the Doris Duke Foundation (DDF), a national philanthropic organization based in New York. DDF supports five national grantmaking programs—in the performing arts, the environment, medical research, child and family well-being, and the promotion of mutual understanding between communities. It also operates two public-facing centers: Duke Farms and Shangri La.
Before joining DDF, Sam served as Senior Vice President and Chief Program Officer at the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. There, he oversaw more than $100 million in annual grantmaking across all program areas, and led the foundation’s research and evaluation portfolio as well as its grants administration.

Sara Hossain is a Senior Advocate at the Supreme Court of Bangladesh and a partner at the law firm Dr. Kamal Hossain and Associates. She serves pro bono as the Honorary Executive Director of the Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust (BLAST).
She is currently a Professor of Practice at SOAS, University of London, a member of the United Nations University–International Institute of Global Health’s High-Level Advisory Committee, and an Overseas Bencher of the Middle Temple. She also chairs the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Iran and previously served on the Commission of Inquiry on the 2018 Gaza Protests, appointed by the President of the UN Human Rights Council.
Sara has been involved in landmark cases before the Supreme Court of Bangladesh on issues of equality and discrimination—particularly concerning women’s rights, freedom of expression, and protection from torture. She frequently writes and speaks on women’s rights, equality and non-discrimination, freedom of expression, access to justice, and public interest litigation. Her publications include Honour: Crimes, Paradigms and Violence Against Women.
She was educated at Wadham College, Oxford, and was called to the Bar from Middle Temple. She is also a member of the Dhaka Bar Association.

Dr. Seema Jilani is an Assistant Professor of Pediatric Hospitalist Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Children's Hospital, where she trained. Her humanitarian aid work has taken her to Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, Bosnia, Ukraine, Gaza and the West Bank over the past 20 years. She has treated migrants on board refugee rescue ships in the Mediterranean Sea, critically ill children on board medical evacuation flights, and responded on the scene after the 2020 explosion in the Port of Beirut, Lebanon. She was selected by the U.S. State Department as a Senior Fulbright Scholar to Istanbul, where she designed a curriculum for medical students on how to engage in media advocacy. Dr. Jilani has briefed the United Nations Security Council, the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Senior Officials at The White House and National Security Council. She is a Member of the Council on Foreign Relations and her work has been featured in The New York Times, NPR, PBS NewsHour, The New Yorker, GQ Heroes, and The Guardian.

Shazna Nessa is an American, British-Bangladeshi writer, currently writing Beneath the Same Stars, a literary memoir about a girl’s escape from child marriage, which ultimately leads her to a decades-long pursuit of an ever-shifting idea of truth, memory, and freedom. Shazna has a background in visual journalism and has worked at The Wall Street Journal, The Knight Foundation, The Associated Press, and Condé Nast. She was awarded a degree in linguistics, literature, and history from the Sorbonne, Paris. Fellowships include a MacDowell residency in 2024, a John S. Knight fellowship at Stanford University in 2014, and a Sulzberger fellowship at Columbia University in 2008. She is currently an entrepreneur in residence at the Brown Institute at Columbia University.

Shelley Thakral is the spokesperson for the World Food Programme (WFP) in the Democratic Republic of Congo. She has also worked with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Facebook/Meta, WHO, and UNICEF. Previously, she served as the WFP spokesperson in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, as well as in Afghanistan, Southern Africa, and Yemen.
Shelley spent 16 years as a BBC journalist, reporting from regions including North America, the Middle East, and South Asia. Born in Britain,  she now calls North Goa home.

Shola Lawal is an independent journalist and filmmaker based in Lagos and Berlin. Her work focuses on social justice and development issues, the environment, and all things Africa. She is regularly published in Al Jazeera and The New York Times, among others.

Simon Allison is the co-founder of The Continent, Africa's most widely distributed newspaper, and an executive board member of the International Press Institute.

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Sofia Schurig is the 2024 AI Accountability Fellow at the Pulitzer Center. She is a Brazilian investigative reporter and researcher, focusing on the intersection of human rights and technology, particularly in the areas of cybercrimes and online child safety.
At 18, during the pandemic and while still in high school, Sofia began her career in journalism. Today, she is a staff reporter at Núcleo Jornalismo, where she started as an intern while pursuing a degree in communications and culture. She also works as a researcher at SaferNet, a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting internet safety.
Sofia’s reporting has been utilized by Brazilian law enforcement and government agencies to address issues of youth extremist radicalization and has prompted major tech companies to moderate thousands of instances of criminal content on social media. Her work is diverse, encompassing investigations into the exploitation of single mothers on online forums, profiles of “white-hat hackers” who assist in recovering hacked Instagram accounts, and much more.

Susan Morrison is the articles editor of The New Yorker and the author of the New York Times-bestselling biography "Lorne: The Man Who Invented Saturday Night Live."  She is the former editor in chief of the New York Observer and an original editor of SPY magazine. She lives in New York City.

Sushmita is the 2024 AI Accountability Fellow at the Pulitzer Center. She is an international award-winning journalist, researcher, photographer, and former engineer with over 15 years of experience across disciplines. She has worked on issues of climate change, infrastructure, environmental justice, forest governance, health, gender, and more.
She is a former Pulitzer Center grantee; a 2024 diversity fellow of the Society of Environmental Journalists and the Uproot Project; and a winner of the 2024 Covering Climate Now award (Justice category) and the 2022 Red Ink Award for excellence in Indian journalism.
Sushmita is a guest lecturer at TISS in Mumbai, where she teaches modules on climate change and health for master’s students in public and mental health, as well as foundation courses in human rights. She frequently delivers talks and lectures on issues of public importance. Her articles have appeared in India’s leading newspapers, magazines, and podcast platforms.

Tako Robakidze is a documentary photographer based in Tbilisi. She holds a Bachelor's degree in Law from Tbilisi State University. Alongside her university studies, she attended the documentary photography school Sepia, where she studied for five years. In 2015, she earned a Master's degree from the Graduate School of Journalism at Caucasus University.
Since 2014, Tako has worked as a freelance photographer, collaborating with Georgian and international NGOs to cover a range of social issues. Her work focuses on documenting sociopolitical conditions and the ongoing impact of war in Georgia.
She received the Magnum Foundation Photography and Social Justice Fellowship in 2017, and in 2020, was awarded the Tbilisi Photography & Multimedia Museum Multimedia Lab Production Grant and a Goethe Institute production grant for her project on Georgian IDPs.
In 2021, Tako received the Stanley Greene Legacy Prize and Fellowship, and in 2022, she was selected as a VII Academy Fellow and became a National Geographic Explorer. In 2023, she was chosen for the VII Academy Mentorship Program, and in 2024, she received the Alexia Award of Excellence.

Thornike Gordadze is a Georgian/French scholar in the fields of political science, international relations, and history, with a focus on the Caucasus region and European integration. He earned his PhD from the Paris Institute of Political Studies (Sciences Po), specializing in the political history of the Caucasus and the dynamics of post-Soviet statehood. His academic research encompasses nationalism, state-building, and the influence of external powers in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus.

Dr. Gordadze has built a prominent career balancing academia and diplomacy. He served as the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs for Georgia and was appointed as a chief negotiator onGeorgia’s Association Agreement and visa liberalization with the European Union. He was later appointed as the State Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration, further contributing to Georgia's foreign policy strategies during his tenure.

In addition to his governmental roles, Dr. Gordadze has been deeply involved in academia. He has held teaching positions at Sciences Po in Paris, where he led courses on democracy, state-building, and security in the post-Soviet space. He also served as the head of reserch department at the French Higher National Defense Studies. He was senior fellow at International Institutte for Strategic Studies (IISS).  His research and expertise have been recognized by various international institutions, and he has participated in numerous conferences, research projects, and policy discussions centered on the geopolitics of Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and Russia.

Usama Mukwaya is a Ugandan screenwriter, film director, and producer born in Kampala. With nearly a decade of experience in storytelling and filmmaking, he is known for shaping the emotional and creative direction of numerous films.
His notable credits include Bala Bala Sese (2015), Love Faces (2018), Kyaddala (2019–), Sanyu (2021–2024), The Blind Date (2021), Sixteen Rounds (2021), The Passenger (2023), Nambi (2023), and Call 112 (2025). He trained at Maisha Film Lab, holds a diploma in IT from Makerere University, and another in screenwriting and directing from MNFPAC.
Usama is the founder of O Studios Entertainment Ltd., a multimedia company behind several acclaimed local and international productions. He served as General Secretary and Treasurer of the Screenwriters Guild of Uganda and programmed the 7th–9th editions of the Pearl International Film Festival.
A Young Achievers Award winner in Film & TV, he also directed content acquisition for Stream Afrique, a pan-African VOD platform. As producer of the iKon Awards (2023–2025), he earned his first major live TV production credits. He is currently an executive member of the Uganda Film Network and remains committed to using narrative to shape Africa’s social, cultural, and creative future.

Uta Bekaia is a Georgian-born multimedia artist currently based between Brooklyn and Tbilisi. His work centers on the speculative recreation of ancestral rituals, reimagined through a Queer utopian lens. Drawing inspiration from traditional crafts, Bekaia creates elaborate wearable sculptures, ceramics, tapestries, and objects, which he weaves into immersive installations, films, and live performances.

Dr. Volodymyr Yermolenko is a Ukrainian philosopher, journalist and writer, President of PEN Ukraine, doctor of political studies (France), and PhD in philosophy (kandydat nauk, Ukraine). He is analytics director at Internews Ukraine and chief editor of UkraineWorld.org, a multimedia project in English about Ukraine. He is asociate professor at Kyiv-Mohyla Academy. He is a book writer of non-fiction and fiction, winner of Myroslav Popovych Prize (2021), Petro Mohyla Prize (2021), Yurii Sheveliov Prize (2018), Book of the Year prize in Ukraine (2023, 2018, 2015) and others. He is also head of the board of International Renaissance Foundation (Open Society Foundations) and a  public lecturer. Author of podcasts “Explaining Ukraine” and “Thinking in Dark Times” (in English), co-author (with Tetyana Ogarkova) of “Kultpodcast” (in Ukrainian). He is the author of numerous articles in international and Ukrainian media. Published in The Economist, Le Monde, Financial Times, New York Times, Newsweek, Yermolenko also gives numerous comments to BBC, CNN, Al Jazeera, France 24, France Culture, Radio France International etc. His texts and interviews have been published in Ukrainian, English, French, German, Spanish, Polish, Italian, Russian, Dutch, Norwegian, Czech, Greek, Chinese and others. Father of three daughters.

Wynona Mutisi is a Zimbabwean visual artist working as a Layout Designer and Illustrator at The Continent, an African digital newsweekly.

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