Guy Berger
Director for Freedom of Expression and Media Development, UNESCO
Guy has many years of experience in the African media and headed the School of Journalism & Media Studies at Rhodes University in Grahamstown, South Africa until being appointed Director for Freedom of Expression and Media Development at UNESCO.
Abdessattar Ben Moussa
President, LTDH
Abdessattar is the President of the Tunisian Human Rights League (LTDH). Previously, he served as head of the Tunisian National Lawyers’ Association.
Aboubakr Jamaï
Publisher
Aboubakr is the founder and editor of Moroccan weekly magazine Le Journal Hebdomadaire. In the past, he co-founded Upline Securities, Morocco's first independent investment bank and was a financial and economic adviser on the Executive Secretariat of the Middle East and North Africa.
Kamel Labidi
President, INRIC
Kamel is a Tunisian journalist and human rights defender with many years of media experience. He is currently the president of the National Authority for Reform of Information and Communication (INRIC) in Tunisia and is a prominent campaigner within the IFEX Tunisia Monitoring Group (IFEX-TMG).
Tatiana Repkova
Founder & Director, Media Managers Club
Tatiana is a newspaper and media management consultant who has worked in over 18 countries, and is the founder of Media Managers Club, an online source for sharing news and expertise in the media community. She is the former Director of Research and Information Management at WAN-IFRA.
Magda Abu-Fadil
Director, Journalism Training Program, American University of Beirut
Magda is Director of the Journalism Training Program at the American University of Beirut. She has years of experience as a foreign correspondent and editor with international news organizations such as Agence France-Presse and United Press International.
Fahem Boukadous
Jounalist and activist, Tunisia
Fahem is a Tunisian human rights activist and journalist who has been persecuted for reporting on human rights. Fahem was reporting on a social protest movement in the Gafsa Redeyef mining region of southern Tunisia for satellite TV channel Al-Hiwar-Ettounsi, when government authorities arrested him.
Gamal Eid
Executive Director, Arabic Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI)
Gamal is the founder and executive director of ANHRI, the Arab world's leading organization for providing original research, legal aid, and technical, networking, and strategic support for the defense of freedom of opinion, expression, and belief.
Anette Novak
Editor in Chief, Norran, Sweden
Anette has been editor-in-chief of daily newspaper Norran since 2009, and became a member of the Board of the Swedish Media Association in the same year. She has been working to turn the 100 year-old Norran into a modern media house with a focus on co-creation, moving the trademark position from "news leader" to "motor in shaping the community's future.”
Nabeel Rajab
Director, Bahrain Center for Human Rights
Nabeel is the president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights, and has been a human rights defender for years. In addition to being on the Advisory Committee for the Middle East Division of Human Rights Watch, he is the Deputy Secretary General for the International Federation of Human Rights and the Chairman of CARAM Asia, an NGO for research on AIDS and mobility.
Ghias al-Jundi
PEN International Writers In Prison Committee/IFEX-TMG Advocacy officer
Ghias is a Syrian journalist and human rights activist who was arrested, imprisoned for 4 years and tortured for his writings on human rights. He continued working in human rights after his release, but after learning he was being targeted by the Syrian government, Ghias left the country to avoid persecution.
Jacek Utko
Design director, Bonnier Business Press (BPP)
Jacek is the award-winning design director for Swedish company BBP, which publishes newspapers in eight Central European countries. Jacek has won over 40 accolades; notably, two of the newspapers he redesigned won "World's Best Designed Newspaper," from the Society for News Design.
Hafez al-Bukhari
President, Yemen Polling Centre
Hafez is an accomplished journalist and president of the Yemen Polling Center, an independent political research center that he founded in 2005. The Centre was the 2010 recipient of the Best Partner in the Middle East and North Africa award from Gallup International.
Fabrice Epelboin
Journalist and Entrepreneur
Fabrice teaches at Sciences Po Paris and CELSA/Sorbonne universities and since the mid 1990s has developed numerous online businesses. He was the editorial director at ReadWriteWeb’s Francophone edition, a blog important to the Tunisian revolution that published writing by Slim Amamou and other Tunisian personalities.
Hussam Eddin Mohammad
Journalist and Literary Critic
Hussam is a journalist with a career spanning over 25 years of reporting and creative writing. He has worked for leading newspapers, magazines and publishing houses and is well-known as a literature and art critic, column writer and journalist. He has held various senior editorial positions and founded the Al-Wa'I (دار الوعي) publishing house in Damascus and co-founded the Syrian Writers Association.
Yousef Ahmed
General Coordinator of the Arab Network for Freedom of Expression
Yousef is a journalist and freedom of speech activist and has many years of experience in the field of media development and training. He ran the Middle East Program at Amnesty International/Dutch Section for five years and is the co-founder and general coordinator of the recently established Arab Network for Freedom of Expression.
Mansoor al-Jamri
Editor in Chief, Al Wasat
Mansoor is the co-founder and editor in chief of Al Wasat, an independent Arabic-language newspaper in Bahrain that has regularly faced harassment and political intimidation. This year, Mansoor received the 2011 Committee to Protect Journalists International Press Freedom award.
Marwan Bishara
Senior political analyst, Al Jazeera
Marwan is the senior political analyst at Al Jazeera, where he hosts and edits the network show Empire, which examines global powers and their actions through field reporting and expert panels. He is regularly called upon to write about or speak on topics of international politics, especially foreign policy and the Middle East.
Sihem Bensedrine
President, OLPEC
Sihem is the president and co-founder of Observatoire de la Liberté de la Presse, de L'Edition et de la Création (OLPEC), a Tunisian organisation that promotes press freedom. She is also an award-winning human rights activist with extensive experience in journalism and publishing.
Mohamed Alayyan
Publisher
Mohamed is a champion of Jordan's independent media. He is the publisher and founder of Al-Ghad Daily (the first independent paper in Jordan and one of the country’s most popular publications) and the Alwasweet Weekly Newspaper. Mohamed is also the founder of publishing company Al-Farida Specialized Printing, and he helped form Jordan's first independent television channel.
Mohamed El-Dahshan
Professor, Ain-Shams University
Mohamed is an economist and writer based in the Middle East who contributes to a wide variety of publications. He recently received the Anna Lindh Euro-Mediterranean Journalism Award for his coverage and analysis of the Egyptian revolution using traditional and social media.
Said Essoulami
Center for Media Freedoms, MENA region, Morocco
Said is President of the Arab Freedom of Information Network, Coordinator of the Moroccan National Freedom of Information Coalition, Coordinator of the Arab Media Freedom of Information Committee, and Director of the Centre for Media Freedom in the MENA region.
Riadh Guerfali
Blogger and activist
Riadh is a Tunisian blogger, anti-censorship campaigner and human rights activist. He holds a doctorate in public law and has been called to the Tunisian bar, while also teaching in France on topics covering constitutional law, political institutions and the law covering emergent technologies.
Lina Atallah
Managing editor, Al Masry Al Youm English, Egypt
Lina studied journalism at the American University in Cairo. Before joining Al-Masry Al-Youm English Edition, she wrote for Reuters, Cairo Times, the Daily Star, and the Christian Science Monitor, among others. In 2005, she worked as radio producer and campaign coordinator with the BBC World Service Trust in Darfur, Sudan.
Emna El Hammi
Blogger, Libération, France
Emna holds a Ph.D. in biotechnology and is a college professor. She is also a major contributor to the collective blog Nawaat.org and an internet activist. She is a passionate follower of the Tunisian revolution and monitors closely the country’s transition to democracy through her writing.
Raghida Dergham
Senior diplomatic correspondent, Al Hayat
Raghida is a columnist and senior diplomatic correspondent for the London-based Al Hayat, the leading independent Arabic daily. She has been with them since 1989. She has been a political analyst for NBC, MSNBC and the Arab satellite LBC for 8 years. She is also a contributing editor for L.A. Times Syndicate Global Viewpoint and has also contributed to: The New York Times, The Washington Post, The International Herald Tribune and Newsweek Magazine.
Rohan Jayasekera
Associate Editor, Index On Censorship Magazine
Rohan is the Associate Editor and Deputy Chief Executive of Index On Censorship Magazine in London as well as an activist for freedom of expression and media rights. Rohan is also the former Managing Editor at the Institute of War and Peace Reporting (IWPR).
Nehad A M Hassouna
Mada Board Member
The Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA) was established in 2006 to counteract the lack of support available for journalists in the territories who continue to face numerous oppressive constraints in their fight for freedom of expression. The vision of MADA is to end the isolation of journalists, support them in their work, reduce practices of self-censorship out of fear of reprisal, and facilitate Palestinian media in reclaiming its role as the fourth authority.
Tarek Alghorani
Social media activist, Syria
Tarek studied Engineering and ran a blog called Al Domari Al Souri that was deactivated by the Syrian regime. He also wrote for akhawia.net, an online forum, and co-founded a secular Syrian youth group. He was arrested on June 17, 2005 for his writings on akhawia.net and sentenced to 7 years in prison. He was released in 2011 and continues to fight for freedom of expression in Syria.
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