ANNA AAGENES - Amnesty USA

SHAHRAM HASHEMIShahram Hashemi is currently the Executive Director of the Student World Assembly and AIUSABoard Member since June 2007. He earned his Masters in Human Rights and EconomicDevelopment from Columbia University and BA in Finance from Adelphi University’s HonorCollege. Mr. Hashemi has been involved in human rights activism for over a decade, working withvarious human rights organizations. In addition to his human rights work, he also has extensiveauditing, financial, and budgeting experience through his work with Bank of New York and variousinstitutions within the City University of New York. Mr. Hashemi currently serves as ExecutiveDirector of the Student World Assembly, an international grassroots network of student activists.Student World Assembly is currently the largest student organization dedicated to democraticvalues, human rights, and youth leadership.Mr. Hashemi is the recipient of the former Mayor of New York City, F.H. LaGuardia MemorialAssociation Award for his service in the 9/11 rescue efforts. He currently resides in the Woodsideneighborhood of New York City.FARIDA ISMAELFarida Ghulam is the wife of the jailed Sunni opposition political activist in Bahrain, Ibrahim Sharifal- Sayed. She is a leader of the Waad party, which is the largest leftist party in Bahrain. Since thearrest of her husband in 2011, she has spoken at the largest Shiite opposition group, Al- Wefaq inManama Bahrain demanding freedom for her husband and other prominent jailed political leaders.

FRANK JANNUZIFrank Jannuzi serves as Deputy Executive Director of Amnesty International USA, and head of theWashington, D.C. office. Mr. Jannuzi is an international affairs policy and political expert who mostrecently served Chairman John Kerry as Policy Director for East Asian and Pacific Affairs for theDemocratic staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. His Senate service included work onhuman rights legislation (JADE Act on Burma, North Korea Human Rights Act, Tibet Policy Act) aswell as field investigations into human rights and security conditions in numerous East Asianhotspots, including China (especially Tibet), Burma, Cambodia, Southern Thailand, Vietnam,Mindanao, and North Korea.Prior to joining the staff of the SFRC, Mr. Jannuzi worked as the East Asia regional political-militaryanalyst for the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), U.S. Department of State. His portfolio atINR included China’s defense modernization, the Korean Peninsula, insurgencies and civil wars inSoutheast Asia, and territorial disputes in the South China Sea and Kuril Islands. In 1990, he workedas a refugee officer on the Thai-Cambodia border, and returned as an electoral officer forCambodia’s UN-run elections in May, 1993. Mr. Jannuzi was the founding editor-in-chief ofPeacekeeping Perspectives, the State Department’s classified journal on multilateral peacekeepingand humanitarian operations. Mr. Jannuzi holds a BA in history from Yale University and a MPPwith a concentration in international affairs and security from the John F. Kennedy School ofGovernment, Harvard University. In 2006, He conducted an International Affairs Fellowship inJapan, sponsored by Hitachi, Ltd., at the Institute for International Policy Studies and KeioUniversity. He lives in Baltimore with his wife, Dr. Jennifer Martin, and their daughters Zoe andCamille.CARLOS LASCANOCarlos Lascano has achieved international recognition as a director, illustrator, writer, andanimator. In the past few years he has developed a universe of his own, where all his differentforms of expression merge together in creating a whole, personal world.His restless renaissance spirit has always pushed him in the search of the improvement and fusionof every kind of visual art: owner of a very personal style, his mixing of digital tools and real objectsbrought a new organic aesthetic concept to animation, area in which his artistic activity has beensuccessfully devoted to for the last few years. His work alternates between commercial andnarrative projects. Within his extensive résumé, a Goya Awards nomination, a Preselection to theAcademy Awards, and over 30 international prizes are to be found, as well as a participation as ajury -presided by David Lynch-in the Animation Category of Vimeo’s First Festival Awards, held inNew York in 2010.His ability to tell stories and arouse emotions in the viewer have contributed to the massive spreadof his work, earning him international recognition and making him a reference point in modernanimation. In 2011, Carlos was chosen by Amnesty International to write, coproduce and direct theofficial spot for their 50th anniversary, project in which he worked alongside Oscar winner HansZimmer. Later that year, the Coca Cola Company summoned Carlos to direct the official animatedcommercial spot the brand presented at the 2012 Eurocup.“A Shadow of Blue,” his latest animation short film, is currently on its festival run and has beenselected to participate at more than forty festivals around the globe.

REBECCA MACKINNONRebecca MacKinnon is a Bernard L. Schwartz Senior Fellow at the New America Foundation, whereshe conducts research, writing and advocacy on global Internet policy, free expression, and theimpact of digital technologies on human rights. She is author of Consent of the Networked: TheWorldwide Struggle for Internet Freedom (Basic Books, January 2012). She is also cofounderof Global Voices, an international citizen media network, and serves on the Boards of Directors ofthe Committee to Protect Journalists and the Global Network Initiative.CARLOS MAURICIOCarlos Mauricio was a professor at the University of El Salvador in June 1983 when he waskidnapped from his classroom, forced into an unmarked van and taken to National Policeheadquarters, where he was tortured for two weeks. Upon his release, he fled to the U.S.In 2002, he was one of three plaintiffs who successfully sued two former Salvadoran Ministers ofDefense for their responsibility in his imprisonment and torture. The generals were ordered to pay 54 million. In 2002, Carlos founded the Stop Impunity Project, which works to bring an end to theimpunity enjoyed by human rights abusers in El Salvador.Carlos has worked closely with the School of the Americas Watch to close this Pan Americantraining facility. Last year, for the sixth time, he took a caravan from San Francisco through twelvecities across the country to the annual vigil to close the School of the Americas at Fort Benning,Georgia. Carlos has also taken part in SOAW delegations to Argentina, Uruguay, Bolivia, Ecuador,Peru and Chile in 2006, and Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras in 2007. He was instrumental inpersuading the governments of Argentina, Uruguay and Bolivia to stop sending troops to theSchool of the Americas.In 2006 and 2007 Carlos lived in Burma, closely monitoring the human rights situation. In 2007, hevisited Cambodia, to meeting with representatives of human rights and museums of historicalmemory to research the Cambodian struggle against impunity. In 2008 and 2009 he lived in Peru,closely following the trial of ex-president Fujimori, as well as the indigenous uprising in theAmazon.In November 2009, as a member of a delegation invited by President Mauricio Funes, and togetherwith representatives of Amnesty International, the Center for Justice and Accountability, heattended ceremonies in San Salvador to commemorate the assassinations of the six Jesuit priestsand their two housekeepers.In his efforts to build a Museum of Memory in El Salvador, he is currently working with anorganization of former political prisoners and torture survivors and returns to El Salvador regularly.

JAMES MCGOVERNCongressman Jim McGovern, since his election in 1996, has been widely recognized as a tenaciousadvocate for his district, a tireless crusader for change, and an unrivaled supporter for socialjustice and fundamental human rights.Currently serving his eighth term in Congress, McGovern serves as a Senior Minority Whip; thesecond ranking Democrat on the powerful House Rules Committee, which sets the terms fordebate and amendments on most legislation; and a member of the House Agriculture Committee.In those roles, McGovern has secured millions of dollars in federal assistance for Central andSoutheastern Massachusetts. McGovern is also co-chair of both the Tom Lantos Human RightsCommission and the House Hunger Caucus.Over the past 14 years, McGovern has consistently delivered millions of dollars for vital local andregional projects, small businesses, public safety, regional and mass transportation projects, andaffordable housing around the district. Under McGovern’s leadership over the past two years,individual project successes have included federal funding for innovative, high-tech smallbusinesses; police jobs saved in Worcester and Fall River; 2.8 million delivered to regional transitauthorities in Greater Attleboro and Southeastern Massachusetts for infrastructure repairs andnew buses; and 1 million to Medway and Ashland for long-overdue traffic improvements.McGovern voted against the initial authorization of force in Iraq in 2002, and has been among themost prominent Congressional voices on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. McGovern introduced abipartisan, bicameral bill calling for a flexible timetable for withdrawal of troops from Afghanistanas a matter of national security and fiscal responsibility.McGovern has also taken a leadership role in the fight against hunger at home and abroad,successfully expanding the McGovern-Dole International Food for Education and Child NutritionProgram, which helps alleviate child hunger and poverty by providing nutritious meals to childrenin schools in the world’s poorest countries.Before his election to Congress, the 50 year-old McGovern spent fourteen years working as asenior aide for the late U.S. Representative John Joseph Moakley (D-South Boston), former dean ofthe Massachusetts delegation and Chairman of the House Rules Committee. In 1989, McGovernwas the lead investigator on the Moakley Commission Congressional Investigation into themurders of 6 Jesuit priests, their housekeeper and her daughter in 1989. The investigationultimately led to a seminal change in U.S. foreign policy towards El Salvador when determined thatthe Salvadoran military was implicated in the murders. That landmark determination led to futuremilitary aid from the U.S. being conditioned on an improved human rights record.

THENJIWE MCHARRISThenjiwe McHarris has devoted her professional and political career to the restoration ofhistorically marginalized people and places. Thenjiwe joined Amnesty International USA in 2009and currently is a Senior Campaigner working on both the organization's Arms Trade TreatyCampaign as well as the Death Penalty Abolition Campaign. Thenjiwe was seconded in 2011 byAmnesty International's International Secretariat to launch AI South Africa's Making Rights LawCampaign and continues to organize and campaign on a spectrum of human rights issues.Thenjiwe has spoken on topics including movement building, building grassroots power, leadershipdevelopment, human rights and poverty as well as grassroots organizing at Yale University,Columbia University, New York University, Bard College, Rutgers University, Medgar Evers College,World Social Forum – Kenya, Social Forum of the Americas – Guatemala, the South African HumanRights Commission, United Nations Student Human Rights Conference as well as other institutionsand forums in the United States and abroad.CHRIS MICHAELChris Michael is a trainer, video producer and human rights advocate who helped launch and runthe Hub, and has led and supported WITNESS partner campaigns and online-focused initiatives.Prior to WITNESS, Chris designed, led and coordinated innovative and high-profile local, nationaland international social and environmental justice campaigns for organizations such as GlobalExchange and Rainforest Action Network. Much of Chris' work has been focused on creative,innovative and effective campaigns that utilize technology to promote justice. Additionally, Chrishas worked as a field archaeologist, architectural historian and writer.

GEOFFREY MOCKGeoffrey Mock is manager of internal communications for the Duke University Office of News andCommunications and editor of Duke Today, www.duke.edu/today, the university’s daily onlinenewspaper.He joined Duke University in 1986 to help start Dialogue, a weekly tabloid that covered both thecampus and medical center at Duke University. He became editor of the paper in 1987 andcontinued with it until January 2006 when the paper was discontinued and Duke Today waslaunched. In its two years, the online newspaper has been honored by both CASE and RaganCommunications for its combination of university news and community information. The onlinepaper provides research stories, university news and essential items such as traffic alerts, serviceoutages, dining menus and classified ads. Mock also oversees the marketing plan for Duke Today,which has helped increase readership nearly three-fold in its two-plus years.Before joining Duke, Mock worked as an education reporter for newspapers in Gastonia, N.C., andHavre de Grace, Md. He graduated from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill with apolitical science degree in 1982.KASHA JACQUELINE NABAGESERAKasha Jacqueline originally an accountant by profession, she changed carriers by acquiring aHuman Rights Advocacy diploma from Human Rights Education Associates in Massachusetts, USA.As the Executive Director of Freedom and Roam Uganda, she now works as a queer feminist,fighting for the rights of LGBT persons not only in Uganda but in Africa at large. In 2010 she waselected the most inspiring queer woman in the world by the Velvetpark Magazine, which describedher as a “Braveheart”. In 2011, as the world was celebrating 100 years of International Womens’Day, she was listed on the Women Deliver 100 list, as well as among the 50 most inspiringFeminists women in Africa. In the same year Kasha got awarded The Martin Ennals Award forHuman Rights Defenders, which is often considered as the Nobel Price for human rights and ischosen by a jury of ten leading international human rights organizations.Hans Thoolen, chairman of the Martin Ennals Foundation, in announcing the award, described heras “a leading light, an exceptional woman of a rare courage, fighting under death threat for humandignity.” He also affirmed the jury’s rationale for presenting the Ennals award to an LGBT rightsadvocate for the first time: “Let there be no mistake on *what awaits gay people on the ground,especially for those who openly claim their equal rights I do hope that the Martin Ennals award of2011 will contribute to the eradication of homophobia in humans.” In 2013 she will be awardedthe Nuremberg International human rights award for her continuous work in LGBT activism. Evenin the wake of the pending Anti-Homosexuality Bill in the Parliament she has continued to live inUganda and is currently suing the government for the continuous closure of LGBT gatherings.

ALICE NKOMAlice Nkom is a gay rights activist and lawyer working for LGBT rights in her homeland Cameroon.Alice Nkom has been working tirelessly for improving the living conditions of LGBT people in hercountry. In 2003, Nkom was a very prominent delegate in an International Visitor LeadershipProgram on “Grassroots Democracy.” In Oregon, she was an active part of the Portland Bus Project— an initiative directed towards improving interaction, inspiring youngsters to be politically activeand to foster the growth of a grassroots progressive movement. Taking inspirations from herexperiences in Oregon she has been working towards setting up a similar initiative in her homelandof Cameroon, titled “Get on the Bus.”MICHAEL POFFENBERGERMichael Poffenberger is a co-Founder and the Executive Director of The Resolve LRA CrisisInitiative, a research and advocacy organization focused on ending atrocities being committed bythe Lord's Resistance Army (LRA). Since co-founding The Resolve in 2007, Poffenberger hasoverseen campaigns that secured passage of landmark US legislation addressing the crisis, testifiedin Congress, and developed the advocacy strategy for the "Kony 2012" campaign. In 2011,Poffenberger oversaw the launch of the LRA Crisis Tracker, an award-winning tool that maps LRAatrocities in near real-time. Poffenberger serves on the Advisory Board of Invisible Children and theBoard of Directors for the Grassroots Reconciliation Group.SAMANTHA RODGERSSamantha Rodgers came to Amnesty from Greenpeace USA where she was a member of the seniorleadership team as Grassroots Director, overseeing Greenpeace’s volunteer and mobilizationstrategies to solve global warming, protect ancient forests, save oceans and reduce environmentaltoxins. In 2006, she started Greenpeace’s field organizing team and launched Project Hot Seat, acampaign to implement legislative solutions to global warming in the U.S. that moved over 70Members and candidates for Congress to improve their positions on the issue. Prior toGreenpeace, she worked with MoveOn.org Political Action, where she was part of MoveOn’s firstfull-scale field organizing campaign and directed operations in Albuquerque, NM during the 2004election season.

LUIX SALDANAJose Luix Saldana Caudillo is a drumcircle Facilitator. Since 1992, he has been sharing the powerand medicine of drumming. He works mainly with business and development groups. Since 1994 hehas been implementing an ongoing rhythm based program in state and federal prisons within theMexican system. His latest phrase is “give them the space and a drum and they’ll show you magic,light and power.”BISHOP CHRISTOPHER SENYONJOBishop Christopher Senyonjo is a clergyman and LGBT rights activist from Uganda. He studied atthe Union Theological Seminary in 1963, and was ordained into the priesthood in 1964 inthe Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City. He served in the Church of Uganda and waselevated to bishop in 1974. In 2002, his functions of vesting and laying on of hands were revoked bythe Archbishop of the Church of Uganda on behalf of the House of Bishops of Uganda. Heconsecrated a bishop for the Charismatic Church of Uganda; and in 2006, the Church of Ugandaresponded by completely dissociating itself from Senyonjo and stating that he was no longer abishop. Senyonjo contested this. He was included in Huffington Post religion's 10 most influentialpeople of 2010.SALIL SHETTYSalil Shetty joined Amnesty International as the org

She has been published in the Baltimore Sun, Washington Post, International Herald Tribune, The New Statesman, The Daily Star, Le monde diplomatique, and has appeared on CNN, NPR, and Al Jazeera. Since November 2004, she has authored an award -winning blog now known as Gaza Mom. A running t