RASHA ABDULLA Chairperson of the Journalism and Mass Communication Department at the American University in Cairo. She is author of three books on the Internet in the Arab world, including the first large scale academic study of the uses of the Internet among Arab students in Egypt. With a PhD from the University of Miami, Abdulla has also won prestigious awards and focuses currently in particular on Internet activism and issues of privacy and freedom of expression. Her latest publication is 'The Changing Middle East Media over the past 20 Years: Opportunities and Challenges' (Koramy 2010 Edition).

RYM ALI Princess Rym Ali is founder of the Jordan Media Institute. She has been a producer and correspondent for different news organisations, including UPI’s United Nations bureau in New York and CNN, where she began as a producer in London and later worked as Bagdad correspondent. Princess Rym, who holds a MPhil in Political Science from the Institut d’Etudes Politiques in Paris and is a graduate (MS) from Columbia University’s School of Journalism. She left her job at CNN when she joined the Jordanian Royal Family in 2004 and has since been working as a Commissioner at the Royal Film Commission of Jordan.

CATHERINE ASHTON Baroness Catherine Ashton was appointed as High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice-President of the European Commission as of 1 December 2009. She was European Commissioner for Trade from October 2008 until November 2009 and solved a number of high-profile trade disputes with major trading partners as well as championing trade as a means of promoting development around the world. Previously, Baroness Ashton was appointed Leader of the House of Lords and Lord President of the Queen’s Privy Council in Gordon Brown’s first Cabinet in June 2007.

ANDRÉ AZOULAY President of the Anna Lindh Euro-Mediterranean Foundation for Dialogue between Cultures. As Counselor of His Majesty the late King Hassan II of Morocco and of His Majesty Mohammed VI, he played a central role in the national economic reform process and foreign investments growth. Azoulay is also President of the Executive Committee of the 'Foundation of the Three Cultures', based in Spain, and is well-known for his input to give real chances to a last and just peace in the Middle East and the many initiatives he has been involved in the perspective of deepening the logic of reconciliation between Jews and Muslims.

MICHELE CAPASSO President of Fondazione Mediterraneo in Italy. He has worked as a photographer, painter, architect and engineer, carrying out more than 500 projects in various countries of the World, before taking the decision to devote himself to the promotion of intercultural dialogue and peace in 1994. Since then Capasso has been organising different programmes and social projects, and has also published many articles and books on the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership. He received numerous awards for his commitment and achievements to build bridges between cultures including the Independence Distinction of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.

ANDREU CLARET Executive Director of the Anna Lindh Euro-Mediterranean Foundation since July 2008. As a former journalist he has been Director of the Spanish News Agency (EFE) for Sub-Saharan Africa, Central America and Catalonia. Claret was also Director of the European Institute of the Mediterranean (IEMed), based in Spain, and as an analyst of international affairs has specialised in North-South relations, Mediterranean cooperation and intercultural dialogue. He has also taught political journalism at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona, and is a member of the Board of Directors for the Foundation for the Future.

YOUSSEF COURBAGE Research Director of the Institute National d’Etudes Demographiques (INED) in Paris. He is an expert in the field of relationship between demography and politics, principally in Arab and Muslim countries. Courbage was Scientific Director of the French Institute of the Near East in Beirut and is author of around three hundred and fifty publications, books, articles, reports and teaching material. Together with Emmanuel Todd he added a new dimension to the ongoing debate over the clash of civilizations through predicting the modernization of the Islamic World in their book 'Le rendez-vous des civilizations'

GRACE DAVIE Professor at the Department of Sociology in Exeter and member of the Advisory Board of the Centre for European Studies. Her expertise lies in the sociology of religion, with a particular emphasis on patterns of religion in Europe. Recently she has been involved in a variety of research projects, including 'Welfare and Values in Europe' and 'Secularity as a European and International Phenomenon' which explores why Europe is the most secularised part of the modern world. Davie holds a PhD from the London School of Economics and an Honorary Doctorate Uppsala.

HEIDI DUMREICHER Founding director of Austrian-based Oikodrom, a pioneer in integrated sustainability research related to human settlements. She works in theory and practice on the future of the city, contributing to the Aalborg Charter, the foundational European document on urban sustainability. As initiator and scientific co-ordinator of numerous research and awareness raising projects, Dumreicher conducted sustainability negotiation processes between experts and dwellers in Vienna, China and six Mediterranean Islamic countries, and has developed with Kolb the theory of 'emotional co-ownership'. She is also a member of the Advisory Council of the Anna Lindh Foundation.

MONA EL HAMDANI Country Programme Manager at the Media Diversity Institute (MDI) in Morocco. After studying Communications, she worked as Coordinator in charge of monitoring and evaluation for the political party programmes at the National Democratic Institute Morocco (NDI). El Hamdani took part in organising and supervising civil society activities and national and International events such as the International Observation Mission, 2007 legislative elections. Her current work focuses on encouraging community dialogue and diversity in partnership with local and international partners.

THIERRY FABRE Responsible for Programming and International Relations at the Musée des Civilizations de l’Europe et de la Meditérranée (MuCEM) which is based in the French city of Marseille. He is also coordinator of the region-wide Network of Centers of Excellence in Humanities Research on the Mediterranean (Ramses) in the Maison de Sciences de l’Homme of Aix-en-Provence. As essayist, editor and researcher, Fabre founded the magazine Qantara at the Institut du Monde Arabe and is the founding editor of 'La pensée de midi' and 'Rencontres d’Averroès'.

MIKE JEMPSON Director of the journalism ethics charity 'MediaWise'. He is a senior lecturer at the University of the West of England and Visiting Professor in Media Ethics at Lincoln University. With more than 30 years of experience in print, broadcasting and public relations, Jempson has devised and delivered training for journalists on human rights, media regulation and press freedom issues in some 40 countries working with UN agencies and the International Federation of Journalists. He is Vice Chair of the National Union of Journalists Ethics Committee and was an advisor to the EC-sponsored pan-European Study on Media and Diversity.

AÏSHA KASSOUL Professor at the Diplomatic Institute of International Relations, and Economic and Social Committee, Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Algeria. She teaches Clash of Civilization and Dialogue of Cultures and has written various books and theatre plays. In addition, Kassoul has published numerous scientific articles in different print media, such as L’Opinion, La Nation, El Watan and Algérie Actualité. Popular publications include 'Alger en toutes lettres' (2003), 'L’Algérie en français dans le texte' (1990), 'Chroniques de l’impure' (1998) and 'Le pied de Hanane' (2009). She is also a member of the Anna Lindh Foundation’s Advisory Council.

BICHARA KHADER Professor of political, economic and social sciences, and Director of the Arab Study and Research Center at Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium. He was a member of the Group of High Experts on the European Foreign Policy and Common Security and a member of the 'Groupe des Sages' for Euro-Mediterranean cultural dialogue. With a PhD from the Catholic University of Louvain, Khader’s latest publications of Khader include 'Le Monde Arabe expliqué à l’Europe' (2009) and 'l’Europe pour la Méditerranée de Barcelone à Barcelone from1995-2009' (2009).

BETTINA KOLB Lecturer at the Institute for Sociology at the University of Vienna. She is an expert in visual sociology applying the method of participatory photo interviews as a sociological tool for inter and transdisciplinary research, working in fields including socio-cultural representation in visuals, combining place and space. Kolb’s research has also focused on Mediterranean neighbourhoods of hammamms, sociology of health, focusing on social sustainability, combining health promotion aspects with sustainability, and together with Heidi Dumreicher, she has contributed to establishing a social theory on sustainability.

MARIA KONTOCHRISTOU A lecturer at the Greek Open University. She has collaborated with leading research institutes and has worked many years as a consultant. Kontochristou has directed the Departments of Promotion and Communication and International Collaborations of the Hellenic Culture Organization at the Greek Ministry of Culture. Current research interests involve media, audiovisual and cultural policy, media and identity construction, celebrity activism, international relations and culture, EU and cultural diplomacy, and she is the editor of the book 'Identity and the Media in Contemporary Greece' (2007).

TOLGA KORKUT Human Rights Editor of bianet.org. After working as radio programmer, he perused his career by working for various mainstream media groups in Turkey as foreign news editor, managing editor and team member of Açık Radyo (Open Radio). Since 1997 Korkut worked in the Internet journalism field and he also served as business manager and managing editor for Internet journals and news sites of various mainstream media groups. As editor of bianet.org he has focused on Internet journalism technologies, rights based journalism, fight against discrimination, social diversity and peace journalism.

ANAT LAPIDOT-FIRILLA Senior research fellow and academic director of the Mediterranean Neighbours Unit at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, and teacher at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Between 2005 and 2007 she was academic director of the 'Women accessibility to equal citizenship in the Middle East' project at the Center for Strategic and Policy Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Lapidot-Firilla is also the editor of the new Journal of Levantine Studies, and her research focuses on various aspects of religion, politics, and identity , with an emphasis on Turkey.

AMIN MAALOUF Lebanese novelist and journalist. He is well known for his works that offer a sensitive view of the values and attitudes of different cultures in the Middle East, Africa and Mediterranean world. After studying sociology and economics, Maalouf continued the long family tradition and became a journalist, working at the age of twenty-two for the leading Beirut daily an-Nahar. He travelled in India, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Somalia, Kenya, Yemen, and Algeria, often covering wars and other conflicts before emigrating to France where he continued to work as a journalist and writer.

ROBERT MANCHIN President and Managing Director of The Gallup Organization Europe. He began his career at the Institute of Sociology at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences after finishing the Karl Marx University of Economics and the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music, and has worked as a consultant and co-authored a number of books. At present, Manchin is also leading the Flash Eurobarometer, Europe’s largest on-going survey measurement project. He is professot at the College of Europe in Bruges and also and holds the position as Director of the Institute for Advanced Behavioral Sciences in Luxembourg.

PREDRAG MATVEJEVIC Writer and Professor at the Department of Languages and Slavic Literature at the University of Rome 'La Sapienza'. He lives currently in Rome after leaving Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1991 due to his political activism. The French Government has awarded him 'The Legion of Honor' and his books are published in over twenty languages and have been recognized by numerous international literary awards. With a PhD from the Sorbonne, Matvejevitch is Vice President of International PEN in London, was a member of 'Groupe des Sages' of the European Commission in Brussels and a founding member of 'Association Sarajevo' in Paris and Rome.

TUOMO MELASUO Professor of Peace and Conflict Research and Research director of TAPRI, Tampere Peace Research Institute, at the University of Tampere. With a PhD in political science, Melasuo is also professor in political history at the University of Turku, and his academic interest lies in particular in the recent history of North Africa and international relations in the Mediterranean. At TAPRI, he focuses on Mediterranean Studies and Euro-Mediterranean relations with emphasis on socio-economic and cultural evolution. Melasuo is the vice-chair of MOST, Management of Social Transformation programme in UNESCO, and member of the Adviosry Council of the Anna Lindh Foundation.

ANTOINE MESSARRA Professor at the Lebanese University and Saint-Joseph University, and founder of Lebanese Foundation for Permanent Civil Peace. He is member of Constitutional Council in Lebanon and a member of the Anna Lindh Foundation’s Advisory Council. As journalist Messara worked for Le Jour, L’Orient-Le Jour, and others, and is a member of Master’s Executive Committee, a francophone journalism cooperation between the Lebanese University, The French Press Institute (IFP, Paris) and Centre de formation et de perfectionnement des journalists (CFPJ, Paris).

DALIA MOGAHED Senior Analyst and Executive Director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies. She leads the analysis of Gallup’s survey representing the opinions of more than one billion Muslims worldwide and co-authored the book 'Who Speaks for Islam?: What a Billion Muslims Really Think' which is the largest, most comprehensive study of its kind. Mogahed has been involved in a range of important bodies, such as the High-Level Group of the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations, and was selected as an advisor by President Barack Obama on the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.

AMRE MOUSSA Secretary General of the League of Arab States since 2001. With a degree in law from Cairo University, Moussa joined the Egyptian Foreign Service in 1958. Afterwards, he served as Advisor to the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Egypt, Ambassador of Egypt to India, and Chief Representative of Egypt to the United Nations in New York. Since 2003 he has been a member of the United Nations High Level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change for International Peace and Security, and has been awarded high Decorations from various countries, including the German Federation and namely the Grand Cordon of the Nile of Egypt.

LAURA NAVARRO Lecturer in Intercultural Communication at the University of Valencia., She is researcher of the project Mediamigraterra (University Paris 8) focused on media and migrations in the Euro-Mediterranean space, and lecturer in the master 'Intercultural Mediation and Citizen Participation' (University of Valencia, Spain). She has worked also in the EU Marie Curie Excellence Team 'Minority Media' and collaborates with organisations such as the Spanish Community Media Network. One of her publications is the book 'Contra el Islam' (2008), about dominant representations of Islam and Arab world in the Spanish media.

MAGUED OSMAN Chairman of the Egyptian Cabinet of Ministers’ Information and Decision Support Center. As one of the pioneers of statistics and national information in Egypt, Osman is also Professor, at the Department of Statistics, Cairo University. He has extensive technical and consultancy experience in the fields of survey methodology, public opinion polling, and demographic analysis. In addition, Osman is a member of the International Association for Statistical Education, the American Statistical Association, IUSSP, the International Union for Scientific Studies In Population, and the World Future Society.

NATALIA RIBAS-MATEOS Ramón y Cajal Researcher at the Universidad de A Coruña. She has been a Marie Curie Fellow at the Laboratoire Méditerranéen de Sociologie Aix-en Provence in France and at the Centre for Migration Studies in Sussex in the United Kingdom. During 2009 her principal research was centered on remittances, gender and border spaces in El Paso in the United States of America, and in Jebala in the Kingdom of Morocco. Ribas-Mateos’latest published work includes 'The Mediterranean in the Age of Globalisation. Migration, welfare and borders' (Transaction Publishers, 2005).

ISABELLE RIGONI Team leader of the EU Marie Curie Excellence Team 'Minority Media' hosted at Migrinter, University of Poitiers in France. She holds a PhD in political science from the University Paris 8 (France, 2000), and was a post-doctoral fellow at the Centre for Research in Ethnic Relations (University of Warwick, 2001-2003) and at the Centre Marc Bloch (Berlin, 2004-2005). She is currently teaching at the university of Poitiers; and she teached previously in the universities of Paris 8 Saint-Denis and Evry-Val d’Essonne (1996-2005). She is working on ethnic media, migrations, transnational mobilities and gender.

ALEXA ROBERTSON Associate Professor at the Department of Political Science at the University of Stockholm in Sweden and affiliated with the university’s Department of Journalism and Mass Communication. Her current research, funded by a grant from the Swedish Research Council, compares reporting in 'counter-hegemonic' global news channels with accounts of the world given by established global broadcasters, to see how Europe is depicted by its 'others'. Robertson has also published in the year 2010 the book, 'Mediated Cosmopolitanism: the world of television news'.

MARTIN ROSE Country Director of the British Council in Morocco. Previously he was Director of the Our Shared Europe project and the founding Director of 'Counterpoint', the British Council’s think-tank on cultural relations and public diplomacy. Rose has spoken and published widely on Cultural Relations, with publications including Trust, Mutuality and Cultural Relations (with Nick Wadham-Smith, 2004), British Public Diplomacy in an Age of Schisms (with Mark Leonard, 2005) and A Shared Past for A Shared Future (2009). He has worked with the British Council in Baghdad, Rome, Brussels and Ottawa.

NAOMI SAKR Professor of Media Policy and Director of the Arab Media Centre at the University ofWestminster’s Communication and Media Research Institute. She previously worked at the Economist Intelligence Unit as a Middle East specialist and has been managing editor of political risk and economic forecast reports. Sakr received the Middle Eastern Studies Book Prize 2003 for 'Satellite Realms: Transnational Television, Globalization and the Middle East'. Her most recent book 'Arab Television Today' (2007), investigates law and policy, content creation and the status of journalists, including women presenters and war reporters.

JORGE SAMPAIO High Representative for the Alliance of Civilizations, the United Nations Initiative which aims to improve understanding and cooperative relations among nations and peoples across cultures. Jorge Sampaio is the former President of the Republic of Portugal from1996 to 2001. As President, his actions were mainly focused on education, social issues, human rights, European and international affairs. He was also appointed in May 2006 by the United Nations Secretary-General as his Special Envoy to Stop Tuberculosis, with the task to work to reach the Millennium Development Goal of beginning to reverse the incidence of the disease by 2015.

ELDAR SARAJLIĆ Editor for the publication and journals Pulse of Democracy and Status. His main research areas are comparative politics and political theory, with a special emphasis on ethno-politics and ethnocentrism, democracy, post-communist politics, political elites and religion. Sarajlic writes about politics, culture and society of Bosnia and Herzegovina and collaborates with a number of universities, including the University of Edinburgh and University of Oxford. Eldar is a published author and has published several papers and articles in various publications throughout Europe.

SABINE SCHIFFER Head of the Media Responsibility Institute (IMV) in Germany. Her research focuses on discrimination in news media and on the impact of media on attitudes and values, especially on children’s values. Modern forms of propaganda are one of her most important subjects, in which the 'Enemy' (Feindbild) Islam is playing an important role today. With a PhD degree in linguistics, publications include a book on the 'Coverage of Islam in German Press' (2005) and on a comparative analysis of anti-Jewish and anti-Islamic hate speech (2009, with Constantin Wagner, IMV).

ISMAIL SERAGELDIN Director of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina. He chairs the Boards of Directors for each of the Bibliotheca’s affiliated research institutes and museums. He serves as Chairperson and Member of a number of advisory committees for research, scientific and international institutions and civil society efforts. In addition, Serageldin has served in a number of capacities at the World Bank, including as Vice President for Environmentally and Socially Sustainable Development (1992-1998), and for Special Programmes (1998-2000), and he has published over sixty books and monographs on a variety of topics.

SARA SILVESTRI Senior Lecturer in International Politics at City University London and heads a research programme at Cambridge University. She obtained her PhD from Cambridge University, and to then moved to Brussels to work on intercultural dialogue for the European Commission President. Silvestri’s interdisciplinary research and publications concern Muslim identity politics and public policies towards religion in the EU, faith-based networks, immigrants’ integration, and security. She is also a member of the Advisory Council of the Anna Lindh Foundation.

KATÉRINA STENOU Director of the Division of Cultural Policies and Intercultural Dialogue at the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO). She is a specialist in the field of intercultural communication. As a member of various research institutes devoted to intercultural relations, Stenou highlights mainly the links between diversity, dialogue and development, thus fostering global mutual understanding, in line with UNESCO’s mandate. She has also published several articles and books dealing with issues concerning the formulation of policies to respond to the challenges of today’s multicultural societies.

MOHAMED TOZY Professor of political science at the University Hassan II in Casablanca and the University of Aix en Provence. After publishing Monarchie et islam politique au Maroc (1997) he became well known as a specialist on Moroccan Islamist movements. Tozy also works as a researcher for Mediterranean Laboratory of Sociology (MMSH/CNRS) and as an expert consultant to international organizations, such as FAO and USAID. He is member of different organizations, such as the Scientific Council of the European Network Analysis Political Societies (REASOPO), the Scientific Committee of the journal Prologues.

ANNA TRIANDAFYLLIDOU Senior Research Fellow at the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP). She is Visiting Professor at the College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium, and her main research areas include media and discourse studies. 'Media and Ethics of a European Public Sphere from the Treaty of Rome to the 'War on Terror'(EMEDIATE) was one of many European Union funded projects Triandafyllidou was involved in, and her recent publications include the book 'The European Public Sphere and the Media' (with R. Wodak and M. Krzyzanowski, Palgrave, 2009).

ERHAN ÜSTUNDAG Reporter and editor-in-chief for the Independent Communication Network (BIA). Born in Kırklareli in Turkey, he has been working for the Independent Communication Network (BIA) since 2004, as reporter and editor-in-chief. A graduate from Istanbul Bilgi University Faculty of Communication, Ustundag organised the first International Independent Media Forum in 2006, in Istanbul, succeeding in gathering alternative media representatives from all over the world. Areas of interest include children rights journalism, peace journalism, communication policy and political economy of media.