OUR SPEAKERS

About me

Mr. Hallaj is A consultant on urban planning, development and local governance.  A Co-founder and Partner at LUGARIT, where he is engaged in facilitating various dialogue, research, and policy projects for peace-building, recovery, development, and governance in the MENA region.  His professional and published research covers the institutional, financial and political aspects of the urban built environment; housing, land and property (HLP); and the war economy.  Formerly, he was the CEO of the Syria Trust for Development, and served on the boards of several NGO’s, public commissions and microfinance institutions.  In 2007, Mr. Hallaj was the recipient of the Aga Khan Award for Architecture as team leader of the Shibam Urban Development Project. He subsequently served on the master jury and steering committee of the award.  He is currently a member of the Syrian Constitutional Committee as part of the civil society delegation

About me

Kazimuddin (Kazu) Ahmed is a doctoral researcher at University of Helsinki and his research is about exploring peace opportunities using participatory video (PV) as a community based tool in the state of Assam, India. While he teaches participatory visual methods for social sciences research to university students, he also assists various communities in different parts of the globe in telling their own stories with the use of PV. He has over two decades of experience in development journalism, human rights and peacebuilding, community media, and academic research. He is also a documentary photographer and filmmaker

About me

About me

Docent and a senior research fellow at the Tampere Peace Research Institute (Finland). Lecturer for the MA in Peace, Mediation and Conflict Research. Before moving to Finland, I held permanent positions at the University of Kent (UK) and at Sciences Po Lille (France).

I hold an Accreditation to Supervise Research (Docent) and a PhD in Political Science from the University of Lille (France, 2003 and 1999).

Invited professor at the University of Louvain (Belgium), at the University of Turin (Italy), at the University of Coimbra (Portugal), at Sciences Po Lille (France) and at the Université Lumière de Bujumbura (Burundi).

About me

Pekka Haavisto is a Member of Parliament and the former Foreign Minister of Finland. He is a peace negotiator and a defender of both democracy and human rights. Haavisto is especially experienced in foreign policy and international operations. He has led research into the environmental impact of wars and represented the EU and the UN in various crises all over the world. Haavisto has also authored numerous books. His beloved hobbies are literature, Beetle cars, and wooden boats.

About me

Lieutenant Colonel Petteri Hemminki is a principal teacher in the department of military technology  in the  Finnish  National Defence University. He has also graduated from the University of Turku 2020 with master´s degree in Artificial Intelligence and he is now doing doctoral research focusing on autonomous systems and utilization of Artificial Intelligence on the future battlefield. As the team leader of the Autonomous Systems research group, he participates in interdisciplinary research projects that also cover human-machine interaction and legal and ethical issues.

About me

Marjaana Jauhola (PhD in International Politics) is Senior Research Fellow at Tampere Peace Research Institute, Tampere University and Docent in Global Development Studies, University of Helsinki. Her close to 20 years’ research focus has been on social and economic equalities of global responses to crises, such as the Indian Ocean Tsunami and armed conflict in Aceh, Indonesia and the 2001 Kachchh earthquake in Gujarat, India. Before joining academia, she has a decade long experience in international development and humanitarian aid. Her latest book Scraps of Hope in Banda Aceh: Gendered Urban Politics in the Aceh Peace Process (Helsinki University Press, 2020) received an honorable mention for the 2022 IPS Best Book Award, International Political Sociology Section of International Studies Association.

About me

Ms Saana Keskitalo is a conflict resolution professional with fourteen years of experience in various dialogue, mediation and capacity building processes at CMI – Martti Ahtisaari Peace Foundation, an independent Finnish organization specializing in conflict resolution, with operations in three continents. Her experience focuses on the design, implementation and management of informal conflict prevention and resolution processes. Since 2010, she has managed several country specific processes, geared towards supporting local conflict resolution and peaceful transition efforts, including in Libya, Iraq and Palestine. Ms Keskitalo currently manages CMI’s work related to the changing peace mediation field, and engagement with mediation actors across CMI’s four regional programmes. Ms Keskitalo has an MSc in International and Middle East politics from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, and an MA in Politics and Economics from the University of Dundee. Ms Keskitalo is married with two children. 

About me

Eeva-Liisa Kiiskilä is a leading expert in peace education (Peace Education Institute, Finland). Peace Education Institute is a leading peace education organization in Finland working in national and international settings. Eeva-Liisa has worked in the field of education as a teacher, peace educator, project manager, material producer and in different development tasks. Her feet are tightly rooted to the combination of peace and pedagogies. She has been recognized for her work to promote equality and equity.

About me

Dr Benjamin Klasche is a lecturer in politics and international relations at Tallinn University. He is also Co-Director of the Central and Eastern European Security Hub and Senior Researcher at the European Horizon Twinning Project, A critical relational perspective on peace & security in CEE. An International Relations scholar at heart, his research also draws from Public Administration and Sociology. His research interests are IR and social theory, particularly relationalism and critical theories, climate change, and peace. His book, A Relational Approach to Governing Wicked Problems (Palgrave MacMillan 2023), co-authored with Peeter Selg and Georg Sootla, argues for a need to rethink governance as a process from the relational point of view to spur its potential for addressing these problems. His work has been published in International Studies Quarterly, International Relations, International Review of Sociology and International Studies.

About me

Dr Frans Kruger is an Associate Professor in Education. Prior to joining the University of Nottingham, Frans held a senior lectureship in Philosophy and Policy Studies in Education at the University of the Free State, South Africa. Previously, he held positions at the University of Kwazulu-Natal in South Africa and Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in the Republic of Korea (South Korea). Frans is an associate editor for Education as Change and an editorial board member for Qualitative Research and In Factis Pax: Journal of Peace Education and Social Justice.

About me

Tetiana Kyselova is Associate Professor at the Department of International Relations, Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, Ukraine; director and founder of the Mediation and Dialogue Research Center. Dr. Kyselova holds a DPhil from the University of Oxford and a PhD from the Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. She has been working with peacebuilding civil society and professional community of mediators in Ukraine since 1990s advising them on the strategies of peacebuilding, self-regulation, training, methodology of mediation and dialogue. Her research interests include conflict transformation, peacebuilding, mediation and dialogue.

About me

Marko Lehti is a Research Director of Tampere Peace Research Institute (TAPRI) and an Academic Director of master’s programme in Peace, Mediation and Conflict Research (PEACE) both at Tampere University, Finland. Lehti’s current research on peace mediation and peace building focuses on agonistic peace building, private peacemaking actors and Nordic peace. He has also published on crisis of multilateralism and changing global order. Furthermore, his research has dealt transnational encounters and identifications and among others in the Baltic countries, the South Caucasus, and the Balkans. His latest books are “Contestations of Liberal Order. The West in Crisis?” (Palgrave 2020) and “The Era of Private Peacemakers. A New Dialogic Approach to Mediation” (Palgrave 2019). His forthcoming book with Christopher Browning and Johan Strang is “Nordic Peace Revisited” (Routledge 2024).

About me

Claus Lindroos, Director of the Centre for Peace Mediation, Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Finland

Claus Lindroos was appointed as Director of the Centre for Peace Mediation in 2024. Before this he has served as Deputy Director General for the Department for Africa and the Middle East, Director of Unit for Humanitarian Assistance and Policy and Special Adviser to the Minister for Development Cooperation. His career in the Diplomatic Service includes posts in Brussels, Dublin and Nairobi.

Lindroos joined the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in 1997. He holds the degree of Master of Social Sciences. The Government promoted Claus Lindroos to the public office of Counsellor for Foreign Affairs in 2020.

About me

Mikael Mattlin is FIIA’s Deputy Director (act.) and Research Professor. He heads the Institute’s Center on Global Orders and China (CORD). 

Previously, he was the Institute’s Acting Director. Prior to joining FIIA, he was Professor of Political Science (2021–22), Senior Lecturer of International Politics and TIAS Collegium Researcher at the University of Turku, as well as Professor of Chinese Studies (2018–19) and University Lecturer in World Politics in the University of Helsinki. Mattlin also leads the Academy of Finland funded ForAc -research project. Prof. Mattlin has published extensively in peer-reviewed academic journals, e.g., The China Quarterly, Journal of Contemporary China, Information, Communication & Society, Cooperation and Conflict, Simulation & Gaming, European Political Science, Journal of Political Science Education, Asia Europe Journal and European Foreign Affairs Review.

In the Spring of 2022, Prof. Mattlin published the first comprehensive Finnish-language research-based book on the Chinese political system (Vastapaino). The book was co-authored with two other leading Finnish China experts. The book is a finalist for the Science Book of the Year 2022 award.

Prof. Mattlin has long developed, taught and researched a negotiation simulation-based teaching concept for international relations. The teaching concept has received recognition both nationally and internationally, e.g., recently receiving an honourary mention from the European Political Science Consortium (2021 EPS Jacqui Briggs Prize). The teaching concept has inspired colleagues around the globe to try the concept, with excellent results.

About me

Maria Mekri is the Executive Director of SaferGlobe, with a special focus on supporting social stability in complex environments. SaferGlobe is an independent peace and security think tank, which produces knowledge and develops tools to promote sustainable peace and security including the Finnish Arms Control Report.  Mekri´s academic background is in international politics from Cambridge University and Brandeis University and in international business from HaagaHelia.  She has worked extensively with peace technologies and innovation in peace.  Currently her focus is on supporting companies in working responsible in conflict affected contexts, and finding social innovations for sAs a part of its focus on developing arms control, SaferGlobe has e.g. published this info sheet in Finnish on AI and arms control.

About me

Based in Jerusalem, Daniel is the Executive Director of Musalaha, an organization that teaches, facilitates and trains reconciliation mainly between Israelis and Palestiniand from diverse ethnic and religious backgrounds. Prior to Daniel’s work with Musalaha, Daniel co-founded Lighthouse Relief on Lesvos Island, a humanitarian start-up responding to the influx of refugees in Greece. He later continued to work with the Danish Refugee Council and Nonviolent Peaceforce, responding to the humanitarian crisis’ in Greece and Iraq. Daniel holds an MBA with Distinction from Durham University Business School, UK. In addition, he graduated with honors from the highly selective 3-year Global Scholars Program at American University in Washington D.C., focusing on International Relations and Religious Studies. He is the only Palestinian ever to be invited to personally address the UN Security Council in New York

About me

Katariina Mustasilta is a Senior Research Fellow in the European Union and Strategic Competition programme at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs. Her research covers countries’ internal conflicts, the EU’s external action in the realms of conflicts and threats to peace, and international conflict prevention and peace-building efforts. Her publications include academic articles in journals such as the Journal of Peace Research and European Foreign Affairs Review as well as more policy-oriented research reports and briefings.

She recently led FIIA’s project ‘Finland in Afghanistan 2001-2021’ that examined Finland’s engagement in the stabilisation and reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan. At the moment she focuses on European conflict prevention and management efforts in the time of strategic competition, European strategic cultures, and conflict analysis as a tool for water diplomatic efforts.

Prior to joining FIIA, Mustasilta worked at the EUISS, where she covered conflict research relevant to the EU’s integrated approach to conflicts and crises. Mustasilta holds a PhD in Political Science from the Government Department at the University of Essex. Her PhD focused on the role of traditional governance in sub-Saharan African countries’ internal conflicts.

About me

Swati Parashar is Professor in Peace and Development at the School of Global Studies, Gothenburg University, Sweden. Her teaching and research have led to academic appointments and fellowships in India, Singapore, UK, US, Ireland, Australia and Sweden. She has also taught at the University of Rwanda in Kigali and at the University of the West Indies in Kingston, Jamaica. She is a member of the Swedish Development Research Network and has also served as a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of SIDA.  

Swati’s research interests include feminism, postcolonialism, research methodologies, gender-based violence, conflict, peace and development in South Asia and East Africa. She is the author of Women and Militant Wars: The Politics of Injury (Routledge, 2014); co author of Camille Bulcke: The Jesuit Exponent of Ramkatha (Cambridge University Press, 2024); Ripping, Cutting, Stitching: Feminist Knowledge Destruction and Creation in Global Politics (Rowman and Littlefield, 2023). She has co-edited several books including the Routledge Handbook of Feminist Peace Research; Writing Saved Me; Gender, Silence and Agency in Contested Terrains; and Revisiting Gendered States: Feminist Imaginings of the State in International Relations. She has published several journal special issues and articles, policy papers and popular media pieces. She is a co-editor in chief of the International Feminist Journal of Politics and serves on the advisory boards of other journals as well as the Helsinki University Press. She is also one of the co editors of the book series, Creative Interventions in Global Politics with Rowman and Littlefield, and Gender and Sexuality in Global Politics with Bristol University Press.  

Swati also contributes regularly to media debates through op eds and blogs and has served as Chair of the Peace Studies Section of the International Studies Association, and as Program Co-Chair for their 2023 annual convention at Montreal. 

Swati holds a PhD in Politics and International Relations from Lancaster University, UK; MA in International Studies from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India; and a BA (Hons) History from Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi University, India.

About me

Anush Petrosyan is supporting the coordination of the PeaceEdu project at TAPRI and she is one of the researchers of the Re-(E)MBody Project. She is a Doctoral Researcher at Tampere Peace Research Institute (TAPRI), Tampere University in Finland. Her research interests are memory in post-conflict reconciliation, memorialization and peace processes, and the role of intergenerational transmission of memory in post-conflict societies. Her doctoral research is titled “Reconstructing Life in Exile: Memory and the Search for Belonging among Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh” while within the Re-(E)MBody Project she investigates the issue of enforced disappearances in the context of the Armenian – Azerbaijani conflict. From 2022 – 2024 Anush served as a Board Member at the European Peace Research Association (EuPRA).

About me

Head, Women in Peacemaking and Digital Peacemaking, CMI – Martti Ahtisaari Peace Foundation 

Johanna leads CMI’s methodological priorities that advance more gender inclusive peace processes and respond to the opportunities and threats digital technologies present to peacemaking. Johanna has over two decades of experience in peace mediation, having advised and led inclusive dialogue processes in conflict-affected contexts including e.g. Yemen, South Sudan and Nepal. She first joined CMI in 2013 to serve as the country manager for South Sudan based in Juba. Prior to this, Johanna worked for Demo Finland to support constructive cross-party dialogue in transition contexts. Johanna holds MA in Diplomacy from the University of Helsinki and MPA from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government as Fulbright scholar. She was also fellow-in-residence at Durham University (UK) in research project Mediation for the 21st Century with a focus on inclusivity. Johanna is a member of Nordic Women Mediators. 

About me

Riikka Pöyhönen is a History and Social Studies teacher. She worked as a Teachers Without Borders Volunteer in Uganda in 2022. Her work included co-operation with UMYDF, Uganda Muslim Youth Development Forum, and finalizing Peace Education Manual for Peace Clubs.  She organized trainings for teachers and NGO workers and supported The Peace Clubs. She has also held Peace education on-line trainings for students in Cambodia and developed peace education materials for Finnish Schools.

About me

Farah Salmi is a distinguished expert in International Law and Human Rights, with a focus on peace mediation, legal consultation, and advocacy for marginalized communities. Holding a Master’s in International Law and certification as a Human Rights Trainer, she has represented the Palestinian cause at international forums like the UN and EU. Specializing in legal frameworks, peace-building, and gender equality, she advocates for women’s rights, security, and youth empowerment in conflict zones. As Founder and Director of Innovate for consulting and Law services, she leads efforts to provide legal support and advocacy for human rights defenders and communities in crisis, promoting global peace and dignity.

About me

Antti Tarvainen is a researcher at the foundation of the Finnish Institute in the Middle East and a doctoral researcher at the University of Helsinki. In his research Antti examines the entanglements between innovation economy, geopolitics and state violence in the global landscapes of Palestine/Israel. His empirical sites range from Palestine/Israel to Silicon Valley and to the Gulf countries. Theoretically Antti’s work moves between settler colonial, relational and critical theory.

About me

Tarja Väyrynen is Professor in Peace and Conflict Research at the Tampere Peace Research Institute (TAPRI). She has a research profile which includes such themes as gender and peacebuilding, theories of conflict and conflict resolution, subaltern and indigenous resistance and post-conflict memory work. Her recent publications include (2023) “War agency  in women’s auxiliary military organizations: The case of Lotta Svärd in Finland”, International Feminist Journal of Politics; (2021, eds. with S Parashar, E. Feron and C. Confortini) Routledge Handbook on Feminist Peace Research, Routledge; (2019) Corporeal Peacebuilding: Mundane Bodies and Temporal Transitions.  Her current research project deals environmental conflict resolution.

About me

Katja Vauhkonen works as programme manager in Felm in a project supporting Myanmar’s peace process. Vauhkonen is a member of steering committee of Finland’s women, peace and security network. She has worked on promoting gender equality and inclusion with civil society organisations, Finnish Government and United Nations.

About me

Peter Wallensteen is Professor Emeritus at Uppsala University and the University of Notre Dame, USA. He was the first Head of the Department of Peace and Conflict Research, 1972-1999. During that time Wallensteen initiated and led the Uppsala Conflict Data Program (UCDP), 1978-2015. He was the first holder of the Dag Hammarskjöld Chair at Uppsala University, 1985-2012. Since 2021 he is Deputy Chair of the Alva Myrdal Center for Nuclear Disarmament, Uppsala University and leads its working group on international measures for nonproliferation. His research includes economic sanctions, causes of war, mediation, conflict resolution and quality peace. Wallensteen has personal experiences as a third party in armed conflicts around the world.

The volume Peter Wallensteen: A Pioneer in Making Peace Researchable (Springer 2021) explains his involvement in peace research, and presents ten fields he has contributed to. His Understanding Conflict Resolution is now in its 6thedition (Sage, 2023, with editions in Arabic and Korean). Wallensteen has published on Alva Myrdal’s contributions to nuclear arms control (with Armend Bekaj, Springer 2022) and recently finished The Peacemaking Mandate (on Nordic mediators, with Isak Svensson, CUP 2025) as well as Sanctions for Nuclear Disarmament and Non-Proliferation (with Armend Bekaj, Routledge 2024).

About me

Matthias Wevelsiep serves as the Director of Programs and Operations at the Network for Religious and Traditional Peacemakers. Prior to his current post, Matthias was working on Finn Church Aid’s digital transition and was heading FCA’s Programme Development Unit. He is focused especially on the intersection of sustainable development and digitalization as well as on the humanitarian-development-peace nexus. Before FCA, he worked with CMI (Martti Ahtisaari Peace Foundation) and with Plan International Finland. Matthias has over 20 years of experience in international development cooperation and peacebuilding from Africa, Asia, and the Americas.