Peace News Expert Network

Ayse Bala Akal is a research assistant at the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO) and holds an MA (2020) in International Criminal and Humanitarian Law from the University of Oslo

Beatrix Geaghan-Breiner is a Research Assistant at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She recently graduated from Columbia University, where she studied the history of U.S. foreign policy.

Brooke Coe is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Oklahoma State University (USA). Her work compares regional law and organisations in the global South, and she is the author of Sovereignty in the South: Intrusive Regionalism in Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia (CUP 2019).

Catherine Vanner is an Assistant Professor of Educational Foundations at the University of Windsor. Her research uses qualitative and participatory methods to examine the relationship between gender, violence, and education in North American and Sub-Saharan African contexts. Her current research analyzes teacher and student experiences on education about gender-based violence in Canada and is funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. She has worked as Postdoctoral Fellow at McGill University and as Education Advisor for Plan International Canada and the Canadian International Development Agency (now Global Affairs Canada). She holds a Ph.D. in Education from the University of Ottawa and a M.A. in International Affairs from Carleton University.

Cecile Pentori is the South Asia Program Coordinator for Conciliation Resources. She has worked with UNDP, UNIFEM and holds a Master degree in IR.

Cedric de Coning is a Research Professor with the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI) where he co-directs the Center on UN and Global Governance, and he is a senior advisor and chief editor for the African Center for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD). He holds a PhD from the Department of Philosophy at the University of Stellenbosch (2012). He has served in a number of advisory capacities for the African Union and United Nations, including on the UN Secretary-General’s Advisory Board for the Peacebuilding Fund. He has co-edited 10 books, of which the most recent is ‘Adaptive Mediation and Conflict Resolution: Peace-making in Colombia, Mozambique, the Philippines, and Syria’ (Palgrave MacMillan, 2022). He tweets at @CedricdeConing.

Chas Morrison is Assistant Professor for Research at the Institute for Peace and Security, Coventry University. His main research interests are around the social dynamics in crisis-affected environments, covering civil society and community actions, civilian protection and conflict legacies. He also researches participation, inclusion and leadership in post-disaster reconstruction. Before joining Coventry University, he worked for several years for humanitarian NGOs in East Africa and South Asia community reconstruction programmes after civil conflict and disaster.

Christian Cito Cirhigiri is a peace journalist from the Democratic Republic of Congo and founder of the Peacemaker 360 campaign

Dr Denise Bentrovato is originally from Italy and studied foreign languages, African studies, international relations, conflict resolution, and international and political history in the Netherlands, Denmark and the United Kingdom. In 2013, she completed her PhD at the Research Institute for History and Culture at the University of Utrecht, with a thesis investigating the politics of history, identity and education in Rwanda, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Throughout her career, she has worked in academia and for government institutions, international organisations and NGOs in Europe and Africa in the fields of peacebuilding and post-war educational reform, including UNESCO, the Inter-Agency Network for Education in Emergencies (INEE) and the Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research (GEI).

Her academic work combines an interest in memory politics, transitional justice and history education in Africa, and covers questions surrounding the politics and practice of history curriculum and textbook revision and the teaching and learning of sensitive and controversial histories of abuse, conflict, mass violence and genocide in post-colonial and post-war societies.

Dr Maurice Beseng is a Visiting Research Fellow at the Centre for Trust, Peace, and Social Relations (CTPSR), Coventry University. His research focuses on issues of conflict, security, and development in Cameroon