Ahn Byungok (Korea)
Head, Institute of Climate Change Action (ICCA)

Mr. Ahn is the head of the Institute for Climate Change Action (ICCA), a nongovernmental organization providing research, analysis and commentary covering climate change and energy issues. He works with governmental agencies, communities and civil society groups. He joined the Korean Institute for Pollution Problems (KIPP) in 1985 as a graduate student, when the environmental movement was just getting started in Korea. As a German Öekumenisches Studienwerk scholar, he has spent time in Germany and researched ecology at the University of Essen-Duisburg. After earning a Doctoral degree in Germany, he returned to Korea to join the Korea Federation for Environmental Movement (KFEM), the biggest environmental NGO in Asia with about 40,000 members. In 2007, Mr. Ahn was selected as the Secretary General of KFEM and was involved in various environmental and societal issues in the country. He provides theoretical and practical foundations for climate change mitigation and adaptation and lectures in diverse fora: universities, public policy workshops and training of civil society groups.

Guo Zhiyuan (China)
Attorney / Chief Arbitrator / Professor and Director, Center for Law Application, Anhui University

Dr. Guo obtained a B.A. (International Economic Law) and an M.A. (Procedural Law) at the Anhui University Law School, and received a Ph.D. (Procedural Law) at China University of Political Science and Law. Dr. Guo’s main interest is in conducting comparative law research on the theory and practice of alternative dispute resolution, civil procedure, evidence, and human rights law. He has authored more than twenty publications in China on research in these fields. He was selected by the American Fulbright Committee as a 2009-2010 Humphrey Fellow to take pre-academic training at the University of Arizona, study at the University of Minnesota Law School, and form a professional affiliation at Dorsey & Whitney LLP.

Sasanka Perera (Sri Lanka)
Professor of Anthropology and Head, Department of Sociology, University of Colombo

After graduating with a B.A. degree in Sociology, Political Science and English Language and Literature from the University of Colombo (1984), Dr. Perera continued his studies at the University of California, receiving his M.A. and Ph.D. in Social Anthropology. He conducted postdoctoral research at Princeton University (1992) and obtained a Diploma in Conflict Resolution from the Department of Peace and Conflict Research, Uppsala University (1998). Currently, he is the Chairman of the Colombo Institute for the Advanced Study of Society and Culture, which he initiated with a group of other academics in 2005 to address issues of knowledge production and political intervention which are not addressed by present-day Sri Lankan universities. He is also Chief Editor of the Sinhala-language journal Patitha and the South Asia Journal for Culture. His research interests include politics of education in multiethnic societies, ethnic conflict, political violence and nationalism, rhetoric of “development,” politicization of religion, and politics of space with an emphasis on urban space. He also serves on the editorial board of the Tamil-language journal, Panuwal.

Kong Rithdee (Thailand)
Film Critic / Columnist, Bangkok Post

Mr. Rithdee is a film critic and columnist on cultural affairs at the Bangkok Post, Thailand’s leading English-language newspaper. His pursuits are born out of the belief that film criticism (and art criticism in general) can be a form of literature, and that writing on movies and art can help interpret the state of the world we’re living in by way of creating a constructive dialogue among artists and viewers. In the past five years, he has co-directed three documentary features that touch on the subject of the Muslim minority in Thailand. His second film, The Convert, about a Buddhist woman who converts to Islam to marry a Muslim man, was screened at film festivals in Vancouver, Bangkok, Taiwan, Singapore, Jakarta, and Yamagata in Japan. He is interested in the politics of moving images at a time when the world is saturated with visual information, and he is particularly eager to explore new possibilities since he straddles the role of a print journalist at a time when newspapers are believed to be on the way out, and a filmmaker who believes in the power of moving images.

Seki Kaoruko (Japan)
Humanitarian Policy Officer, United Nations

Ms. Seki works with the United Nations covering issues related to humanitarian affairs, peacekeeping and peace building. In various countries in Asia, Africa and Europe, she has worked on coordinating the international humanitarian response to assist the victims of complex emergencies and natural disasters. She also served with four UN Peacekeeping Operations—in Mozambique (ONUMOZ), Liberia (UNOMIL), Kosovo (UNMIK), and most recently in Timor-Leste (UNMIT) where she supported rebuilding of the national police, as a part of the overall security sector reform aimed toward the consolidation of peace. She was also engaged in developing UN civil-military policy and guidelines in support of humanitarian operations, and is the managing editor of “Civil-Military Guidelines and Reference for Complex Emergencies,” available in six languages. She has lectured at institutions worldwide, including Afghanistan, Britain, Chile, Denmark, Guatemala, Hungary, Japan, Kenya, Liberia, Thailand and the United States. She holds three master’s degrees from universities in Japan, the Netherlands and the United States.