Co-Chair, Canadian Voice of Women for Peace (VOW) • Canada
Lyn Adamson is Co-Chair of Canadian Voice of Women for Peace (VOW). She is also a nonviolence trainer and conflict resolution practitioner, lifelong activist for peace and environment, grandmother, Quaker, and advocate for a safe climate future. VOW has conducted more than 30 study tours for women to UN sites and organized international peace conferences and workshops. Janis Alton, her Co-Chair, was part of the international women’s peace delegation that crossed the Demilitarized Zone from North Korea to South Korea in 2015.
International Coordinator, Women Cross DMZ • United States
Christine Ahn is the founder and International Coordinator of Women Cross DMZ, a global movement of women mobilizing to end the Korean War, reunite families, and ensure women’s leadership in peace building. She is co-founder of the Korea Peace Network, Korea Policy Institute and Global Campaign to Save Jeju Island She has addressed the United Nations, U.S. Congress, and the Republic of Korea’s National Human Rights Commission. Christine has been a policy analyst at the Global Fund for Women, Oakland Institute, Institute for Food & Development Policy, and Nautilus Institute. A columnist with Foreign Policy In Focus, her writings have been published in The New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, CNN, and The Nation. She has appeared on Al Jazeera, Anderson Cooper 360, BBC, CBC, CNN, Democracy Now!, NBC Today Show, NPR, the Samantha Bee Show, and Voice of America.
International President, Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) • Japan
Kozue Akibayashi is the International President of Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF). She is a researcher/activist who has worked on issues of gender and peace, militarism, and demilitarization. She also serves on the steering committee of Women Cross DMZ, having been part of the delegation of 30 international women peacebuilders who crossed the DMZ on the Korean Peninsula in 2015. A Professor at Doshisha University (Kyoto) she teaches gender studies, peace studies and peace education. From 2006-2014 she was Associate Professor in the Department of International Relations at Ritsumeikan University (Kyoto), and previously also taught gender, peace, and security at Teachers College/Columbia University (New York City), Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, and other institutions. In 2014 she also served on the advisory group for the Japanese government on the National Action Plan to implement UNSC 1325.
MARY-WYNNE ASHFORD, MDPast Co-President, International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War • Canada
Mary-Wynne Ashford is a retired medical doctor and professor who became an activist for the abolition of nuclear weapons in 1984. She was Co-President of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) for two terms, and President of the Canadian affiliate of IPPNW, Physicians for Global Survival, for two terms. IPPNW won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1985. She also serves as a board member of Canadian Voice of Women for Peace (VOW). She is a consultant, writer and speaker, and was the Keynote Speaker at a conference in South Korea based on her book, Enough Blood Shed: 101 Solutions to Violence, Terror and War (2007) sponsored by the UN, the City of Busan, and Indigo Publishers. She led two delegations of IPPNW doctors to North Korea in 1999 and 2000 to present information about the medical consequences of a nuclear bomb. Mary-Wynne has two TEDx talks and has won many awards for her work including the Queen’s Medal on two occasions. She is an Honorary Citizen of the City of Victoria and currently has a heavy schedule in British Columbia speaking on the threat of nuclear war between the U.S. and North Korea.
SUSAN BAZILLIDirector, International Women’s Rights Project (IWRP) and Representative, Women Peace and Security Network • Canada
Susan Bazilli is the Director of the International Women’s Rights Project (IWRP), currently based in Vancouver. The IWRP works with women’s NGOs on a project by project basis on capacity building, and has worked on issues of women, peace and security such as SCR 1325 and the Responsibility to Protect. Susan is a feminist lawyer, educator, activist, trainer, advocate and writer who has worked for 30 years on women’s equality rights. She is a long-time member of the Women’s International League of Peace and Freedom (WILPF) and a member of the Canadian Women Peace and Security Network (WPSN), whom she is representing at the Vancouver Forum. She has consulted to many UN bodies and a wide range of NGOs on women’s human rights issues in Southern Africa, South East and Central Asia, Eastern Europe and North America. Her advocacy work has included Legal Director of the Metro Action Committee on Violence Against Women (METRAC); founder of the Ontario Women’s Justice Network; Executive Director of the California Alliance Against Domestic Violence; manager of the Southern African Women’s Legal Rights Initiative; and special adviser on violence against women to the American Bar Association in Moscow.
LIZ BERNSTEINExecutive Director, Nobel Women’s Initiative • Canada
Liz Bernstein is the founding Director of the Nobel Women’s Initiative. She has led the organization in building strong relationships with Global South grassroots women’s organizations to grow the global women’s peace movement. From 1998-2004 Liz served as Coordinator of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) and prior to that, lived in Thailand and Cambodia for 10 years (1986-1996) where she worked with local peace and justice advocacy organizations and co-founded the Coalition for Peace and Reconciliation. Liz also co-founded Ecology Ottawa. The Nobel Women’s Initiative uses the prestige of the Nobel Peace Prize and six courageous women peace laureates to magnify the power and visibility of women’s movements working in countries around the world for peace, justice and equality. The NWI works to strengthen and expand feminist efforts to promote nonviolent solutions to war, and opposes violence and militarism. In 2015 Mairead Maguire, Nobel Peace Laureate from Northern Ireland, and Leymah Gbowee, Nobel Peace Laureate from Liberia, both members of the Initiative, joined Women Cross DMZ to cross from North Korea to South Korea. Nobel Women’s Initiative is a member of Women Peace Security Network-Canada.
ERICA FEINAdvocacy Director, Win Without War • United States
Erica Fein is Advocacy Director at Win Without War. She engages with policymakers in the U.S. Congress, the Executive Branch, the NGO community, the media, and grassroots partners to advance the organization’s progressive foreign policy and national security agenda. Her career has centered in and around Congress and U.S. foreign policy issues. Previously, she served as Director of Government Affairs and Nuclear Weapons Policy, and Director at Women’s Action for New Directions where she led campaigns to limit the excessive U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal. Prior to that, she served as legislative assistant to former Congressman John D. Dingell of Michigan where she advised on issues such as national security, foreign policy, and veterans’ affairs. Erica holds an MA from the Josef Korbel School of International Studies and a BA from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her work has been featured in U.S. News and World Report, the Huffington Post, the New York Times, Defense One, among other publications, and she has been a guest on several radio programs, including “From a Woman’s Point of View” on WMNF Tampa 88.5 and “Make It Plain with Mark Thompson” on SiriusXM radio.
Women Cross DMZ • Sweden
Ewa Erikssonn-Fortier was in the delegation of 30 international peacebuilders of Women Cross DMZ that crossed from North Korea to South Korea in 2015 and continues to serve on the WCDMZ Steering Committee today. She has a 30-year career within the International Red Cross movement from which she retired two years ago. She has served abroad on long-term country missions to Vietnam, Malawi, Bangladesh, China, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, and has also carried out many shorter-term missions to other countries. She was the former Head of Country Delegation in Pyongyang, DPRK in 2008 and 2009, for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, and has since returned for several country visits to the DPRK in cooperation with the International Red Cross.
ELLEN JUDD, FRSCCanadian Voice of Women for Peace • Canada
Ellen Judd is Distinguished Professor and Professor of Anthropology at the University of Manitoba. She is an ethnographer and a peace and justice activist whose research is concentrated in political anthropology, the anthropology of gender and kinship, and the study of conflict, inequality and mutuality. She has been active in the peace movement since the Vietnam War era and the nuclear disarmament movement of the 1980s, advocating nonviolently for peace and justice in Canada and internationally, including at Greenham Common, Faslane and Guantanamo Bay. Since 9/11 her focus in anthropology and in activism has been on opposing war and on building bridges across cultural and political barriers. She teaches the anthropology of gender/feminist anthropology and the anthropology of human rights, and works with graduate students in peace and conflict studies. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, a past President of the Canadian Anthropology Society and a Visiting Professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science. She currently serves on the national board of the Canadian Voice of Women for Peace.
NAN KIM, PhDAlliance of Scholars Concerned about Korea & Presbyterian Peace Network for Korea • United States
Nan Kim is Associate Professor in the Department of History at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, where she is the Director of the Public History program and the Coordinator of the Asian Studies program. She is a member of the Alliance of Scholars Concerned about Korea (ASCK) and is the author of Memory, Reconciliation, and Reunions in South Korea: Crossing the Divide. The book focuses on the reunions of North-South Korean separated families and explores how public memory of unresolved war trauma has played a significant role in the Korean peace process. She serves on the steering committee of ASCK and the editorial board of the Seoul Journal of Korean Studies. She is a member of the Presbyterian Peace Network for Korea (PPNK), a group within the Presbyterian Church (USA) which strives to contribute toward current efforts to reconcile all sides of the Korean conflict through peaceful means. A native of New York City, she received her Ph.D. in cultural anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley.
MIHYEON LEEManager, Center for Peace and Disarmament, People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy • Republic of Korea
Mihyeon Lee is the Manager of Center for Peace and Disarmament, People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy (PSPD), a watchdog NGO based in Seoul. She has worked since 2012 at the Center whose main activities include monitoring government policies and suggesting alternatives to DPRK-US conflicts, North Korea’s nuclear issue, inter-Korean relations, security issues of the ROK-US military alliance, and the growing regional arms race, among others. PSPD is the Seoul focal point of Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict (GPPAC) Northeast Asia, for which Mihyeon manages the network in South Korea. She has participated in the Ulaanbaatar Process, a civil society dialogue for peace and stability in Northeast Asia which was organized by GPPAC NEA. Since 2013 she has also coordinated Parliamentarians for Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament (PNND) Korea. She gave a presentation on “Is Nuclear-free Northeast Asia Feasible – Civil Society Perspectives” at the NEA-NWFZ NGO forum which was held in parallel with the 2015 NPT review conference.
Guahan Coalition for Peace and Justice • Guam
Lisa Linda Natividad is an Associate Professor in the Division of Social Work at the University of Guam and President of the Guahan Coalition for Peace and Justice. She is an indigenous daughter of Guahan (Guam, a U.S. territory in the Pacific) and a voice against the United States’ militarization of her island. She is an advocate for the exercise of her people’s (indigenous CHamorus) right to self-determination and political decolonization. She is an active member of the International Network of Women Against Militarism and organized a global women’s demilitarization conference on Guahan in 2009. Lisa is a member of the Guam Commission on Decolonization and has participated in various organs of the United Nations to advocate for her people’s human rights. She has presented UN interventions before the Committee on Decolonization (C-24), the 4th Committee, the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, the UN World Conference on Indigenous Peoples, and at a C-24 Regional Decolonization seminar. She was part of Women Cross DMZ, an international delegation of women peacebuilders who crossed from North Korea to South Korea in 2015.
LEE MOON SOOKNational Council of Churches in Korea(NCCK) • Republic of Korea
Lee Moon Sook is Vice-chairperson of the Reconciliation and Reunification Committee of the National Council of Churches (NCC) and an ordained minister of the Presbyterian Church in the Republic of Korea. Since the 1990s Moon Sook has worked for peace and reunification on the Korean peninsula, organizing multiple relief campaigns, including the launch of Church Women Making Peace in Solidarity. She has also served as Moderator of the Women’s Committee of the National Council of Reconciliation and Cooperation, Co-representative of the Women’s Division, South Korean Committee of the Joint Committee for Implementation of the June 15 Agreement (inter-Korean Summit 2000), and Executive Member of the Preparatory Committee for the Women’s Six-Country Talks. Moon Sook visited the U.S. State Department and the Senate and House of Representatives several times as part of the Preparatory team for Women’s Six-Country Talks. She was a member of the lobbying group of civic leaders and one of the ‘peace treaty’ campaigners of the National Council of Churches-Korea, to share women’s, civic and Christian perspectives regarding the issues on the Korean peninsula, and to appeal for a peaceful resolution. Moon Sook has been the Executive Director of the Asian Church Women’s Conference (ACWC) since 2010. Prior to that, she was Director of the National Council of Churches-Korea and General Secretary in the KCWU.
PATTI TALBOTThe United Church of Canada • Canada
Patti Talbot has served as national staff of The United Church of Canada for 25 years. She currently leads the United Church’s Global Partnerships team with direct responsibility for United Church global partnerships in northeast Asia. Born in Japan of missionary parents who lived and worked among Korean residents, she has a lifelong commitment to a vision of peace with justice in the Korean peninsula and in northeast Asia. She lives in Toronto with her husband and their teenage son. The United Church of Canada came together in 1925 through a union of Methodist, Presbyterian, Congregational, and other Christian churches – one of the first ecumenical unions in the world to bring together major Christian denominations into one body. The United Church’s engagement in Korea spans well over 100 years, with a history of mission, commitment to health, education for girls, and leadership development and training. Today, the United Church works with partners in the North and in the South, focusing on amplifying the Korean partners’ call to challenge the rhetoric of fear and seek positive, just ways to lessen the ongoing conflict.
Women Cross the DMZ & Veterans for Peace • United States
Ann Wright served for 29 years in the U.S. Army/Army Reserves and retired as a Colonel. Her assignments included the U.S. Southern Command, the U.S. Pacific Command, the Defense Intelligence Agency, and the International Security Affairs division of the Office of the Secretary of Defense. She is a graduate of the U.S. Naval War College and has been a speaker at the U.S. National Defense University, West Point, and the Asia Pacific Center for Security Studies. Also a U.S. diplomat for 16 years, Ann was Charge d’Affaires or Deputy Chief of Mission in US Embassies in Afghanistan, Sierra Leone, Mongolia and Micronesia, and Embassy Officer in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Nicaragua and Grenada. She received the State Department’s Award for Heroism for her leadership in evacuating the U.S. Embassy in Sierra Leone during the 1997 coup. She was head of the Justice Division for the United Nations mission in Somalia (UNOSOM) in 1993 that attempted to reestablish the Somali police and judicial systems in a country without a national government. She resigned from the U.S. government in March 2003 in opposition to the U.S. war on Iraq. She crossed from North Korea to South Korea in 2015 with Women Cross DMZ and has been on peace missions to Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Gaza, Israel, Malaysia, and most recently to the Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh.
YEHJUNG YI, MAKorean Sharing Movement • Republic of Korea
Yehjung Yi has worked at the Korean Sharing Movement (KSM) since completing graduate studies in 2003. Currently, she leads the Policy Team at the KSM. Before joining the team, she worked at the Center for Peace & Sharing, the policy body of the KSM, and the Inter-Korean Cooperation Team where she was responsible for Health and Medical Assistance to North Korea which included various projects such as hospital rehabilitation and the Pharmaceutical Production Project, among others. Yehjung worked as a member of the Secretariat of the 4th International NGO Conference on Humanitarian and Development Assistance to North Korea in 2005 and since then, has actively participated in organizing meetings on aid to North Korea and promoting cooperation and coordination among aid agencies. Since 2009 she has been a key member of the Secretariat of the Annual International Conference on Assistance to North Korea, co-organized by the KSM, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung and the Gyeonggi Provincial Government. Yehjung has a M.A. in International Studies (East Asian Studies) from Yonsei University, Seoul, Republic of Korea.
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