Belarusian philologist, translator, writer, poet and politician, in 1990-1995, Member of the Supreme Council of the Byelorussian SSR / the Parliament of Belarus, 12th legislature; member of the BNF opposition, with anti-Communist and pro-independence origins. In 1996—99, 2007-2009 he acted as the Chairman of the BPF Party; PhD since 1989. In 1980 he graduated from the Minsk University of Foreign Languages. He taught at the Polatsk State University in 1981-1990. From 1991 he was deputy director at the Belarusian Lyceum of Humanities. He was arrested many times for his oppositional activities against the regime of Alexander Lukashenka. His lyceum was forced to become an underground school in 2003.His first publications appeared in print in 1985 in the Byelorussian SSR . Since 1989 he belongs to the Union of Belarusian Writers. He has translated works from Latin, Ancient Greek, German, English , French, Polish, Czech and other languages. In 2003 he was elected chairman of the Belarusian PEN Club and he held this position until October 2005. In total, his name was signed by more than 200 publications. His scientific achievements include the development of the methodology of language and literature , linguistics and literary studies.
Experts
Lavon Barshcheuski
Lavon Basceuski
President of the Belarusian PEN-Club, one of the leaders of the opposition Belarusian National Front.
Henryk Bątkiewicz
He holds a PhD degree in Political Sciences. His doctoral thesis was awarded the prize by the Polish Institute of International Affairs. Worked, among others, as a head teacher and as a teacher in a school and in an infant school at the Institute of Children's Diseases in Cracow. In 1990 worked in the Special Schooling Centre at the University Children's Hospital. Recently he has taught at the Brother Albert Memorial College for Social Workers. Since January 2004 Deputy Mayor of the City of Cracow, exercises general supervision over education, culture activities and preservation of the City’s historical monuments.
Tamar Beruchashvili
Deputy State Minister of Georgia on European and Euro-Atlantic Integration. 1998-99 Deputy Minister of Trade and Foreign Economic Relations,
1999-2000 Minister of Trade and Foreign Economic Relations, 2000-04 Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, 2004 Deputy State Minister (Deputy Chief of the Government), 2004 Minister of State and Minister of Integration with European structures. She also has an great academic experience as the Assistant Professor of Economics Department of the Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University, teaching International trade policy and commercial diplomacy and European Integration for the Master’s degree students and as a lecturer at the Georgian Institute of Public Administration (GIPA), Course for the Master’s degree students – Trade and Development. She is a member of the American Society of Public Administration, a member of the Georgian Information Society, board member of International Trade Policy and Law Center and a chairperson of the Government Commission for Gender Equality.
Mieczysław Bieniek
Former NATO's Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Transformation. He holds the ran), Multinational Division Central-South in Iraq. Besides and was assigned as a Special Envoy of the SACEUR in Afghanistan. He served as a senior military advisor to the k of the four-star General. So far it was the highest position, taken by Polish general in NATO Command Structure. He served as Commanding Officer of the Polish Contingent in the UN Mission – UNDOF; as Chief Logistics Officer in UN Mission – MINURSO. He commanded Nordic-Polish Brigade Command in SFOR, 3rd Corps NRDC (Turkey Polish Minister of Defense. General Bieniek was appointed as the Polish Military Representative to the NATO and European Union Military Committees in Brussels. His education includes the Polish Army Academy, Polish Armed Forces General Staff Academy and Royal College of Defense Studies in London. Also, he holds PhD in International Security from Polish NDU. Author of many articles and books about International security and strategy as well as cyber and energy security.
Nikko Biernacka
A freelance photographer, founder of the Machina Fotografika Foundation, she promotes people who work in photography, supports the creative development of women and performs educational activities in visual arts. A graduate of Cultural Studies at the Adam Mickiewicz University of Poznań and Creative Photography in Opava (Czech Republic), with a diploma in Dita Pepe’s seminar. She exhibits both in Poland and abroad. She publishes in newspapers: Polityka weekly, Wysokie Obcasy magazine, Tygodnik Powszechny weekly, as well as in books. She strives to make fashion a tool for the promotion of important social, artistic and cultural events and she attains this goal in “artfashion” photo sessions. She has also completed coach training organized by NGO Trainers’ Association STOP, currently participant in the Leaders Program of The Polish-American Freedom Foundation. She works on project „440 km”, which aims to support women’s development with physical disabilities and make them more visible in public space.
Patryk Błaszczak
Diplomat and government official. In 2008, he started working at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, at the Department of the United Nations and Human Rights, and then at the Department of European Policy. In 2017-2018 he was the head of the Political Department of the Embassy of the Republic of Poland in Paris. From 2019, deputy director in the Department of European Policy. From October 2020, he also serves as the National Coordinator of Visegrad Cooperation.
Krzysztof Bobiński
Is the President of Unia & Polska, a pro-European organisation. He worked with the Financial Times as its Warsaw Correspondent from 1976 to 2000 and later published Unia & Polska, a magazine devoted to EU issues. He writes for openDemocracy and is associate editor on the Europe section of Europe’s World. He is a co-chair of Steering Committee of Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum. He studied modern history at Magdalen College, Oxford. He is a Commander (II class) of the Stella della Solidarieta’ Italiana.
Vít Bojňanský
Vít Bojňanský is an academic sculptor. He showed first interest in plastic art and painting already in childhood, attending the Primary art school in Bratislava. After graduating the Arts and Crafts school in Bratislava in 1981, he continued his education at the Academy of Fine Arts and Design, which he graduated under supervision of masters Ladislav Snopek and Jan Kulich in 1987.
He took part in numerous sculptural symposiums either at home or abroad, while in 1995 he won the 3rd award at the International Sculptural Symposium in Cagliari, Sardinia. At the turn of the century, he took party in several study programmes in Paris (CIDA), where his paintings were exhibited, too. His work was exhibited at dozens of individual or collective exhibitions, and presented at private collections all around the world, including prestigious exhibition halls in the Netherlands, France, Austria, Germany, Spain, the USA, Italy, Korea, the United Arab Emirates, China and the Czech Republic.
Endre Bojtár
Editor-in-chief of a liberally-oriented Hungarian weekly Magyar Narancs.
