July 27 - August 7, 2024
Editor-in-chief Academic director
Based in Armenia, Tatev is an international investigative journalist and editor with 13 years of editorial experience. Until August of 2023, she was openDemocracy’s Europe and Eurasia editor. Her writing has appeared in numerous international media outlets, including the BBC, Euronews, and the Guardian.
Tatev is also a lecturer at the Yerevan Brusov State University of Languages and Social Sciences.
In 2023, Tatev received the Journalists for Human Rights 2023 award for her investigation into illegal adoptions. In 2022, she won an Emma Goldman Award for innovative research on feminist and inequality issues in Europe – the first time a journalist has won the award.
Journalist
Tharushi Weerasinghe is an award-winning freelance journalist based in Colombo, Sri Lanka, specializing in environmental issues, politics, and social justice reporting. Her work appears in the Sunday Times (Sri Lanka) and other regional publications.
Her climate journalism includes on-ground reporting from the United Nation’s COP27 (Egypt) and COP28 (UAE) have exposed state mismanagement of resources and ecologically damaging policy-making within Sri Lanka. She was also an on-ground reporter of the “Aragalaya”, the Sri Lankan anti-government protests that took place in 2022.
Weerasinghe is a multiple grant awardee fellow at the Earth Journalism Network and Stanley Centre for Peace and Security. She was awarded the Denzil Peiris Young Reporter of the Year 2023 award and the Upali Wijewardene Best Feature Writer of the Year 2023 award by the Sri Lanka Press Institute and Editor’s Guild. She was also the two-time winner of the aforementioned Young Reporter of the Year Merit award in 2021 and 2022. She is also the Lakshman Kadirgamar Scholar of 2024 to the Manorama School of Communication in Kerala, India where she is currently studying journalism alongside a law degree from the University of London.
Head of sales
In the media and PR industry for almost two decades as a journalist and producer, Konrad collaborated with Polish Television (TVP), Polish Radio, investigative journalism outlet OKO.press and Gazeta Wyborcza. He also worked as a PR consultant and political campaign strategist for European, parliamentary and presidential elections in Poland. In 2016 received the Grand Press award.
Combining his work with activism, Konrad served as a chief press officer for the “Save the women” bill Civic Committee. He also founded a non-profit initiative for women’s rights and animal welfare.