Professor Priyankar Upadhyaya is widely regarded as the pioneer of peace studies in India and holds the UNESCO Chair for Peace and Intercultural Understanding at Banaras Hindu University, in addition to over thirty years teaching international relations and peace studies as well as managing the M...

Susan Hayward is a senior advisor for religion and inclusive societies at the U.S. Institute of Peace. Hayward directs the Institute’s efforts to advance conflict prevention, resolution and reconciliation projects engaging the religious sector. Since joining the Institute in 2007, her field work h...

Asna Husin is Associate Professor (‘Dosen’) teaching Philosophy of Education and Islamic Civilization at Ar-Raniry State Islamic University at Darussalam in Banda Aceh, Indonesia. She currently serves as senior researcher at the Washington D.C. based NGO Nonviolence International, working on Cul...

Facilitating inter-religious cooperation on issues of shared concern as a means to deepen trust through collaboration.  Utilizing diverse tools and technologies to foster dialogue and cooperation, from traditional in-person roundtable dialogues to social impact entertainment (TV and radio drama and...

Dr. Imam Umer Ahmed Ilyasi is the Chief Imam of the All India Imam Organization which is a voice of half a million Imams of India who happens to be the religious and spiritual guide of 210 Million Indian Muslims. AIIO is recognized in that capacity and role both at the national and international lev...

Father Ameer Jaje is a Dominican priest and Advisor to the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and Professor at the Catholic Institute for Theology in Paris.  He is a Founding Member of the Iraqi Council for Interfaith Dialogue since 2013 and Member of the Dominican Institute of Orienta...

Born in 1947, in Beirut, Lebanon, His Holiness Catholicos Aram I studied at the Armenian Theological Seminary, Antelias, Lebanon and the Ecumenical Institute of Bossey, Geneva, Switzerland. He received his M.Div. from the Near East School of Theology, his S.T.M. jointly from the American University ...

Sister Emily (Emeline) Tannous is a member of the religious order dedicated to Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, founded in Lebanon in 1853 and currently coordinator of the Theological and Ecumenical Department in MECC. Committed to the pastoral life in the church and to ecumenical, interfaith and in...

Dr. Sayyed Jawad Mohammed Taqi Al-Khoei is the Secretary-General of the Al-Khoei Institute in Najaf, Iraq, a pioneering centre that combines a traditional Islamic seminary with a contemporary interfaith academy. He was born in December 1980, in Najaf into the family of the spiritual leader for Shia ...

Bishop William Swing is the President and Founder of the URI. Bishop Swing had the original vision of URI in 1993 in response to an invitation from the United Nations which asked him to host an interfaith service honoring the 50th anniversary of the signing of the UN Charter. Bishop Swing served as ...