Staff and Offices

Akbota is a project manager with university degrees in international relations and political science, who has previous worked on projects with the World Bank and OSCE.

Angela joined IWPR in September 2020 as Global HR Director and leads the people agenda across the organisation. Having worked previously in a range of senior HR and recruitment roles, both in the profit and not-for-profit sectors she is focused on ensuring the HR function offers support and guidance to our staff whilst ensuring our people activities support the organisational missions.

Anne oversees monitoring, evaluation, management and design of a portfolio of projects on civil society capacity building, media development, and government accountability. She has nearly a decade of experience working at prominent conflict resolution and human rights organisations.

Anne holds an MA in Conflict, Peace and Security from the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies in Geneva, Switzerland. She also has a diploma in Monitoring and Evaluation from New York University and a BA in History and International Studies from Northwestern University.

Ayan is project coordinator of IWPR’s Religious Freedom for Kazakstan project. With an MA in Religious Roots of Europe from the University of Copenhagen in Denmark, he is among the first religious studies scholars from Kazakstan to hold a master’s degree from a European university.

Aziza is project manager of the Kazakstan Uncensored and Civil Society for Kazakstan programmes.  With bachelor’s degree in finance and a master’s degree in management. Aziza has ten years of experience working on projects funded by international organisations including the EU and USAID.

Carolina is a Bolivian journalist who specialises in fact checking in television and print media. A co-founder of the Bolivian Feminist Journalism Network, she has a master's degree in Latin American Social Studies and was a fellow of Periodistas por el Planeta.

Caroline joined IWPR in September 2022 as an HR specialist covering all global locations. She has an Honours Degree in International Business and Economics, a postgraduate qualification in HR, and is MCIPD accredited. Prior to joining IWPR she had over 20 years experience in building and strengthening HR departments, in both the private sector and in international development organisations.

Carrie joined IWPR in 2021 as International Compliance Manager. She is responsible for ongoing donor regulatory guidance and support to staff. With over 15 years of experience in the international development sector, specialising in USG rules and regulations. Carrie holds an MA in Conflict Resolution from the University of Bradford and a BA in International Development from Clark University.

Cecilia is a Digital Communications Expert with more than 16 years of experience and passionate about human rights, gender perspective and sustainability. For the last four years, her work has focused on supporting vulnerable groups in the Caribbean.

Cecilia is IWPR’s Principal Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) manager, with more than a decade of professional experience in this field. She oversees the development and implementation of IWPR's MEL system and has introduced qualitative participatory evaluation methods. Cecilia has restructured IWPR's MEL practices, enhancing the ability of staff and partners to understand and learn from project impacts. She prioritises inclusive and participatory approaches that empower marginalised groups to influence decision-making processes while fostering a culture of organisational learning and accountability.

Dahlia has over 20 years of experience working with global organisations, civil society and governmental institutions, in coordination with a wide variety of international donors both in Lebanon and across the Middle East. She has experience in projects focusing on democracy and good governance, counter-terrorism, citizen participation, education and youth. A Lebanese national, Dahlia is fluent in Arabic, English, and French.

Elvira has worked in the NGO sector for nearly 25 years and has extensive experience in grants, financial management and administrative skills. An English graduate, she is also fluent in Russian and her native Georgian.

Gabriela is a multimedia journalist and product manager dedicated to telling useful, relevant, and compelling stories that cut through the noise and cultivating resilience, agility, and inclusion in news organisations. At IWPR, Gabriela helps beneficiaries develop their audiences, pilot business initiatives and navigate the complex challenges of media management.

Gehan joined IWPR in 2022 as the Head of Programme Finance. He is responsible for all donor financial reporting including proposal budgeting where he leads a team supporting programmes and teams across IWPR. He has over 15 years of experience working in both the corporate and not-for-profit sector overseeing resource mobilisation, grant management, and financial reporting.

Handa joined IWPR in 2018 and is the HR systems and benefits coordinator. She is responsible for the administration of all HR related systems and is the first point-of-contact for company-wide benefits and leave arrangements. Handa graduated in Business Administration from Strayer University in the US and has over eight years of experience in the field of HR. 

Jefferson is a public accountant specialist in project management with extensive experience in the evaluation, planning, execution and control of projects under PMI and MGA methodology. Financial experience includes budget control, costs, portfolio, treasury, database, quality, investments and inventories.

José Luis is a Salvadoran academic, journalist and media development expert. For more than 15 years he was a professor of communication and journalism at the Central American University (UCA) in El Salvador and has worked on numerous projects with organisations including UNESCO, UNDP and Media4Democracy to media pluralism, and freedom of expression in Latin America.

Len joined IWPR in 2007 for its first human rights project in the Philippines, funded by the US State Department. She handles all the financial aspects of field project activities, and prior to joining IWPR worked in the finance department of one of the leading accounting firms in the Philippines.

Maftuna is a graduate of Amity University’s economics faculty. She is an active volunteer at Youth Union Uzbekistan, GoViral.

Manal joined IWPR in 2019 as a procurement associate and is now the operations manager for MENA regional programmes. Manal has 20 years of experience in the business world and launched her career in the humanitarian sector at the Lebanese Red Cross. She holds a Master’s Degree in Business Administration and a CMA and speaks fluent Arabic and English.

Naidelyn is a political scientist who leads IWPR’s monitoring, evaluation, and learning processes of Latin America and the Caribbean programming. She has worked with think tanks, consulting firms and academia on applied research, international knowledge networks and regional political analysis. Her areas of expertise include research methods, data analysis for social projects, press freedom and the strengthening of democracy.

Nino is the BREN project country coordinator for Georgia. With a PhD in Law from Tbilisi State University, she has more than 14 years experience in planning, implementing and coordinating programmes for international organisations. She has served as a project officer and pro-consul at the British Embassy in Tbilisi as well as working for the UN Association of Georgia as a legal counsellor of the refugee and migration programme.

Reza has more than 16 years of experience in international development, programme design, monitoring, evaluation and management. He has been responsible for developing and managing over a dozen accountability, media, research and civil society capacity building projects for IWPR.
 
A PhD candidate at American University where he studies the history of modern Middle East and critical theory, Reza is a frequent media contributor and has written for publications including Foreign Policy, the Guardian and CNN. He holds an MA in Middle East Studies from The George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.

Sarah is a Chartered Accountant with over 10 years experience in the INGO sector.  Having qualified with Deloitte, she left in 2010 to focus her career on utilising her accountancy skills for the benefit of charities. Prior to joining IWPR in 2020 she worked at Save the Children International for 8 years in various finance roles.

Seth Meixner has led media and development programming in Asia, the Middle East and North Africa, and Latin America for 22 years. He has built and managed award-winning multimedia news operations and delivered projects supporting social and gender equality, free media, and access to information in post-conflict countries. Prior to becoming Regional Director for MENA and LAC, Seth served as IWPR's Senior Country Director in North Africa, and investigations manager and Interim Country Director in Afghanistan.

After completing a degree in architecture, Srđan became interested in photography, graphic and product design. While doing freelance work, he completed several web design courses at Chelsea College of Art & Design and St Martins. He joined IWPR in 2001. Srđan is responsible for managing the content of IWPR’s website while also acting as an in-house web and graphic designer. In 2020, Srđan redesigned and oversaw the development of IWPR's current website.

Stephen joined IWPR as COO in 2020, committed to maintaining the highest standards of performance, accountability and compliance. He has a background in finance and international development in the public and private sectors, working with governments, donors, financial institutions and companies to drive sustainable outcomes.

Tamar is project coordinator for countering gender disinformation in Armenia, Georgia, and Poland. A human rights lawyer with an LLM from the University of London and an MA from Ilia State University, she has extensive experience of working in academia and human rights organisations, with a primary focus on gender and identity issues.

Tanya has over 20 years’ experience in international development within fundraising, communications and senior management. Following an earlier career in advertising agencies, Tanya is committed to international development that is locally-driven and sustainable. She has a wide range of fundraising experience from institutional donors, the private sector and high net-worth individuals.

Vonda has more than 30 years of experience in international development, law, and journalism. She has managed contracts and grants on behalf of governments, and international and private sector organisations involving research and capacity building programmes. Her areas of focus include rule of law, transnational organised crime, anticorruption, accountability, media rights and disinformation. As a lawyer, she has served as a justice advisor to the US Department of State.

Waheed joined IWPR's Finance Department in 2022 and works closely with colleagues in the Caucasus region and Moldova.

Yhiba joined IWPR in April 2023 as a recruitment & HR advisor. With over 13 years of experience in the field, Yhiba has worked with HR teams at global companies, providing talent management, compliance and training support.