European Young Leaders (#EYL40)

A gifted violinist and visionary champion for youth and community development, Nabeel has led and inspired people from all walks of life across Israel, Europe and the U.S. He performed with, and was a spokesperson for, the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra for a decade as well as performing as a soloist with the Jerusalem Camerata and the Haifa Symphony orchestras. In 2006, Nabeel gave up his music career and returned to his hometown, the Arab-Israeli city of Nazareth, where he founded and led the Barenboim-Said Conservatory—now known as the Polyphony Conservatory—to answer the need he saw in the community for quality music programming. Nabeel has been awarded the Yoko Ono Award for Courage in the Arts for his lifelong-commitment to fostering a sense of community between young pan-Arab and Jewish musicians.

A Maltese athlete and climate activist determined to eliminate marine plastic pollution, Neil created Wave of Change, a movement to encourage a behavioural shift in society’s plastic use. Neil swims great distances to raise awareness about marine pollution and inspire others to collect three items of rubbish when visiting the seaside. He has swum a 100km journey from Sicily to Malta in an astonishing 28 hours, as well as around the entire island of Malta. Most recently, he swam the 125.6km journey from the Italian island of Linosa to Gozo in just over 52 hours, breaking the previous world record for the longest continuous, unassisted, current-neutral swim along a single-segment natural route in ocean, sea or bay. The entire swim was livestreamed, attracting over 2mn viewers, which Neil used as a platform to highlight plastic pollution in our oceans. The former competitive swimmer participated in the Athens Olympic Games and the Games of the Small States of Europe.

Ifrah Ahmed is a Somali-Irish social activist and advocate for the eradication of female genital mutilation (FGM). She is the Founder of the Ifrah Foundation, devoted to the elimination of FGM in her native Somalia and the Horn of Africa. As a child, Ahmed underwent forced mutilation and later fled to Ireland during the war in Somalia in her teenage years, where she was granted political asylum. She became the first woman to broadcast her testimony about undergoing FGM and has served as an advisor to the Somali president and government on gender. Ahmed is also a multi-award winning international advocate for the global elimination of FGM. Along with community empowerment, media and film are central tools to her advocacy work. She has made a short documentary on the death of a 10-year-old girl due to FGM-induced complications. The award-winning, feature-length film “A Girl from Mogadishu” documents her experiences of gender-based violence and turns it into a force for change.

Lina is a leading figure in the sport industry in Saudi Arabia, who co-founded Jeddah United (JU), the first Saudi private sports company to train girls and boys in team sports to promote sports culture. Lina was captain of the Jeddah United Women’s basketball division up to 2012, columnist for Almadina newspaper, and climbed the Everest Base Camp as part of a breast cancer awareness campaign. Her efforts are an example of grassroots challenging of strict gender rules in Saudi Arabia, and Lina has been listed as one of the 200 Most Powerful Women in the Middle East by Forbes Magazine 2014.

Camilla Appelgren is an environmental activist, who hails from Sweden but has called Malta home for over two decades. She founded Malta Clean Up to inspire citizen climate action by organising monthly clean-ups in different locations across the island, as well as to mobilise public support for clean-up and waste reduction efforts in the face of environmental degradation. Appelgren also built up the patrolling ranger unit at the Majjistral National Park. Her role is to ensure adherence to the park’s site regulations and documentation of environmental crimes, such as poaching and dumping of waste. A strong advocate against single-use plastics, she strives towards a zero-waste lifestyle and encourages others to adopt sustainable practices in their everyday lives. Appelgren ran as a Democratic Party (PD) candidate in the 2019 European elections. Although she was not elected to the European Parliament, the support she received from voters defied expectations, in no small part due to her passion for the environment and commitment to her community.

Charles-Pierre is Chief Technology Officer at Premier Voisin, a company he co-founded. Previously, he worked as advisor on regulations and digital commons to the French Minister of State for Digital Transition and Affairs. He also served as director in charge of the project ‘Vaccination Information Systems” at the French Ministry of Health and Solidarity. He is a French engineer and cybersecurity specialist leading the organisation that advises the French government on digital matters. Previously, seeking to combine his technical skills with public service, Charles-Pierre worked at the French National Cybersecurity Agency (ANSSI), where he was tasked with finding offensive viruses, tracing their source, and identifying contaminated computers to neutralise the threat. Charles-Pierre’s diverse career also includes his supervision of the deployment of an electric vehicle (EV) fleet in the United States and co-authoring a book on 3D printing.

Dionysia-Theodora Avgerinopoulou is a Member of the Hellenic Parliament, where she chairs the Environment Committee. She is also the Director of the European Institute of Law, Science and Technology and an attorney-at-law, specialising in international, European and environmental and climate law, as well as international investment law. She has previously served as vice-chair of the Global Water Partnership Organization. Dionysia-Theodora is a leader in environmental and humanitarian activities and has been the recipient of several international awards, including the Global Citizenship Award for Leadership in Assisting Humanity by Orphans International Worldwide and the Green Star Award by UNEP, OCHA and Green Cross International for her contributions in the preparedness and reconstruction in cases of natural disasters.

Anne founded ReDI School, a vocational training programme that teaches programming and tech skills to migrants and seeks to fill vacancies in the German IT job market. With five schools throughout Germany and Denmark, ReDI hosts 1,000 students per semester, 65% of which are women and girls. She also founded the Berlin Peace Innovation Lab, which focuses on technology’s role in facilitating emerging and measurable social change towards global peace. Prior to this, Anne spent two years in Japan, researching open social innovation, and received the prestigious Rotary Peace Fellowship. She previously worked as a corporate social responsibility consultant, during which time Anne developed and implemented Samsung Electronics’ award-winning corporate social responsibility strategy for Scandinavia.

Selene works for the Prosperity Unit at the UNDP in Kabul, Afghanistan as a Portfolio Specialist. She is the founder of several social ventures, including Plain Ink, which creates free, educational comics for children and communities in developing countries, and Youth Action for Change (YAC), which provides high-quality and free online courses for young change-makers in 130 counties. Selene also serves as a member of RENA, an Italian association of young professionals promoting innovation, merit, youth empowerment and a new generation of local public policies, and the Italian Economic Development Minister’s Taskforce on Innovative Startups. She has previously worked as a consultant, trainer and speaker for various organisations, including the UN, Amnesty International, the World Bank, Oxfam, OSCE, the Council of Europe, Columbia University and Microsoft. She is a recipient of the Mother Teresa Award for Social Justice.

Katharina is the Chief Innovation Officer at Mozilla Foundation. She is a German journalists and previously was the managing director of Spiegel Online, the leading German news web site, where she was responsible for the commercial aspects and the long-term strategic development of the company. Previously she was editor-in-chief and Online Director of the WAZ Media Group, and was an independent writer focusing on technology and the socio-political implications of the digital age. She became one of the best known German-speaking bloggers, winning several awards, including ‘Young Journalist of the Year’ in 2006. She has also participated in humanitarian work in Africa and Bosnia.

Velibor is a Montenegrin economist, who was appointed by the Government of Montenegro to serve as the Managing Director of Montenegro’s first science and technology park and one of its most significant scientific research and innovation projects. He also serves as the President of the Center for Development and Entrepreneurial Society. With extensive experience in both the private and public sectors, Velibor’s career has focused on development of the entrepreneurial ecosystem and enhancing SMEs in Montenegro. Before taking up his current post, he was the general director of FK Budućnost, Montenegro’s biggest football club. He has also served as director of Montenegro’s first business incubator, ‘Inventivnost’, and as director at an entrepreneurship and innovation centre, ‘Technopolis’, where he remains as President of the Board. Additionally, Velibor has co-founded two private companies, one of which works in economic consultancy and one of which operates within the pharmaceutical industry.

Chaima Bouhlel serves as the President of Al-Bawsala, a non-profit Tunisian NGO operating to bring transparency to political processes and engage ordinary citizens in a region wracked by government crackdowns. Chaima joined Al-Bawsala in 2014 to start and lead “Marsad Baladia” project, an observatory that monitors all municipalities across the country, and was elected as president in October 2016. Since 2016, she has also been co-hosting a weekly radio show on the National Radio discussing public policy and public institutions’ performance. Prior to joining the Al-Bawsala, Chaima worked in the micro finance sector, and in building the capacity of journalists in post-revolutionary Tunisia. During her studies at Harvard University, she was president of the Society of Arab Students, and co-organized the Harvard Arab Weekend in 2011, the biggest pan-Arab conference in North America.

Hala Bugaighis is a lawyer and co-founder of Jusoor, a non-governmental organisation committed to independent policy research and human development projects for women with focus on the economic and social empowerment. As a lawyer with 15 years of experience, Hala focuses on commercial, banking, civil and investment laws, and has a sound understanding of law practice in an international context. Through her private companies, Hala has worked as a consultant to many international companies as well as Libyan private and public entities, focusing on development and capacity building. In 2015, Hala was nominated a UN Women Champion for Women Economic Empowerment – an initiative that aims to improve women’s economic standing and potential around the world.

Sinéad is an Irish writer, educator and advocate, who champions inclusive, universal design to create a more equitable and accessible world for everyone. She founded Tilting the Lens to bring visibility to inaccessibility through the three pillars of education, advocacy and design. The consultancy has advised major global brands, including Gucci, Ralph Lauren, Netflix, Pinterest and Starbucks, on their move from awareness to action. Sinéad serves on Gucci’s Global Equity Board, ITV’s Cultural Advisory Council, the Irish President’s Council of State and Ireland’s Future of Media Commission. As a public speaker and host of the As Me with Sinéad podcast, Sinéad facilitates honest conversations about identity, disability and accessibility. Her children’s book, “Break the Mould”, is a primer on how to take your place in the world – with lessons for all. It won the An Post Irish Book Award.

Gustavo is a Portuguese doctor and anaesthesiologist, specialising in intensive care. Gustavo has been actively outspoken about COVID-19 and the pandemic to raise awareness around scientific information, vaccination and mental health. He has appeared on major news channels, such as CNN, Reuters and Público, while his Facebook and Instagram accounts reach audiences of 60k and 80k, respectively. An activist and self-described dreamer, he is passionate about humanitarian medicine. Over the last years, Gustavo has joined 13 humanitarian missions to war zones with the International Committee of the Red Cross and Doctors Without Borders. Following his first mission to Mozambique, he has travelled to various Central and Northern African countries, including the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Central African Republic, Burundi and South Sudan. In the greater Middle East, these humanitarian missions have brought him to Pakistan, Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Yemen and Palestine. His latest book, “The World Needs to Know”, shares his experiences of several humanitarian missions to war-torn countries.