#NoWar2024 Speakers
More speakers to be announced soon!
Gabriel Aguirre
Gabriel Aguirre is Latin America Organizer for World BEYOND War, is from Venezuela, and is currently based in Bógota. He has been an activist and advocate for peace, social justice, international solidarity and human rights, and has more than 13 years of experience in social and community work. He has participated in multiple international events and activities on five continents, always in defense of a stable and lasting peace. He has been a representative to the United Nations to defend the foundations of a more just world without wars or sanctions. His work experience includes participation in several international missions of solidarity to countries that have had military, economic, political, and social conflicts. He has also been an organizer of various campaigns for the closure of military bases, and the lifting of sanctions on countries that suffer their consequences. He holds a degree in Political Science, with a specialization in International Relations, and a master’s degree in Public Policy.
Ricardo Armando Patiño Aroca
Ricardo Armando Patiño Aroca is Ecuadorian and Mexican. He is an economist with a Master's in Economic Development from universities in Mexico and Spain. He was head of economic planning at the Agrarian Reform Institute in the early years of the Sandinista Revolution in Nicaragua. He has been a university professor, advisor to workers' and urban residents' organizations, promoter of citizen initiatives to denounce illegitimate debts and creator of a microfinance entity in his country. He is co-author of the book “Construir poder transformador” (Building transforming power). In the government of Rafael Correa he served as Minister of Economy and Finance, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of Defense. He chaired the Commission for the Integral Audit of Ecuador's Foreign Debt. He actively participated in the creation of UNASUR and CELAC and was responsible for granting political asylum and protection to Julian Assange in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. He currently collaborates at the Institute of Economic and Technological Studies of Venezuela.
Laura Benítez
Laura Benítez is a biologist with a degree from the Universidad del Valle and a scientific researcher with a Master's degree in Environment and Marine Resources from the University of the Basque Country (Spain), University of Bordeaux (France) and University of Liege (Belgium). Laura's area of research interest is the ecology and conservation of marine mammals, focused on the study of the humpback whale population that breeds in the southern Colombian Pacific, especially in the Gorgona National Natural Park. Laura is currently the Environmental Justice professional at Baobab - Center for Innovation in Ethnic-Racial, Gender and Environmental Justice. Laura is also part of the Scientific Committee of the Gorgona National Natural Park and the activist group Colectivo Unidos por Gorgona.
Alison Broinowski
Alison Broinowski is a Member of the Board of Directors of World BEYOND War. She is based in Australia. Broinowski was an Australian diplomat until 1996. Her last overseas assignment was at the Australian Mission to the UN in New York. Her PhD is in Asian Studies at ANU. She has written or edited 14 books and many articles on Australia’s interface with Asia, with the United Nations, and the world. Four of her latest books are About Face: Asian Accounts of Australia 2003, Howard’s War 2003, Allied and Addicted 2007, and with David Stephens, The Honest History Book 2017. She is a Visiting Fellow in the Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs at ANU, and a Fellow of the Australian Institute of International Affairs. She is Vice President of Australians for War Powers Reform.
Cynthia Enloe
Cynthia Enloe is a Research Professor in the Department of Sustainability and Social Justice at Clark University, and is affiliated with Clark's Women's and Gender Studies and Political Science Programs.
Cynthia Enloe’s career has included Fulbrights in Malaysia and Guyana, guest professorships in Japan, Canada, UK, Australia, New Zealand, and Iceland, as well as The Middlebrook/Djerassi Visiting Professor of Gender Studies at University of Cambridge, UK. She has presented lectures in Sweden, Norway, Germany, Portugal, Spain, Chile, Vietnam, Korea, Cambodia, Colombia, Bosnia, Turkey, Brazil, the Czech Republic, Austria, Finland, Ukraine and at universities around the U.S. Her writings have been translated into Ukrainian, Spanish, Turkish, French, Portuguese, Japanese, Korean, Swedish, Czech, Icelandic, Finnish, German and Chinese. She has published in Ms. Magazine and The Village Voice, and appeared on National Public Radio, Al Jazeera, C-Span and the BBC.
Professor Enloe’s fifteen books include Maneuvers: The International Politics of Militarizing Women’s Lives (2000), The Curious Feminist (2004), Nimo’s War, Emma’s War: Making Feminist Sense of the Iraq War (2010), The Real State of America: Mapping the Myths and Truths about the United States (co-authored with Joni Seager; 2011, revised 2014); Seriously! Investigating Crashes and Crises as if Women Mattered (2013). Enloe’s thoroughly updated edition of Bananas, Beaches and Bases was published by University of California Press, 2014. Her updated edition of Globalization and Militarism: Feminists Make the Link was published in English and French in 2016, and Spanish in 2022. Enloe’s The Big Push: Exposing and Challenging Persistent Patriarchy, is published in English, Japanese and Spanish (originally: Myriad Editions, UK; University of California Press, US, 2017).
Her newest book is Twelve Feminist Lessons of War (London: Footnote Press; Berkeley: University of California Press) 2023.
Jared Hayes
Jared Hayes is Environmental Working Group (EWG)'s Senior Policy Analyst with extensive experience on PFAS contamination at U.S. military installations. Jared provides research, data analysis and event support to the government affairs team. After graduating from college, Hayes volunteered with various Massachusetts-based veterans’ charities as a fundraising events organizer.
Kathy Kelly
Kathy Kelly has been President of the Board of World BEYOND War since March 2022, prior to which time she served as a member of the Advisory Board. She is based in the United States, but is often elsewhere. Kathy’s efforts to end wars have led her to living in war zones and prisons over the past 35 years. In 2009 and 2010, Kathy was part of two Voices for Creative Nonviolence delegations which visited Pakistan to learn more about the consequences of U.S. drone attacks. From 2010 – 2019, the group organized dozens of delegations to visit Afghanistan, where they continued learning about casualties of U.S. drone attacks. Voices also helped organize protests at U.S. military bases operating weaponized drone attacks. She is now a co-coordinator of the Ban Killer Drones campaign and the Merchants of Death War Crimes Tribunal.
Wolfgang Lieberknecht
Wolfgang Lieberknecht is a co-coordinator of the World BEYOND War International Peace Factory Wanfried chapter. He is in favour of seeing ourselves worldwide as a human family that works together to ensure that all its members can live in dignity. This is also the philosophy of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The previous generation in Germany waged an imperialist war that cost the lives of over 60 million people; Germans engaged in slave trading and brutal colonisation. As part of the Western alliance, the German state does everything it can to maintain the unjust world order. Many people in Germany don't know about it, others don't care. Wolfgang learnt about this as a teenager and has spent his whole life trying to contribute to change. For many years in the African-European Black and White Initiative. Today, he is working with others to set up the International PeaceFactory Wanfried in his home town as a space where people from different countries, religions and skin colours can get to know each other and train to create peace, because we don't get it for free: we have to work hard for it. But anyone who has experienced the suffering of war knows that we are all responsible for it because we did not commit ourselves in time to finding peaceful solutions.
Diana Salcedo López
Diana Salcedo López is a political scientist from the National University of Colombia, with a Master's in Women, Gender and Citizenship Studies from the University of Barcelona and a Master's in Human Rights, Rule of Law and Democratization from the University of Alcalá de Henares in Madrid. She is an anti-militarist feminist. She is a representative to the Intersectoral Commission of Security Guarantees for women defenders and leaders in Colombia, and representative for national organizations in the Special Women's Instance for the follow-up of the Peace Agreement. Currently, she leads the Colombian section of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF), which positions issues related to the socio-emotional recovery of victims, the strengthening of their social leadership, guarantees for the defense of human rights, the accompaniment of women in reincorporation processes, the strengthening of territorial processes of social and political advocacy and the implementation of the agenda of women, peace and security in Colombia.
Myrna Pagán
Myrna Pagán was born in the colony of Puerto Rico, was raised in the diaspora community of New York City, and resides in the colony of Vieques, which for more than six decades was used by the U.S. Navy and its NATO allies as a military theater for training exercises and experimentation with conventional and non-conventional weapons including napalm, agent orange, and depleted uranium. The effects of devastation of land, sea, and air continues to affect Viequenses' health and environment to this day. She is a cancer survivor and widow of a cancer victim, a mother of five and grandmother of 10. She is the founder of the Vieques Conservation and Historical Trust, and Vidas Viequenses Valen, a grassroots movement working for peace and justice. She serves on the steering committee of the Ceasefire Campaign to Ban OB/OD of military UXO as practiced in impact areas. As a member of the National Council of Elders she is committed to creating a Beloved Community where all can thrive and enjoy their God given rights and privileges. She holds a Master of Fine Arts degree from Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. As an artist, activist and environmentalist she has travelled worldwide defending human rights, and has spoken on eight occasions at the United Nations denouncing the colonial realities of oppression on communities of color and low-income economies.
Paola Renata Gallo Pelaez
Paola Renata Gallo Pelaez is a lawyer with a Master's Degree in National Defense at the School of Defense, Buenos Aires, Argentina, 2014. She is a graduate of the International Diploma in Truth and Peace Building, Universidad Pedagógica Nacional, Bogotá, 2024. Paola is the Co-President of Mopassol, President of the worker cooperative Ltda, Y si lo contamos, and member of Ediciones Luxemburg. She is the co-author of the book Malvinas, Decolonization, Peace and Sovereignty, Editions CTERA, 2024. Paola is a member of the production team of the film Tarará, the story of Chernobyl in Cuba (2021), and a director of the virtual festival Somos Antidoto.
Alejandra Rodríguez Peña
Alejandra Rodríguez Peña is a writer and volunteer with the Corporación Mujer Denuncia y Muévete. She is also a volunteer with the World Network for the Declaration of Women's Rights (WDI) and a member of the Olga Castillo Collective.
Khury Petersen-Smith
Khury Petersen-Smith is the Michael Ratner Middle East Fellow at IPS. He researches U.S. empire, borders, and migration. Khury graduated from the Clark University Graduate School of Geography in Massachusetts, after completing a dissertation that focused on militarization and sovereignty. He is one of the co-authors and organizers of the 2015 Black Solidarity with Palestine statement, which was signed by over 1,100 Black activists, artists, and scholars.
Edgar Jay Stephens
Edgar Jay Stephens was born on Providencias Island. He studied Law and Philosophy in the city of Cali and has been a fisherman for 23 years. He is president of the Federation of Fishermen, representative of the fishermen of Providencia, and delegate to the table of fishermen of Providencia. Edgar is an activist for the rights of the land and its resources of the population of Providencia.
David Swanson
David Swanson is Co-Founder, Executive Director, and a Board Member of World BEYOND War. He is based in Virginia in the United States. David is an author, activist, journalist, and radio host. He is campaign coordinator for RootsAction.org. Swanson’s books include War Is A Lie. He blogs at DavidSwanson.org and WarIsACrime.org. He hosts Talk World Radio. He is a Nobel Peace Prize nominee, and was awarded the 2018 Peace Prize by the U.S. Peace Memorial Foundation. Longer bio and photos and videos here. Follow him on Twitter: @davidcnswanson and FaceBook. Sample videos.
