Sir Nick Clegg
Former UK Deputy Prime Minister and former President, Global Affairs at Meta.
Sir Nick Clegg is the former UK Deputy Prime Minister (2010-2015) and former President, Global Affairs at Meta (2018-2025). Prior to being elected to the UK Parliament in 2005, he worked in the European Commission and served for five years as a member of the European Parliament. He became leader of the Liberal Democrat party in 2007 and served as Deputy Prime Minister in the UK’s first coalition government since the war, from 2010 to 2015.
He joined Meta, then called Facebook, in 2018 and became the company’s chief policy decision-maker and its principal interlocutor with world leaders, governments and policymakers around the globe. He has written two best-selling books, Politics: Between the Extremes and How To Stop Brexit (And Make Britain Great Again).
Kamzy Gunaratnam
Norwegian Parliament Member and former Deputy Mayor of Oslo.
Kamzy Gunaratnam is a Norwegian politician and advocate for democracy, inclusion, and peacebuilding. Born in Sri Lanka and raised in Oslo, she survived the 22 July 2011 terror attack on Utøya and has since become a leading voice against extremism and hate. Kamzy served as Deputy Mayor of Oslo (2015–2021) and is currently a Member of the Norwegian Parliament for the Labour Party.
Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis
Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth.
Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis is the religious figurehead for Jewish communities right across the Commonwealth. He was installed on 1st September 2013 in an historic ceremony attended by His Majesty King Charles III, then The Prince of Wales.
As Chief Rabbi, he is a primary representative of the Jewish community to government, other faiths and civil society. He represented the Jewish community at the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II and participated in the Coronation of King Charles III.
Chief Rabbi Mirvis has broken new ground in the fields of interfaith and social responsibility, as well as taking a strong stand on the welfare of LGBT+ students in Orthodox Jewish Schools, antisemitism in the British Labour Party and advocating support for Israel in the aftermath of 7 October 2023.
Some of his innovative projects include his Centre for Community Excellence, the Ma’ayan female educators programme, the Ben Azzai social responsibility programme and ShabbatUK. He led the Jewish delegation in the recently signed historic Drumlanrig Accords between UK Muslims and Jews.
He received a knighthood in 2023 from King Charles III in a ceremony at Windsor Castle.
Helle Thorning-Schmidt
Former Prime Minister of Denmark.
Helle Thorning-Schmidt is the former Prime Minister of Denmark (2011 to 2015). After serving as Prime Minister, Helle became CEO of Save the Children International, where she played a key role in bringing attention to humanitarian crises in Yemen and Syria, as well as the plight of the Rohingya refugees. Ms. Thorning-Schmidt is a member of the US Council on Foreign Relations, the European Council on Foreign Relations, and the Atlantic Council’s International Advisory Board.
Since 2020, she has served as Co-Chair of the Oversight Board, an independent body helping Meta (Facebook/Instagram) address complex questions about online freedom of expression. Helle has authored several books, including memoirs from a feminist perspective, and continues to dedicate much of her time to promoting progress, free speech, human rights, and democracy. A lifelong advocate for women and girls’ rights, she remains a strong supporter of gender equality and trans rights.
Finn-Jarle Rode
CEO of the World Heart Federation and Chairman of The Oslo Center
Finn-Jarle Rode is CEO of the World Heart Federation and Chairman of The Oslo Center. Finn Jarle has previously served a number of roles in international development work, including as the Director of the Global Partnership team of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) headquarters in Geneva.
He has over 20 years of experience in IFRC/ICRC and the Norwegian Red Cross. He has been IFRC’s Country Director in Afghanistan and North Korea and Regional Director for Eastern Africa and the Indian Ocean Islands. Finn-Jarle also held different positions in Norway’s private sector, including within the shipping and hotel industry. He has an MBA from Heriot-Watts, specialising in organizational development and international finance.
Edin Hussein
Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting Lead at The Oslo Center
Edin is an experienced Monitoring, Evaluation, and Reporting specialist with over 10 years of expertise in designing and implementing Monitoring, Evaluation, Research, and Learning (MERL) systems for donor-funded programs in the democracy and governance sector. Edin has worked extensively to support governance structures, political institutions, and civic spaces, ensuring that programs effectively respond to citizen needs and promote inclusive participation.
Edin has considerable experience in collaborating with organizations dedicated to democratic development, applying evidence-based approaches to assess program impact and strengthen institutional effectiveness. He holds a master’s degree in Monitoring and Evaluation, equipping him with advanced analytical skills to drive meaningful change in democratic governance initiatives.
Bishop Kari Alvsvåg
Bishop of Borg Diocese in the Church of Norway; President of ECRL (European Council of Religious Leaders), Religions for Peace (RfP)
Bishop Kari Alvsvåg has a broad commitment to interfaith dialogue, and is known for her dedication to building bridges between different religious communities and for her work in promoting the values of community, respect and understanding in a diverse society.
A key aspect of Alvsvåg’s work has been her role in Dialogforum Østfold, where she was one of the founders in 2015. Dialogforum Østfold is a platform that brings together Muslim and Christian actors in the region to strengthen dialogue and interaction with the aim of building peaceful communities.
Bishop Alvsvåg is also a member of the executive committee of Church of Norway’s Council on Ecumenical and International Relations, and was previously a member of the Norwegian government’s extremism commission. In September 2024, Bishop Alvsvåg was elected President of the European Council of Religious Leaders (ECRL), an interfaith platform that brings together religious leaders from across Europe to promote dialogue and cooperation across religions.
Ammal Ahmed Haj Mohamed
PEN Norway Project Manager
Ammal Ahmed Haj Mohamed holds a BA in Politics and International Relations and has studied Nordic language and literature. She is a project manager at PEN Norway, focusing particularly on dialogue work and freedom of expression for young voices. Previously, she worked as an advisor at the Directorate of Integration and Diversity and led the diversity, inclusion, and belonging initiative at Sentralen cultural arena. Ammal is a former leader of Norwegian People’s Aid Solidarity Youth.
In 2022, she was listed as one of “33 under 33 rising stars in politics and culture” by Vårt Land for her work and activism. She is a member of the Norwegian UNESCO Commission and serves on the boards of Norwegian People’s Aid, Future in Our Hands, and the Norwegian Chamber Orchestra.
Jessica Cecil
Founder of the Trusted News Initiative and Council member at Chatham House
Jessica Cecil works both commercially and in publicly-funded bodies grappling with the challenges new technology is throwing at the media and creative industries. While at the BBC she negotiated and led the Trusted News Initiative, the world’s only alliance of the biggest tech companies and news organisations, alerting each other fast to the most harmful forms of disinformation. As a Visiting Fellow at Oxford University’s Reuters Institute, she chaired a series of roundtables in 2023 where tech and news companies considered the implications – both good and bad – of Generative AI for the news industry.
Jessica was Chief of Staff to four BBC Directors-General. Before that, she was a journalist and a senior producer on Newsnight, and an Emmy-nominated executive producer.
Jessica is also an experienced non-executive director and chairs committees at the Digital Catapult and at Bristol University, and is a Council member at Chatham House.
Inga Strümke
Associate professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology
Inga is an associate professor at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. With a main research focus on explainable AI, Inga argues that using AI for good is closely linked to both understanding AI well, but also knowing ourselves and our needs, including legal perspectives. She has previously worked on trustworthy AI and algorithm auditing at PwC.
She was awarded name of the year in academia and received the Norwegian Research Council’s outreach prize in 2023. Her book Maskiner som tenker (Machines that think) was the most sold non-fiction book in Norway in 2023, and was awarded the Norwegian literature prize “Brageprisen” in the non-fiction category, and is currently translated to Swedish, Danish, German and Japanese. Previously, Inga received the University of Bergen’s outreach prize in 2019, and was awarded “One of Norway’s 50 leading women in tech 2020”. She is an international keynote speaker, podcast host at the Norwegian Council for Digital Ethics and has several video courses on artificial intelligence available, also in Spanish.
Sasha Havlicek
ISD Global Founder and CEO
Sasha Havlicek is a social and policy entrepreneur who, for the last two decades, has incubated and scaled global initiatives to counter the rise of weaponised hate, disinformation and extremism, on- and offline. As founder of the leading global ‘think and do tank’, the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD), she has led the build-out of ISD’s advanced digital analytics capability, designed to detect and mitigate information threats to democracy, public safety and national security.
Sasha has advised a range of governments at the highest levels, has testified before US Congress and the UK Parliament, and is a regular commentator in the media (CNN, BBC, Channel 4 News and other networks). She is a member of the European Council on Foreign Relations and serves on the Advisory Boards of the Global Internet Forum on Counter-Terrorism, the Christchurch Call and the Global Partnership for Action against Tech Facilitated Gender Based Violence. She is a founding board member of the Forum on Information and Democracy and a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Coalition on Internet Safety.
Moderator: Xenia Wickett
Wickett Adivsory Founder and International Affairs Advisor
Xenia Wickett runs an executive coaching, moderation and geopolitical advisory business, Wickett Advisory, that helps clients distinguish signal from noise.
Xenia brings extensive cross-sectoral and cross-cultural experience to the conversation. Prior to launching her own business, Xenia was the Vice President of Political Analysis and Integrity Due Diligence at Equinor. She has also held positions as Head of the US and Americas Programme and founding Dean of the Academy for Leadership at Chatham House, Executive Director of the PeaceNexus Foundation, which she helped found, and Executive Director for Research at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center.
Xenia holds a Professional Certificate in Executive Coaching from Henley Business School, a Master’s degree in Public Policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School and a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and Physiology from Oxford University. She is a qualified coach with the International Coaching Federation (ICF).