Speakers

Masako Wada

Ass. Secretary General, Nihon Hidankyo, Nobel Peace Prize 2024

Masako Wada is assistant secretary general of Nihon Hidankyo, the Japanese organisation of atom bomb survivors (hibakusha), who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize 2024. Nihon Hidankyo was founded in1956, and the grassroots movement soon became the largest and most widely representative Hibakusha organisation in Japan.

Through personal witness statements, Nihon Hidankyo has carried out extensive educational work on the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of the use of nuclear weapons. Hence the motto “No more Hibakusha”.

Espen Barth Eide

Minister of Foreign Affairs, Norway

His Excellency Mr. Espen Barth Eide is the Foreign Minister of Norway since October 2023. From October 2021 he was Minister of Climate and Environment. In the two Stoltenberg Governments, Mr. Eide occupied many prominent positions: Foreign Minister from 2012 to 2013, Minister of Defense from 2011 to 2012, State Secretary for Foreign Affairs from 2010 to 2011, State Secretary for Defense from 2005 to 2010 and State Secretary for Foreign Affairs from 2000-2001. In his academic career, Mr. Eide, a political scientist, worked as a senior fellow at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI) from 1993 to 2000 and again from 2002 to 2005, specializing on international security, European integration, defense and international relations.

Stefan Löfven

Chair of the Board, SIPRI

Stefan Löfven is Chair of the SIPRI Governing Board as of June 2022. Löfven was the Prime Minister of Sweden from October 2014 to November 2021 and leader of the Social Democratic Party from 2012 to 2021. His background includes extensive experience from various domestic and international assignments. In 2022, he was appointed by the United Nations Secretary-General to co-lead a High-level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism in preparation for the Summit of the Future. He was previously the International Secretary of the Swedish trade union IF Metall and, subsequently, its Chair (2006–12). He was also a board member of the Swedish Trade Union Confederation (2006–12), a board member of the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm (2010–12), Deputy Chair of the Swedish Trade Council (2004–12) and a board member of the Olof Palme International Centre (2002–2006).

Penelope Lea

Climate Activist

Penlope Lea is a 20 years old Norwegian climate activist. At 15, Lea became the second-youngest ambassador for UNICEF: Her career asclimate activist started when she eight, and joint the Eco-Agents, a youth climate Group. At twelve, Lea was one of seven people to join the Children's Climate Panel, founded by the Eco-Agents. At the 2019 United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP25), Lea was one of five child activists to speak at an event organized by UNICEF and the OHCR. Penlope Lea was also a spear at the Nobel Peace Conference Oslo Pax in 2019.

Oleksandra Romantsova

Executive Director, Centre for Civil Liberties, Nobel Peace Prize 2021

Oleksandra Romantsova is a Ukrainian human rights activist, and the Executive Director of Centre for Civil Liberties. CCL was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021, jointly with the Russian organization Memorial and the Belarusian activist Ales Bialitskij. Since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, CCL is engaged in documenting Russia’s war crimes, providing legal assistance to Ukrainians and advocating Ukraine’s interests in the international arena. 

Romantsova joined CCL in 2014, after having volunteered for the Euromaidan SOS initiave. From 2017 to 2018, she was the Deputy Chairman of the Board of the Centre for Civil Liberties. In 2018 she became Executive Director and leads the organisation alongside Chairperson of the Board Oleksandra Matviychuk.

Daniel Högsta

Interim Executive Director, ICAN, Nobel Peace Prize 2017

Daniel Högsta is the Interim Executive Director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2017. In the period which culminated in the negotiations of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons(TPNW), Högsta was the Campaign Coordinator of ICAN and was responsible for generating awareness, understanding and support among governments for the "Humanitarian Initiative" and for the concept of a new treaty to ban nuclear weapons. Since 2018,Daniel’s work focused on supporting the work of ICAN partners to garner political support for the Treaty in “nuclear umbrella” state contexts, as well as on broadening the community of stakeholders that champion the TPNW.

Zia Mian

Physicist, Princeton University

Zia Mian is a physicist and co-director of Princeton University's Program on Science and Global Security. His research interests include issues of nuclear arms control, nonproliferation and disarmament and international peace and security.

Mian serves as Co-Chair of the Scientific Advisory Group of the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and serves on the UN Secretary-General's Advisory Board on Disarment matters. He is also a co-founder and serves on the steering committee of the Physicists Coalition for Nuclear Threat Reduction.

He received the 2014 Linus Pauling Legacy Award for “his accomplishments as a scientist and as a peace activist in contributing to the global effort for nuclear disarmament and for a more peaceful world.”

Benoît Pelopidas

Professor, Founder of the Nuclear Knowledges program at Sciences Po

Prof. Benoît Pelopidas (PhD) founded the program Nuclear Knowledges at Sciences Po and holds the chair of excellence in security studies at CERI (Sciences Po). He is also an affiliate of the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) at Stanford University and has been a frequent visiting fellow at Princeton University’s Program on Science and Global Security.

In France, Nuclear Knowledges is the first scholarly research program on the nuclear phenomenon, which is fully independent and transparent on its funding sources.

He focuses on the construction of knowledge about nuclear weapons, their institutional, conceptual, imaginal and memorial underpinnings.

Jørgen Watne Frydnes

Chair of the Norwegian Nobel Committee

Jørgen Watne Frydnes (39) is the youngest committee chair in history.

Mr. Frydnes currently serves as the Secretary-General of Norwegian PEN. He holds a degree in Political Science from the University of Oslo and a master's degree in International Politics from the University of York, England.

Following the terror attack on Utøya on July 22, 2011, he became the managing director of Utøya AS and was responsible for the reconstruction efforts of Utøya. His task was to transform a site of terror and mass murder into a center for democracy, a platform for knowledge, discussion and dialogue.

Mr. Frydnes has been a member of the Norwegian Nobel Committee since 2021, appointed by the Norwegian Labour Party.

Kjersti Fløgstad

Executive Director, Nobel Peace Center

Kjersti Fløgstad is Executive Director of the Nobel Peace Center (since February 2020). She is former secretary general of UNICEF Norway (2000-211) and has served on several boards, including a four-year stint as chair of the aid organization Care Norway. From 2012, Fløgstad worked as a business consultant and advisor, focusing of sustainability and corporate social responsibility.

Fløgstad joined the Nobel Peace Center from DNB, where she worked with corporate social responsibility linked to the bank’s sustainability and diversity programmes.

Fløgstad holds a Master of Business Administration from BI, Norwegian Business School.