Alex Neve is the Secretary General of Amnesty International Canada. Among his many other duties he has participated in Amnesty International missions to South Sudan, Côte d’Ivoïre, Tanzania, Ghana, Mexico, Burundi, Chad, Colombia, Guinea, Honduras, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Guantánamo Bay and Grassy Narrows, Ontario.  He has represented Amnesty International at international meetings such as the Summit of the Americas and the G8 Summit. He has appeared before numerous Canadian parliamentary committees as well as various UN and Inter-American human rights bodies. He appears and writes regularly in the media and speaks to audiences across the country on a range of human rights topics. Alex holds a Bachelor Laws from Dalhousie and an LL.M In International Human Rights Law from the University of Essex.

 

Ángel Amílcar Colón is a defender of the rights of Garifuna Afro-descendant peoples and former President of the Black Fraternal Organization of Honduras (OFRANEH). In 2009, he was on route to the US in search of work that would enable him to pay for cancer treatment for his son, when he was arrested by Mexican police in the northern border city of Tijuana. Thus began a nightmare of torture, racism, fabricated charges and five years of unjust imprisonment. In 2014, Ángel was released and all charges against him were dropped after Amnesty International adopted him as a prisoner of conscience and campaigned with other human groups for his freedom.  Ángel is an inspiring, courageous voice for justice, rights, dignity and an end to torture.   

   

Kayla Hounsell is a reporter for the CTV News at Six. She joined the CTV Atlantic team in 2009 and very quickly worked her way up to the anchor desk, taking on the role of anchor and producer of the weekend edition of the CTV News at Six. She held that position for two years before deciding to return to the field to focus on her first love - reporting. She continues to serve as backup anchor for Steve Murphy. A proud Newfoundlander, Kayla left home for a post-secondary education at Carleton University’s School of Journalism. While at Carleton, Kayla spent two months in Africa training journalism students at the National University of Rwanda. This year she will again travel back to Africa to work on behalf of CTV with Journalists For Human Rights.  JHR is a Canadian-based media development organization helping to train reporters in the developing world. Before landing in the Maritimes, Kayla worked as a reporter/anchor in the nation’s Capital, Manitoba and Saskatchewan. An East Coast girl at heart, Kayla is thrilled to call Halifax home. 

Ami McKay’s debut novel, The Birth House was a # 1 bestseller in Canada, winner of three CBA Libris Awards, nominated for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, and a book club favourite around the world. Her new novel, The Virgin Cure, is inspired by the life of her great- great grandmother, Dr. Sarah Fonda Mackintosh, a female physician in nineteenth century New York. Born and raised in Indiana, Ami now lives in Nova Scotia.

 

Stephen Law is a writer, conflict mediator, educator, organic farmer and social activist. He is the author of the novel Tailings of Warren Peace. He works for the Tatamagouche Centre as the Social Transformation Program Coordinator and is the co-owner of SunRoot Farm. Stephen lives in Kennetcook, Nova Scotia with his partner and his two daughters.

Michael Crummey was born in Buchans, a mining town in the interior of Newfoundland and returned to live in Newfoundland and Labrador in 2001. His first writing success was in poetry, winning the first Bronwen Wallace Memorial Award for unpublished poets in 1994. He is the author of three books of poetry. In 1998, he published his first collection of short stories, Flesh and Blood and was nominated for the Journey Prize. His first novel, River Thieves, was a Canadian bestseller and was nominated for the Giller Prize, the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize and the Books in Canada first novel award. His second novel, The Wreckage, was long-listed for the 2007 IMPAC Award and his third novel, Galore, was shortlisted for the 2011 IMPAC Award. Sweetland was a finalist for the 2014 Governor General’s Award for fiction.

Dr. Tatjana Takševa is a professor of English and Women and Gender Studies at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax, Canada. She has published numerous essays and books in the area of motherhood studies, literature, teaching and learning, intracultural communication, the impact of digital media on pedagogy and cultural ideas of expertise, as well as on the dangers of consumerism, and the commercializing trends in North American education, and their impact on developing countries. She is the author of “Genocidal Rape, Motherhood and the Discourse of National Identity on the Balkans” (a recent paper written for the Special Issue of Comparative Literature and Culture: War and Life Writing 2015) and a co-editor of a forthcoming collection entitled, Mothers Under Fire: Mothers and Mothering in Conflict Zones (Toronto: Demeter Press, 2015). 

Michael Karanicolas has been with the Halifax-based Centre for Law and Democracy since Spring 2010. An internationally published writer and photographer, Michael takes a personal interest in issues of free speech and journalists’ rights. Michael has a BAH (Dean’s List) from Queen’s University, and an LLB from the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University, where he was awarded the McInnes Cooper Internet and Media Law Prize and the Professor Ronald St. John Macdonald Prize for International Law. Michael’s main focus is on digital rights and freedom of expression online, including authoring publications on access to the Internet as a human rights, copyright reform and standards for digital surveillance. Michael also played a central role in developing and applying CLD’s Right to Information Rating Methodology, and has been involved in CLD projects in Canada, Indonesia, Lebanon, Myanmar and the Maldives.

 

Hilary Homes is Amnesty International (Canada)’s Campaigner on International Justice, Security and Human Rights, and the Arms Trade.  As a member of the Amnesty International’s Standing Committee on Research and Action in 2002-03, she developed policy and directions for the organization's engagement work with law enforcement officials worldwide. She is a co-chair and founding member of the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group (human rights, security and the impact of anti-terror measures), and in addition to the ICLMG, she has participated in the steering committees of numerous other working groups and coalitions ranging from Peace Operations to country-specific groups on Sudan and Afghanistan. Over the years she has also worked and volunteered with the Canadian Red Cross, the United Nations Association, War Child Canada and the Canadian Centre for International Justice. 

 

Workshop on Canada and the global struggle to end torture

Luis Eliud Tapia Olivares is a human rights lawyer with the Miguel Agustín Pro Juárez Human Rights Centre (Centro Prodh) in Mexico City, a highly respected organization which has responded to the epidemic of torture in Mexico with two Stop Torture campaigns: “Torture is not Justice” and “Breaking the Silence: Everyone Together Against Sexual Torture”.  Mr. Tapia provides legal defense to victims of torture, fabricated charges and unjust imprisonment, including Ángel Amílcar Colón Quevado, Claudia Medina and other emblematic cases which Amnesty International has taken up. In 2009 and 2010, Mr. Tapia worked at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights on a landmark decision which found the Mexican state responsible for denial of justice to the victims of gender-based murders in Ciudad Juarez.

Workshop on No more excuses:  Working together to stop violence against Indigenous women

Connie Greyeyes-Dick was born and raised in Fort St John, a member of Treaty 8 First Nations from Bigstone Cree Nation. The 11th child of Joseph and Veronica Greyeyes, Connie was raised on the premise that if you can help; you should, something her parents instilled in all their children. Connie works to tirelessly to improve the lives of indigenous people in her community in a variety of ways; her work at the Women’s Resource Centre; DPAC representative for her children's school; Coordinator for the Aboriginal Success by 6, and the Spirit of the Peace Powwow Society and of course Sisters in Spirit, FSJ Chapter. Connie and her friend Dave Terry held the first Sisters in Spirit vigil for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women in Fort St. John, BC in 2008 hoping to raise awareness of the missing and murdered aboriginal women in the Peace region and Canada. Since then, a team from Fort St John has represented the Peace Region at the National Vigil in Ottawa for the last several years and has brought National attention to the systemic violence and recurring loss of Aboriginal women in the Peace region and throughout Canada.