Human Rights Day Programme – Mentors

ADRIJANA HANUŠIĆ BEŠIROVIĆ has been active since 2012 as a Senior Legal Adviser at TRIAL International, a non-governmental organization which fights impunity for international crimes and represents victims of war crimes in their quest for justice and reparation. From 2019 to 2021, she served on the UN Secretary-General’s Civil Society Advisory Board on prevention of sexual exploitation and abuse. She has served as a human rights consultant to the OSCE Mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina and to various NGOs in Bosnia and Herzegovina and abroad, with a focus on international human rights standards, transitional justice, women’s rights, constitutional and anti-discrimination law. From 2017 to 2022, Ms. Hanušić Bećirović sat on the board of Sarajevo Open Center. From 2010 to 2012, she worked in a law office, and provided legal expertise to the B&H Parliamentary Assembly during 2012. From 2012 to 2013, she was a UNDP legal expert to the National Human Rights Ombudsmen Institution. In 2008 and 2009, she was a fellow of the German Parliament and a trainee at the Council of Europe Venice Commission. Ms. Hanušić Bećirović holds a Law degree from the University of Sarajevo and has received from the University of Strasbourg a master’s degree in Public International Law. She has completed numerous education programs, including the Open Society Fund Policy Development Fellowship Program and the Council of Europe School of Political Studies.

AIDA ČERKEZ is a writer, manager and editor with 20 years experience in covering the Balkan region for major international media organisations. She was born in Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1962, and grew up in the former Yugoslavia and Germany. Aida Cerkez became chief of the Associated Press (AP) Sarajevo bureau in 1994, while the Bosnian capital was under siege. She assumed responsibility for the AP’s coverage of the ongoing conflict in words and images, as well as managing logistics and security for more than and dozen local employees in three field offices, and for visiting correspondents. In 1995, Ms.Cerkez won the Associated Press’ Gramling Award for best managed media operation. In 2005 Aida Cerkez joined the board of the Centre for Investigative Journalism, based in Sarajevo and as of 2017, she is news editor at the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project.

AJNA JUSIĆ graduated in psychology at the University of Sarajevo. She attended the Academy for Young Leaders in Civil Society, and successfully completed the School of Political Studies of the Council of Europe. She is the president of the Association “Forgotten Children of War”. She fights for women who survived rape during the war and children born in the war, the rights of the LGBT community, minorities, and children with special needs. The biggest focus of her work is human rights. Through her engagement and struggle for the rights of children born because of the war, Jusić also became the author of the first world exhibition on children born because of the war and women survivors from Bosnia and Herzegovina. The exhibition is called “Breaking Free” and has become and internationally recognized exhibition. Currently, Jusic is trying to make Bosnia and Herzegovina the first country in the world to have a law on children born as a result of war rape and children whose fathers are members of foreign humanitarian organizations and whose fathers were foreign peacekeepers. She was born in 1993 and believes that only with solidarity, empathy, humanity and dialogue can we build a better and healthier society for future.

DAMIR ŠAGOLJ born in 1971 in Sarajevo, is a Bosnian photographer and journalist. He completed power engineering studies in Moscow and Sarajevo but the Bosnian war and its total destruction meant a change in career for Damir. In 1996 he joined Reuters news agency as theirs Bosnia based photojournalist. For next 22 years Damir travelled the world and reported on major news stories for the agency – mostly on conflicts, civil and other disturbances and natural catastrophes, but also on contemporary and

other issues. He lived in Russia, Thailand, China and spent years in the Middle East. Damir’s work was recognized with industry’s major awards – the Pulitzer Prize and World Press Photo, among many others. He holds a master degree from the University of Arts in London. Currently, Damir lives in Sarajevo and teaches photography at the Sarajevo Academy of Performing Arts.

DALMIR MIŠKOVIĆ is a peacebuilding activist from Livno, Bosnia and Herzegovina. His work is mostly concentrated on peacebuilding, dealing with the past and especially culture of remembrance. Since 2015 together with his team and with the support from the Centre for nonviolent action Sarajevo/Beograd, he has marked and documented 115 unmarked atrocities sites all across BiH. More info about his work and “Neobilježena mjesta stradanja” can be found on onms.nenasilje.org.

NERMINA KULOGLIJA started working as a journalist since 2017. She began her career with Center for Investigative Reporting in Sarajevo, first as an intern, then a journalist, where she mainly focused on researching corruption and organized crime. She holds a master’s degree in Journalism and Mass Communication from the Faculty of Political Sciences at the University of Sarajevo. For the last two years as the member of Balkan Investigative Reporting Network Bosnia and Herzegovina, she has been working on research into extremism, terrorism, genocide denial and corruption. During 2020 and 2021, she published three researches about far-right groups in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Following the symbols used by far-right groups she found the activities of at least three ultra right-wing groups operating in BiH. Groups whose activities she found were banned in Germany and declared as terrorist in Canada.

NATAŠA URBAN is a documentary film director and editor working professionally since 2005. Her films, such as Journey of a Red Fridge (IDFA First Appearance Competition 2007, IDFA Top 25 Audience Favorites 2007) and Big Sister Punam (UNICEF Award for Children Rights), have been screened at over 100 international film festivals and have received 40 awards. They have aired on major TV networks worldwide, including ARTE, RAI, ZDF, DR2, YLE, ORF, RSI, and PBS, and are part of educational programs in schools around the globe, from Ghana to Mongolia. Nataša graduated in 2001 from Bucharest’s University of Arts, in the Department of Photography and Video. She also holds a Master’s degree in Photography, awarded by the University of Arts in Belgrade in 2008. Between 2005-2013, Nataša made films under the name of LUNAM DOCS. She took part in ESoDoc 2006, IDFAcademy 2007, IDFA Summer School 2014, Berlinale Talents 2015, and Werner Herzog Rogue Film School 2016.

NERMIN HAMZAGIĆ graduated from the Academy of Performing Arts in Sarajevo where he works as an assistant professor. He directed several theater shows, performances as well as short films and documentaries. In 2019 he directed his first feature film “Full Moon”. European Film Academy nominated “Full Moon” for the European Discovery Price -Prix Fipresci 2020.

AMBASSADOR JOHANN SATTLER is the Head of the Delegation of the European Union to Bosnia and Herzegovina and is the European Union Special Representative in Bosnia and Herzegovina as of 1 September 2019. He graduated from Innsbruck University in 1994 with a Diploma/Master in Political Science and Slavic Languages and holds a Postgraduate Diploma in Advanced International Studies from the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna. He completed his PhD in Political Science at the University of Vienna in 2008. Throughout his previous experience, and his most recent experience as Austrian ambassador to Albania, Ambassador Sattler has had a particular focus on the Western Balkans. In 1996 he joined the Austrian Ministry for Foreign Affairs in the Human Rights Department. In 1997, he joined the European Community Monitoring Mission, where he was posted to Sarajevo and Tirana. More recently, he was the Head of the Western Balkans Unit within the Directorate for Eastern/South Eastern Europe at the Austrian Ministry for Foreign Affairs. He took up ambassadorial duties in Albania in 2016. He was born in 1969 in Austria. Apart from native German, Ambassador Sattler is fluent in English and Russian, and proficient in Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian and Albanian.

REFIK HODŽIĆ is a writer, journalist and strategic communications specialist from Prijedor, Bosnia and Herzegovina. He has worked for more than 25 years in the field of transitional justice, with a particular focus on the role of media and communications. He currently works as a strategic communications con-

sultant on Syria with the European Institute for Peace and the Independent Investigative Mechanism for Myanmar, and recently in Sri Lanka and Afghanistan. Hodžić served as ICTJ’s director of communications from 2011-2017. While with the ICTJ Hodžić worked in various capacities as an expert in strategic communications in transitional justice processes on contexts as diverse as the former Yugoslavia, Tunisia, Lebanon, Colombia, Kenya, Guatemala, Syria, Canada, Uganda and Nepal. Hodžić served with the International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia from 2000–2004 and 2006–2010 as the Tribunal’s spokesman and outreach coordinator for Bosnia and Herzegovina. He was the first head of the public information and outreach section of the Court of Bosnia. In 2004, Hodžić co-founded XY Films, an independent film and television production company producing documentary films dealing with the legacy of war crimes committed during the 1990s. With XY Films he authored award-winning documentaries and television series. Hodžić has published extensively in international media and academic publications on victims’ rights and the relationship between media and transitional justice. He is one of the founders of “White Armband Day,” a globally-recognized grassroots campaign for the rights of victims’ families in Prijedor, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

NICOLAS MOLL, born in 1965 in Brussels, holds a PhD in Contemporary History from the University of Freiburg (Germany), and has been living in Sarajevo since 2007. He is working as an independent researcher and as free-lance trainer in the fields of dealing with the past, international cooperation and civil society development. More information: https://www.nicolasmoll.eu/

AGNES PICOD has 25 years of experience in the field of human rights, mostly with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), including on economic and social rights and in supporting OHCHR field operations across the world. She has a Masters’ degree in international human rights law and a Master’s degree in literatures and civilizations of Anglophone countries, with a focus on American studies.

LEJLA HODŽIĆ gratuated at the Academy of Fine Arts in Sarajevo, From 1993 she works in contemporary arts field (Obala Art Center Sarajevo 1993-94, Sarajevo Center for Contemporary Art SCCA/pro.ba 1997-2003, from 2004 as freelance) as curator of numerous art exhibitions in Bosnia and Herzegovina and abroad. Costume designer of four awarded feature films directed by Jasmila Žbanić: Grbavica, 2006; On The Road, 2010; For Those Who Can’t Speak, 2012; Island Of Love, 2014; and short films by Jasmila Žbanić, Sasa Peševski, Ermin Bravo, Alen Šimić, Alban Ukaj. Since 2010, she has worked in costume design and scenography for about 60 theatre plays in theaters in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the region (directed by Dino Mustafić, Admir Glamočak, Paolo Magelli, Pjer Žalica, Selma Spahić, Tanja Miletić-Oručević, Andras Urban, Boris Liješević, Aleš Kurt, Kokan Mladenović etc.) for which she was awarded at the Festivals in Jajce (2011, 2013, 2016), Zenica (2017, 2021) and Užice (2019).

LEJLA GAČANICA is a PhD candidate in law, currently working as a legal expert and independent researcher in the field of transitional justice with a focus on the politics and culture of remembrance. She is the author of published articles, analytical, scientific and research papers in these fields.

MAIDA MUMINOVIĆ is Executive director of Mediacentar Sarajevo. She is responsible for design and management of media and civil society development projects in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the WB region in the domain of media education, media research and freedom of expression outreach and advocacy. Her particular area of interest is capacitating human rights CSOs with communications and outreach skills, so that their causes are better presented in media reports.

SINIŠA JURIČIĆ was born in 1965 in Zagreb, graduated in production from the Academy of Dramatic Art in Zagreb in 2009. Founded Nukleus Film in 2002. His focus is on the production of films by talented filmmakers from Southeast Europe. The films produced have been awarded and funded in and outside the country, winning awards in Cannes and Berlin. In 2012, he was awarded the annual Albert Kapovic Award by the Croatian Producers Association for his contribution to the international promotion of Croatian film. He is a member of the European Film Academy and the production networks of EAVE, ACE and Inside Pictures.

SENADIN MUSABEGOVIĆ was born in Sarajevo in 1970. During the siege of Sarajevo, he served in the army of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and also worked as a journalist for the BH Press. He began publishing poetry, essays and stories during the war. Since then, he has published three books of poetry in Bosnian: Body Strikes (1995), The Maturing of Homeland (1999), and The Heavenly Sphere (2004). The Maturing of Homeland was translated into French and Italian, while numerous other works were translated into seven languages. In 1999, he received the Bosnian-Herzegovinian Writers’ Association Award for his collection of essays, as well as the Planjax Award for his book of poetry. A graduate of Sienna University in Italy, Musabegović read political philosophy. In 2004, he presented his doctorate thesis, “War — Reconstruction of the Totalitarian Body” at the European Institute in Florence. He has held lectures as a guest professor at European and American universities. Currently, he works as a professor at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Sarajevo, where he teaches courses in cultural sociology and art theory.