Ambassador Kimani, Executive Director of the Center on International Cooperation at NYU, recently concluded his tenure as Kenya’s Permanent Representative to the UN in New York. He led the Kenyan delegation to the UN Security Council (2021-2022), served as President of the Security Council (October 2021). He also served as 2023 President of the Executive Board of the UN Development Programme, the UN Population Fund, and the UN Office for Project Services. He is an elected member of the landmark UN Permanent Forum on People of African Descent.

With diverse experience in public service, he has held various significant roles, such as President’s Special Envoy for Countering Violent Extremism, Director of the National Counter Terrorism Centre, and Permanent Representative to the UN Environment Programme and UN Habitat. He was awarded the Chief of the Order of the Burning Spear by Kenya’s President. He is the 2022 Honorary Award of the German Africa Foundation.

Holding an MA and PhD in War Studies from King’s College London, he is an expert on the Rwanda genocide and armed conflicts. As a fellow of the African Leadership Initiative and member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network, Ambassador Kimani is sought-after for his insights into diplomacy, peace, and security. He advocates for multilateral reform and delivered a renowned speech at the UN Security Council on February 21, 2022, which framed the Ukraine war in a colonial context and emphasized the importance of peaceful conflict resolution.

Blake Mycoskie is a serial entrepreneur best known for founding TOMS and the person behind the idea of One for One®, a business model that helps a person in need with every product purchased.

A simple idea has grown into a global movement: TOMS Shoes has provided over 96.5 million pairs of shoes to children since 2006.

TOMS humble beginnings happened unintentionally. While traveling in Argentina in 2006, Blake witnessed the hardships faced by children growing up without shoes. His solution to the problem was simple, yet revolutionary: to create a for-profit business that was sustainable and not reliant on donations. Blake’s vision soon turned into the simple business idea that provided the powerful foundation for TOMS.

In fall 2011, Blake released his first book, Start Something That Matters, offering his own amazing story of inspiration, and the power of incorporating giving in business. The book became a New York Times best-seller. More importantly, it is Blake’s hope that Start Something That Matters inspires others to turn their passion and dreams into a reality.

In 2014 Blake stepped down as CEO of TOMS. He realized for the first time in 18 years he wasn’t actively starting or growing a company. During this transition period a new mission was born. In spring 2020 co-founded his newest company, Madefor. A program that applies the principles of modern neuroscience, psychology, and physiology to make your brain and body better. Created alongside some of the best minds in science and health, Madefor provides a simple set of steps to develop the habits and mindset necessary to live your best life.

Blake resides in Jackson, WY with his family, dogs, and cats. In his free time, you can expect to find him outside enjoying nature whether it is rock climbing, surfing or snowboarding.

Christiane Amanpour is CNN’s chief international anchor of the network’s award-winning, flagship global affairs program “Amanpour,” which also airs on PBS in the United States. She is based in the network’s London bureau.

Beginning in 1983 as an entry-level assistant on the international assignment desk at CNN’s headquarters in Atlanta, Amanpour rose through the organization becoming a reporter at the New York bureau, and later, the network’s leading international correspondent.

Amanpour’s fearless and uncompromising approach made her popular with audiences, and a force to be reckoned with by global influencers — in 1996, Newsweek said that her reporting from conflict hotspots in the Gulf and the Balkans had helped make CNN ‘must-see TV for world leaders’.

From the 1991 Gulf War, the 2003 American-led invasion, Amanpour has documented the bloody violence which has marked Iraq’s recent history. In 2004, she also reported exclusively from the courtroom at the trial of Saddam Hussein, where the former dictator, dishevelled and in chains, was eventually sentenced to death for crimes against humanity.

On the ground during the siege of Sarajevo, Amanpour exposed the brutality of the Bosnian War, reporting on the daily tragedy of life for civilians in the city. She was outspoken, calling out the human rights abuses, massacres and genocide committed against the Bosnian Moslems, later saying “There are some situations one simply cannot be neutral about, because when you are neutral you are an accomplice.”

In 2009 “Amanpour” was launched, and the primetime interview program has seen Amanpour speak to a raft of leaders and decision makers on the issues affecting the world today.

Throughout her time at CNN Amanpour has secured exclusive interviews with global power players. In the wake of the September 11 attacks she was the first international correspondent to interview British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf and Afghan President Hamid Karzai. During the height of the Arab Spring she conducted an Emmy-winning interview, the last, with Libya’s former leader ‘Colonel’ Moammar Gadhafi, she was also the last journalist to interview Egypt’s President Hosni Mubarak just before he was deposed.

Following his landslide election victory, Amanpour spoke exclusively to Iranian president Hassan Rouhani, eliciting from him acknowledgement of the occurrence of the Holocaust. She was the first journalist to interview Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff following her country’s shocking defeat in the 2014 World Cup semi-final. She also had the rare opportunity to sit down with Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, talking to him about the widespread violent demonstrations in his country.

In January 2014, Amanpour also exclusively broke the news of a dossier of testimony and photographs which alleged to show systematic torture of prisoners by government forces in Syria, welcoming a panel of war crimes experts who attested to the veracity of the shocking allegations. It was with this evidence that she later confronted Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev — challenging him to justify his government’s support for the Assad regime.

She has reported from the aftermath of many humanitarian crises including the devastating 2010 earthquake in Haiti, the 2011 Japanese tsunami, and Hurricane Katrina, where she visited a community center which had been converted to a makeshift morgue for victims of the storm.

In addition to her work as an anchor and reporter, Amanpour is an active rights campaigner. A board member of the Committee to Protect Journalists, the Centre for Public Integrity and the International Women’s Media Foundation, she has used her profile to raise awareness of key global issues and journalists’ rights. She has interviewed educational rights activist Malala Yousafzai for CNN on several occasions — bringing focus to her courage and international advocacy work. In May 2014 she used an appearance on BBC television to raise awareness of the plight of the 200 Nigerian schoolgirls abducted by Boko Haram – asking British Prime Minister David Cameron to join the #BringBackOurGirls campaign.

Amanpour has earned every major television journalism award including eleven News and Documentary Emmy Awards, four Peabody Awards, two George Polk Awards, three duPont-Columbia Awards and the Courage in Journalism Award. She has received nine honorary degrees, has been named a CBE and was this year inducted into the Cable Hall of Fame. She is an honorary citizen of Sarajevo and a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador for Freedom of the Press and the Safety of Journalists.

Amanpour graduated summa cum laude from the University of Rhode Island with a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism.

Isha Sesay is a British journalist of Sierra Leonean descent. Since 2005 she has worked as an anchor and correspondent for CNN International. Originally based at CNN’s world headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, and now based in Los Angeles, she hosts the news programs CNN Newsroom Live from Los Angeles. In addition, she was the presenter of the 360 Bulletin on Anderson Cooper 360°. In 2012 Sesay also joined HLN as a co-anchor for Evening Express. She left CNN in 2018 to support her organization, W.E. Can Lead, which works on girls education projects in Africa.

Kweku Mandela was born in Transkei, South Africa, and grew up in America, returning to his homeland in 1993. He attended APA International Film School in Sydney and is very active in the South African Film and Entertainment industries, directing and producing projects with his South African production company Out Of Africa Entertainment and working on a variety of other locally produced films.

Kweku Executive Produced acclaimed Novel “The Bang Bang Club” into a feature film, which was released in early 2011. Kweku is currently co-directing and producing a documentary feature about his grandfather entitled Mandela’s Children. He has worked with and supported Oxfam Australia and Make Poverty History. In mid-2009 he co-founded Africa Rising with his cousin Ndaba Mandela and their dream of changing Africa’s image and fostering young leadership and partnerships around the world was started. He supports the UN Decade of Action for Road Safety and the Long Short Walk, a world walk for road safety, in memory of his 13-year old cousin Zenani Mandela who was killed in a crash 2 years ago.

Manuela Roosevelt has been a book publisher since the late 80s, running companies in Switzerland, the UK and now in the States. Throughout her publishing career, she has overseen the publication of over 300 illustrated non-fiction titles in the subjects of science, history, spirituality, biography, current affairs, art history, and gift titles. She has also authored eight books, which have been published in several languages. She is currently Editorial Director at Callaway Arts & Entertainment, a publishing and multimedia company that is spearheading extraordinary publications, immersive location-based digital experiences, and multimedia products.

Manuela is the Chair of the Board for the Eleanor Roosevelt Partnership at Val-Kill, a Friend’s organization to the National Park Service that engages in preservation programs as well as Eleanor Roosevelt’s legacy outreach. She also serves on the Board of Directors of the Omega Institute for Holistic Studies, and is on the Board of Directors of the Sustainability Laboratory. Born in Bern and brought up in Lugano, Switzerland, Manuela red Social Anthropology from the School of Oriental and African Studies, London University. She speaks English, Italian, Spanish, Catalan, and French fluently. She has lived in six countries, and has traveled extensively, including crossing the Sahara desert on camel with a Touareg tribe and studying the Dogon culture of Southern Mali. She currently resides in Hyde Park, New York, with her husband and two daughters.

Maya serves as a consultant to the Obama Foundation, working closely with their international team to develop programming in the Asia Pacific region. Prior to her work with the Obama Foundation, she was the Director of the Matsunaga Institute for Peace and Conflict Resolution at the University of Hawaii at Mānoa where, in addition to leading outreach and development initiatives, she also taught Leadership for Social Change, History of Peace Movements, Peace Education, and Conflict Management for Educators. She was awarded a master’s degree in Secondary Education from NYU’s College of Education and a PhD in Multicultural Education from the University of Hawaiʻi. For many years, she worked at the University of Hawaiʻi College of Education where she taught Multicultural Education, Social Studies Methods, and Peace Education at both the graduate and undergraduate levels. Maya has published a number of book contributions as well as a picture book entitled Ladder to the Moon and is currently under contract to write a Young Adult novel entitled Yellowwood. Maya sits on many voluntary boards and is the co-founder of the nonprofit Ceeds of Peace, which creates peacebuilding action plan workshops for educators, families and community leaders and is the co-founder of the Institute for Climate and Peace which advances effective and inclusive processes to build peaceful and climate-conscious futures for the wellbeing of all.

Pat Mitchell is a lifelong advocate for women and girls. At every step of her career, Mitchell has broken new ground for women, leveraging the power of media as a journalist, an Emmy award-winning and Oscar-nominated producer to tell women’s stories and increase the representation of women onscreen and off. Transitioning to an executive role, she became the president of CNN Productions, and the first woman president and CEO of PBS and the Paley Center for Media. Today, her commitment to connect and strengthen a global community of women leaders continues as a conference curator, advisor and mentor.

In partnership with TED, Mitchell launched TEDWomen in 2010 and is its editorial director, curator and host. She is also a speaker and curator for the annual Women Working for the World forum in Bogota, Colombia, the Her Village conference in Beijing, and the Women of the World (WOW) festival in London. In 2017, she launched the Transformational Change Leadership Initiative with the Rockefeller Foundation focused on women leaders in government and civil society.

In 2014, the Women’s Media Center honored Mitchell with its first-annual Lifetime Achievement Award, now named in her honor to commend other women whose media careers advance the representation of women. Recognized by Hollywood Reporter as one of the most powerful women in media, Fast Company’s “League of Extraordinary Women” and Huffington Post’s list of “Powerful Women Over 50,” Mitchell also received the Sandra Day O’Connor Award for Leadership. She is a contributor to Enlightened Power: How Women Are Transforming the Practice of Leadership, and wrote the introduction to the recently published book and museum exhibition, 130 Women of Impact in 30 Countries. In 2016, she served as a congressional appointment to The American Museum of Women’s History Advisory Council.

Mitchell is active with many nonprofit organizations, serving as the chair of the boards of the Sundance Institute and the Women’s Media Center. She is a founding member of the VDAY movement and on the boards of the Skoll Foundation and the Acumen Fund. She is also an advisor to Participant Media and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Mitchell is a magna cum laude graduate of the University of Georgia and holds a master’s degree in English literature and several honorary doctorate degrees. She is the author of Becoming a Dangerous Woman: Embracing Risk to Change the World. She and her husband, Scott Seydel, live in Atlanta and have six children and 13 grandchildren.