Speakers

European Values Summit 2024

EUROPEAN VALUES SUMMIT 2024: LIST OF SPEAKERS

Antoine Bondaz

Antoine Bondaz is the Director of the Indo-Pacific Program at the FRS (on leave) where he oversees several research programs, including the Korea Program and the Taiwan Program. He actively engages in high-level dialogues, facilitating discussions with government officials from the Indo-Pacific. He has appeared before key institutions such as the French National Assembly and Senate, the European Parliament, the Canadian House of Commons, as well as the OECD, NATO, and at the United Nations. An Associate Professor at Sciences Po Paris, he is also an Expert Associate to the National Security College of the Australian National University.

Reinhard Bütikofer

Reinhard Bütikofer was an MEP 2009-2024 for Bündnis 90/Die Grünen in the Greens/EFA group. He served on the AFET, INTA and ITRE Committees as well as on the Delegations for Relations with the U.S.A. and with the PRC; the latter he chaired for five years. Mr. Bütikofer is a former Chair of the European Green Party (2012-2019) and a former Chair of the German Greens (2002-2008). He co-chairs the German-Taiwanese Dialogue Platform, is a member of the German-Chinese Dialogue Forum, sits on the Advisory Board of GTI, and is a Senior Fellow with Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA).

Jaap van Etten

Datenna’s founder and CEO Jaap van Etten has dedicated decades to tracking China’s techno-economic development – in fields ranging from AI and biotech to advanced materials – first as a Dutch diplomat in China and later at the helm of Datenna. During the lunch presentation, Jaap will demonstrate how universities can utilize detailed OSINT data and techno-economic intelligence to safeguard knowledge security and evaluate Chinese partners for potential military connections and technology transfer risks. Given the opacity of China’s academic landscape, European institutions face significant challenges in managing collaborations. This approach ensures universities can engage responsibly while upholding their core values.

Arta Haxhixhemajli

Arta Haxhixhemajli is a non-resident research fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. Arta holds a Bachelor’s degree in International Relations from the University of Warsaw and a Master’s degree in World Politics and International Relations from the University of Pavia. Her work focuses on international security, security dilemmas, conflict resolution, cyber security, nuclear weapons proliferation, and digital security. She has also published several articles related to cyber security and states, ethical hacking, migration and human security, information security management system standards and trade and foreign policy of Western Balkans.

Atsuko Higashino

Dr. Atsuko Higashino is Associate Professor in the faculty of International Studies at University of Tsukuba, Japan. She holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from University of Birmingham, the United Kingdom, and an MA and BA in Political Science from Keio University, Japan. Before working at University of Tsukuba, she was a Lecturer at University of Birmingham and Associate Professor at Hiroshima City University. She also worked as a special assistant for the Japanese Delegation to the OECD in Paris, where she was in charge of researches on the outreach activities of the OECD. Dr. Higashino is currently teaching International Relations, International History, and politics and policies of the European Union. Her research interests include EU enlargement (Turkey and the Western Balkans), European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) and Eastern Partnership (EaP). Since 2014, she has written extensively on the Ukraine Crisis and EU's response to it.

Sense Hofstede

Researcher and teacher of China’s party state and the geopolitics of the Indo-Pacific, particularly cross-Strait relations and Asean. Completed a PhD in Comparative Asian Studies at the National University of Singapore from 2017 to 2022, with a dissertation on the influence of Chinese nationalism in Singapore and Taiwan. Previously obtained degrees in international relations from Peking University, Sciences Po Paris, and the University of Groningen. Was previously Research Fellow at the Netherlands Institute of International Relations ‘Clingendael’ and Lecturer at Leiden University.

Akira Igata

Professor Akira Igata is a Project Lecturer at the Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology (RCAST), the University of Tokyo. He is also the Director of the Economic Security Research Program (ESRP) at RCAST. He is also an Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS) in Washington DC, Pacific Forum (PF) in Honolulu, Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) in Canberra, and Prague Security Studies Institute (PSSI) in Prague. He is also the Non-Executive Director at the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC).

Marcin Jerzewski

Marcin Jerzewski is the Head of the Taiwan Office of the European Values Center for Security Policy. He also serves as an analyst contributing to the Center’s research on Taiwan and the broader Indo-Pacific region. Concurrently, he is also a contributor to the China Observers in Central Eastern Europe (CHOICE) platform of the Association for International Affairs (AMO). His previous professional experience includes work at the Taiwan NextGen Foundation, the Taipei City Government, the Polish Office in Taipei, and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, DC. Jerzewski delivered expert briefings on Taiwan’s domestic politics and foreign policy to officials of the Legislative Yuan, the Ministry of National Defence of the Republic of Lithuania, and NATO. He is also a frequent commentator on the politics and international relations of Taiwan, with his analyses cited in outlets including Al Jazeera, BBC, The Economist, and Yomiuri Shimbun, among many others. A sinologist and political scientist, Jerzewski was a Ministry of Education Taiwan Fellow in the International Master’s Program in International Studies at the National Chengchi University and studied at the University of Richmond and the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor.

Zuzana Košková

Zuzana Koskova is a sinologist with experience in diplomacy, management of research and science, event management, social media or cloudcomputing. She joined the EVC in February 2023 as the senior program coordinator of the Red Watch program, since April 2023 she has been the Head of the program. During the Czech presidency of the Council of the EU (2022) she served at the Czech MFA where she also completed the Diplomatic Academy program. Previously, she worked at the Faculty of Arts, Charles University in management of science and innovation and as a foreign students coordinator. Before that she worked in a cloudcomupting company and tourism. Apart of that she teaches foreign languages and in her free time travels and engages in sports. She graduated from MA program Modern China Studies at Freiburg University (Germany), bachelor program Sinology at the Faculty of Arts, Charles University in Prague and Humanities at the Faculty of Humanities, CU in Prague. Her research interests are Chinese media, censorship and propaganda.

Olimpia Kot

Olimpia Kot is joining Taiwan Office team as a Senior Project Coordinator. For the past seven years, Olimpia worked in Polish Office in Taipei. Her core responsibilities concentrated over public and cultural diplomacy projects. During her successful career in POT Olimpia organized and supervised dozens of public and cultural events. Her previous academic background is affiliated to work as a research assistant at Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica. Olimpia studied Sinology at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań and earned a master’s degree. At the moment she is a PHD candidate at Institute of Anthropology, National Tsing Hua University. Olimpia speaks Polish (native), English and Chinese (both at full professional working level).

Bo Ram Kwon

Dr. Bo Ram Kwon is a Research Fellow at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses(KIDA). Her research area includes US security and defense strategy, the ROK-US alliance with focus on defense industrial cooperation, the nexus between US foreign policy and American politics, and economic sanctions. As a graduate of Ewha Womans University and Korea University in South Korea, she received her Ph.D. in political science from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, USA.

Margaret Lewis

Margaret K. Lewis is the Associate Dean for Faculty Development and Institutional Operations and a Professor of Law at Seton Hall University. Lewis is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and serves on the National Committee on United States-China Relations Board of Directors, for which she was previously a Public Intellectual Program fellow. She has been a Fulbright senior scholar at National Taiwan University, a visiting professor at Academia Sinica, and a delegate to the U.S.-Japan Foundation’s U.S.-Japan Leadership Program. Lewis has participated in the State Department’s Legal Experts Dialogue with China, has testified before the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, and has been a consultant to the Ford Foundation.

K. Tony Lin

Dr. Lin is professor of communication and information at National Taiwan Normal University and Shih-Hsin University. He is also Dean of KMT Sun Yat-Sen Institute (aka Institute of Revolutionary Practice), which organizes training programs of various kinds for the political party. He was also chief spokesperson for KMT in 2023-2024 presidential campaign trail. Prior to joining the Institute, Dr. Lin was a political appointee for New Taipei City Government where he headed the Department of Cultural Affairs for the city that has four million inhabitants. He has also been sitting on advisory boards for various ministries and was also managing board members for Public TV Taiwan and CTS TV Taiwan respectively. Other than his two advanced degrees in Information from US universities, Dr. Lin was also sponsored by the German government to study international politics at Kiel University. During his tenure as a NY-based TV foreign news correspondent at the turn of the century, Dr. Lin has witnessed several major democratic movements around the world including interviewing President Václav Havel here in Czech Republic.

Eva Pejšová

Dr Eva Pejšová is Japan Chair at the Centre for Security, Diplomacy and Strategy (CSDS) of the Brussels School of Governance (BSoG) and Associate Fellow at the French “Fondation pour la Recherche Stratégique” (FRS). Until 2019, Dr Pejsova was Senior Analyst for Asia at the European Union Institute for Security Studies (EUISS), the EU’s official agency for foreign and security policy research and analysis. She holds a PhD in Strategic Studies from the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) in Singapore and has previously worked with the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the French Prime Minister’s Office, the OECD, and the Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF). Dr Pejsova regularly lectures at SciencesPo (Paris School of International Affairs) in Paris, the Geneva Centre for Security Studies (GCSP), as well as briefs the Members of the European Parliament.

Filip Šebok

Filip Šebok is the Head of the Prague Office of the Central European Institute of Asian Studies, a think tank that focuses on foreign policy, economy, and security issues related to East Asia. Filip's research primarily looks at Chinese domestic and foreign policy, especially relations between China and Central and Eastern European countries and China’s propaganda and disinformation. Filip graduated in International Relations and Chinese Cultural Studies at Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic, and Renmin University in Beijing, studying in a full-time program taught in Mandarin. He is also an incoming PhD. student at the Asian Studies Department of the Palacký University in Olomouc. Previously, Filip worked as a China Research Fellow and Project Manager on the MapInfluenCE and China Observers in Central and Eastern Europe (CHOICE) projects at the Association for International Affairs (AMO) and the editor of all CHOICE publications. He was already affiliated with CEIAS between 2014 and 2019. Moreover, Filip also worked for Stratpol (Adapt Institute) and has co-organized several short term academic programs on international relations. Filip was a Fall 2022 CEPA James S. Denton Fellow in Washington, D.C. He is also an individual member of the European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats (Hybrid CoE) Expert Pool. Filip is an author of several reports, analyses and book chapters, including in in the Routledge volume 'Contemporary China A New Superpower?'.

Athena Tong

Athena Tong is a Visiting Researcher at the University of Tokyo and a Research Associate at the China Strategic Risks Institute, focusing on human rights diplomacy, counter-influence operations, and economic security in relation to the People's Republic of China. Her academic credentials include degrees from Hong Kong Baptist University, Sciences Po Paris, and the University of London, with specialisations in Psychopolitics, Identity-Building, and Political Communications. In addition to her current roles, she has been actively engaged in political and human rights work in and for Hong Kong since 2015 through international advocacy. She works in English, French, Cantonese, Mandarin, Italian, and increasingly, Japanese.

Hung-jen Wang

Dr. Wang received his PhD degree in International Politics from Political Science department at the University of Tübingen, Germany. He is currently a professor at the department of political science, National Cheng Kung University, Director at the Institute for National Policy Research (INPR), and also the vice chairman at the Taiwan Society of Japan Studies (TSJS). His research interests focus mainly on East Asian security, international relations theory, Chinese foreign policy, and Sino-US relations. Dr. Wang is the author of the books, Taiwan and the Changing Dynamics of Sino-US Relations: A Relational Approach (London & New York: Routledge, 2022) and The Rise of China and Chinese International Relations (IR) Scholarship (Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2013), and a co-author of China and International Theory: The Balance of Relationships (London & New York: Routledge, 2019). He has also published journal articles in The China Quarterly, Global Constitutionalism, China: An International Journal, Issues & Studies and others.