Professor George Christodoulou is Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry of the University of Athens. He is a Honorary Fellow of the World Psychiatric Association having served as Executive Committee member and Secretary for Sections (for which he has received a special distinction) as well as chair of the Ethics Committee and chair of the Institutional Program on the Psychosocial Consequences of Disasters. He has organized the Athens Intersectional WPA Congress, the first Intersectional Congress in the history of the WPA and has initiated a series of books ("Advances in Psychiatry") produced by the WPA Sections.
Professor Christodoulou has served as President of the World Federation for Mental Health, President of the International College of Psychosomatic Medicine, President of the European Board of Psychiatry of the UEMS, President of the European Division of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, Founder and first President of the WPA Section of Preventive Psychiatry and is presently President of the Society of Preventive Psychiatry, Board Member of the European Association of Professors Eneriti and Fellow of the World Association of Social Psychiatry and the Royal College of Psychiatrists.
For many years he teaches medical students, psychiatric trainees and postgraduate students and promotes mental health mainly in the framework of the Society of Preventive Psychiatry and the section of Preventive Psychiatry of the WPA that he created.
He is also active in research, mainly in the fields of Clinical Psychiatry, Psychosomatics, Preventive Psychiatry, Medical Ethics and Psychopharmacology, having published widely (h-index 45) has edited about 40 books, has founded and has been the Editor in chief of "Psychiatriki", the official Journal of the Hellenic Psychiatric Association and many other international journals and bulletins (among them "Science and Care", the Bulletin of the WPA Sections). In his own Country, Greece, Professor Christodoulou has been the Director of the Athens University Psychiatric Department and of the Sector of Psychiatry, Neurology and Social Medicine as well as President of the Board of Directors of the Hellenic Center for Mental Health and Research, an organization with the most extensive network of extramural mental health services in Greece. However, he is more well known for his work with the Hellenic Psychiatric Association of which he has been the first President re-elected many times and is now a Honorary President.

Dévora Kestel is a senior mental health policy specialist with more than twenty five years of international experience in Europe, the Caribbean and Latin America, implementing and advising governments on national policies related to mental health systems. She is a strong advocate for the rights of people with mental health issues.
Ms Kestel obtained her MSc in Psychology from the Universidad Nacional de La Plata, in Argentina and her MSc in Public Health at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK. After completing her university studies in Argentina she worked for 10 years in the development and supervision of community-based mental health services in Trieste, Italy. In 2000 she joined the World Health Organization (WHO) as a mental health officer first in Kosovo and then in Albania where she became the WHO Representative to Albania. In both countries, she worked closely with the Ministries of Health to help establish comprehensive community-based mental health systems.
In 2007 Ms Kestel joined the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO/WHO) as the Sub-regional Mental Health Advisor for the English Speaking Caribbean Countries, based in Barbados. In 2011 Ms. Kestel was appointed to the position of the Regional Mental Health Advisor, at the headquarters in Washington DC, providing technical cooperation in the mental health field to the entire region. In 2015 she became the Unit Chief for Mental Health and Substance Use at PAHO/WHO. Over the years, Ms. Kestel has contributed to and co-authored to publications in the area of mental health.
Since 2019 Ms Kestel is the WHO Director of the Department of Mental Health and Substance Use.

Prof. Duarte Nuno Vieira is Full Professor (of Forensic Medicine, Forensic Sciences, Ethics and Medical Law) at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Coimbra (Portugal) and at the Faculty of Health Sciences of the University of Beira Interior. He is presently visiting professor at the Universities of Belgrade (Servia), Xi´an Jiaotong (China), Kasturba (India), and as served, on a regular basis as lecturer and visiting professor, in several other European, African, Central and South American and Asian Universities, as well as at the University for Peace of the United Nations. He is Director of the Institute of Legal Medicine and of the Institute of Bioethics of the Faculty Medicine of the University of Coimbra.
He is Chairman of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court and Chairman of the Thematic Federation on Legal and Forensic Medicine of the European Union of Medical Specialists. He is also President of the Ibero-American Network of Forensic Sciences and Vice-President of the European Confederation of Experts on Evaluation and Repair of Bodily Injury. He is member of the Advising Committee of the American Board of Independent Medical Examiners and has been member of the Executive Committee of the Working Group in Forensic Pathology and Forensic Anthropology of the Permanent Committee of INTERPOL on Disaster Victim Identification. He is also member of the Advisory Board of the Portuguese National Mechanism for the Prevention of Torture and member of the Human Rights Resource Centre of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences and President of the Ethics Committee of Hospital Luz Saúde Coimbra. He was founder of the Portuguese Speaking Countries Observatory on Human Rights and he acts as Executive Director of the Coimbra University Centre for Humanitarian and Human Rights Forensic Research and Training and member of the Executive Board of the Centre for Biomedical Law of the Faculty of Law of the University of Coimbra
He has been President of the International Academy of Legal Medicine, of the International Association of Forensic Sciences, of the European Council of Legal Medicine, of the World Association of Police Medical Officers, of the Mediterranean Academy of Forensic Sciences and of the Latin American Association of Medical Law. He also has been Dean of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Coimbra, President of the Portuguese National Institute of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences, Director of the Institute of Legal Medicine of Coimbra and of his Service of Forensic Pathology, Chief Forensic Pathologist, President of the Portuguese Medico-Legal Council and of the Portuguese Association for Bodily Injury Assessment, among many others appointments.
He is Member of the International Forensic Advisory Board of the International Committee of the Red Cross and Member of the Forensic Expert Group of the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims. He works on a regular basis as temporary forensic consultant for the United Nations, mainly for UN OHCHR and UNODC.
He also has been member of the Portuguese National Council of Ethics for Life Sciences and of the National Commission for Civil Protection. He is Member of the Scientific Board of the European Institute of Training Evaluation and Repair of Bodily Injury of Paris and member of the group of expert reviewers of the European Science Foundation.
Prof. Vieira has published over 350 scientific papers, he is editor or co-editor of 13 books, and serves on the editorial boards of several international leading scientific publications of his area of medical expertise, as well has in the editorial boards of national forensic scientific journals from 18 different European, American, Asian, Meddle-East and African countries (Portugal, Costa Rica, Spain, Italy, Ireland, Turkey, Iran, India, Brazil, Romania, Egypt, Russia, Peru, Poland, Uruguay, Denmark, etc.). He is Chief-Executive Editor of the Journal of Forensic Research (edited by Taylor & Francis), International Associate Editor of the Spanish Journal of Legal Medicine (edited by Elsevier) and Chief-Editor of the Portuguese Journal of Personal Injury Assessment (edited by Coimbra University Press). He has given, as invited keynote speaker, more than 750 keynote lectures outside of Portugal, in countries of Europe, Asia, Africa, Meddle-East, Australasia, and of the entire American continent, and trainings courses in more than 30 different countries (namely on the Istanbul and on the Minnesota Protocols). He is author or co-author of more than 1.500 oral communications and posters presented in scientific events. He as supervised 15 PhD thesis and more than 60 Master thesis and he has been member of more than 150 academic juris in European, Asian, African, Meddle-East and South American universities (of Portugal, Spain, Romania, Ireland, China, Estonia, Jordan, Egypt, Uzbekistan, Greece, Brazil, Crete, etc.)
Prof. Vieira is a Fellow of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences and member of numerous national and international forensic scientific associations, having received honorary fellowship from 18 universities, scientific associations and academies, from Europe, North, Central and South America, Africa and Asia, has been awarded with distinctions from different governments and municipalities, and has received 15 scientific prizes (he is, for example, Doctor Honoris causa by Grigore T. Popa University of Medicine and Pharmacy of Iasi, Romania, Honorary Citizen of the City of Guayaquil, Ecuador, Honorary Member of the College of Pathologists of Sri Lanka, Honorary Member of the Medico-Legal Society of Panama, Honorary Member of the Medico-Legal Society of Cuba, Honorary Member of the Spanish Society of Personal Injury Assessment, Corresponding member of the Russian Association of Forensic Experts, Medal of the Comenius University in Bratislava, Slovakia, etc.). He his Academic (chair 11) of the Portuguese Academy of Medicine, Honorary Academic of the Royal Academy of Medicine of Granada (Spain), of the Academy of Medicine of Uruguay and Corresponding Member of the National Academy of Sciences, Humanities and Arts of Italy. He has been awarded with the title of Knight of the Royal Order of Nossa Senhora da Conceição and of Knight of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem. He has been awarded by the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, in 2014, with the Douglas Lucas Medal Award, the most prestigious international award in the area of legal and forensic medicine, and awarded, in 2020, with the Clyde Snow Human Rights Award and the Milton Helpern Award in Forensic Pathology.
Prof. Vieira has been president and organizer of the main international meetings in his area of expertise, and has been member of the organizing and scientific committees of more than 70 international congresses in countries of the 5 continents.
Prof. Vieira also participated in more than 45 international missions promoted by the International Amnesty, European Commission, International Red Cross, United Nations, USAID, etc., especially in the field of human rights, in countries from Europe, Latin America, Middle East, Africa, Australasia and Asia (Brazil, Iraq, Paraguay, Palestine, Nigeria, Moldova, Comoros, Mexico, Kazakhstan, Colombia, Peru, Kirgizstan, Indonesia, Morocco, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Libya, Tajikistan, Switzerland, Papua New Guinea, East-Timor, Greece, Jordan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Mexico, Macedonia, Ivory Coast, Poland, Palestine, Italy, Ukraine, Kenya, Argentina, Mauritania, Egypt, Mali, Ghana, Tunisia, Argentina, Tajikistan, Mauritania, Maldives, Turkey, Armenia, Georgia, Bahrain, Mozambique, Philippines, Serbia, etc.), and intervene as expert witness in legal proceedings, in countries from the European, American, African and Asian continents. Some of his main fields of work and research are personal injury assessment, the investigation and documentation of torture and ill-treatment, monitoring detention facilities, gender based violence and forensic services and forensic systems organization.

Prof. Athanassios Fokas has a BSc in Aeronautics from Imperial College (1975), a PhD in Applied Mathematics from the California Institute of Technology (1979), and an MD from the University of Miami (1986). In 1996 he was appointed to a Chair in Applied Mathematics at Imperial College. In 2002 he was appointed to the newly inaugurated Chair in Nonlinear Mathematical Science at the University of Cambridge. In 2000, on the occasion of the millennium, he was awarded the Naylor Prize, which is the most prestigious prize in Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics in UK (the last recipient before Fokas was Stephen Hawking). Other distinctions include, the Aristeion Prize in Sciences of the Academy of Athens, the Excellence Prize of the Bodossaki Foundation, and a Guggenheim Fellowship (on the basis “of stellar achievement”). He is a member of various Academies and prestigious Institutions, including a full membership of the Academy of Athens (he is the sixth mathematician to be elected – the first was Caratheodory - and the first ever applied mathematician), a membership of the European Academy of Sciences, a Fellowship at Clare Hall, Cambridge, and a Fellowship of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering. In 2010 he was appointed Ambassador of Hellenism, and in 2012 he was appointed Onassis Senior Visiting Scholar at the University of Harvard. He has been awarded honorary degrees from eight universities and has been decorated with the Commander of the Order of Phoenix by the President of the Hellenic Republic. He is the author or co-author of five monographs and of more than 350 papers, as well as the co-editor of eight books. He has been included in the list of the most highly cited researchers in the ISI Web of sciences. He has published in different areas of science, ranging from abstract areas of mathematics, to applied areas such as models of chronic myelogenous leukaemia, protein folding, and mathematical models for Covid-19. He has introduced the transformative 'Fokas method' for solving partial differential equations and has played a pivotal role in the solution of several mathematical problems arising in medical imaging.

Sherri Kraham Talabany is the President and Executive Director of the Kurdistan-based SEED Foundation and U.S.-based 501(c)3 organization, SEED for Change, non-profit development organizations that promote social, educational, and economic development in Kurdistan, Iraq. SEED’s mission is to support survivors of violence and those at risk through comprehensive mental health, case management, and protection services; training and capacity building for of those serving the most vulnerable; strengthening laws, policies and practices through technical assistance and advocacy, and combating human trafficking. Prior to establishing SEED, Sherri worked in the United States Government in Washington, D.C. from 1998 – 2012. She served in the US Department of State and the Millennium Challenge Corporation working on foreign policy and foreign assistance and international development programs including humanitarian, human rights, security, economic, social, and governance programs. Her work on Iraq started in 1998 and she later served in Baghdad in 2003. Sherri is an American lawyer who earned her Juris Doctorate in 1999 from George Mason University School of Law. She currently resides in Erbil, Iraqi Kurdistan with her husband and two children. She has been involved in volunteer activities, served on non-profit boards, advisory committees, and is a frequent advocate and public speaker on behalf of the poor and underserved, including vulnerable minorities, displaced people, human trafficking victims. She was recognized by multiple awards from several U.S. Secretaries of State and awarded DevEx’s ‘Top 40 Under 40’ Leaders in International Development.

Dr. Afzal Javed is a Consultant Psychiatrist & is an Honorary Associate Clinical Professor at Warwick Medical School, University of Warwick UK. He also holds the honorary position of Chairman Pakistan Psychiatric Research Centre, Fountain House, Lahore (Pakistan).

He graduated from King Edward Medical College Lahore, Pakistan and received higher specialised training in Psychiatry from Pakistan and UK (from Royal Edinburgh Hospital, University of Edinburgh and Institute of Psychiatry & Maudsley Hospital London).

He has served the UK Royal College of Psychiatrists as Deputy / Associate Registrar, member Board of International Affairs of the College, Chairman of West Midlands Division of the College & one of the lead College office bearers for SAS doctors & Patients & Carers groups. He was also elected as executive committee member of the College Faculty of Rehabilitation and Social Psychiatry & represents the faculty at Education and Training Committee of the College.

His role in international psychiatry is highlighted by his involvement with several professional organisations.

• President Elect World Psychiatric Association (WPA)
• Immediate Past President Asian Federation of Psychiatric Associations (AFPA)
• Immediate Past President World Association for Psychosocial Rehabilitation (WAPR)
• Immediate Past Executive Secretary for Scientific Sections World Psychiatric Association (WPA)
• Advisor & Founder Secretary General of South Asian Forum on Mental Health & Psychiatry (SAF)
• Advisor SAARC Psychiatric Federation (SPF)
• Founding Secretary General Asian Federation of Psychiatric Associations (AFPA)
• Immediate Past Co Chairman / Founder office Bearers WPA Section on Psychiatry in Developing Countries
• Chairman Pakistan Psychiatric Research Centre, Fountain House, Lahore, Pakistan

His areas of special interest are Psychosocial Rehabilitation, Social and Transcultural Psychiatry and Psychiatric Research. His academic skills have been invaluable when publishing more than 140 scientific papers and being author of six books/monographs on different topics of psychiatry. He is currently involved in several projects on Schizophrenia and different clinical aspects of long-term management of chronic mentally ill in the community.