Speakers

Raffi Khatchadourian has been a staff writer at The New Yorker since 2008. He covers a wide range of topics, including science, art, politics, foreign affairs, and national security. His articles have been anthologized in “Best American Sports Writing” and in “Best American Nonrequired Reading.” On two occasions, Khatchadourian’s work was nominated for National Magazine Awards—once for his profile of an al-Qaeda propagandist, titled “Azzam the American,” and a second time in collaboration with a New Yorker multimedia team for “Secrets of Edgewood,” an investigation into Cold War psychochemical experiments. His work has also been short-listed for Overseas Press Club and James Beard Foundation awards and for the Livingston Award.

Rimvydas Valatka is a Lithuanian journalist and media manager with 44 years of professional experience. Currently, he is a columnist at the Lithuanian website delfi.lt. His career highlights include senior level media posts in Lithuania‘s independent media as a columnist, editor, manager, and talk-show host in a variety of formats (print, TV, online), as well as a media activist. He worked in Lithuania‘s media sector before and through its transitional period in the 1990s. In the last decade, Rimvydas served as a Council member of the National Broadcaster during its transition in becoming a public service broadcaster in line with European standards. He was awarded the Order of the Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas Presidential Award in 2000 for his service in the development of independent press in Lithuania.

Anneke Hudalla is a project manager at the Berlin based NGO n-ost – a network of European journalists. During her studies of political sciences, she specialized on the political transformation of post-communist countries – before she started working as a journalist for the Czech weekly Respekt. Later, she acted as an assistant to several MPs on the national and the European level, before she joined n-ost as a project manager of Online Journalism, in-depth. The project aims at creating three journalistic networks along the topics of health, climate change and information society.

Giulietta Palumbo is the content editor and editorial production manager at Magnum Photos. After studying photography and anthropology in Italy, she joined Magnum Photos in Paris in 2013, where she started working in the Digital Department on image post-production, archive management and image distribution. She is now coordinating the Editorial Productions of Magnum Photos, assisting photographers and liaising with major clients and publishers as a Content Editor.

Howard Amos is the editor-in-chief of The Moscow Times. A journalist who has lived in Russia for almost a decade, his writing has been featured in publications including The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, Newsweek, The Associated Press, Foreign Policy, and The New Republic.

Liana Sayadyan is the (deputy) editor of Hetq and lectures at the Faculty of Journalism at Yerevan State University. In 1999 she earned a degree in journalism from Yerevan State University and in 2001 she graduated from Armenia’s Public Administration Academy, majoring in political science. After briefly working in the government, she decided to return to journalism. Liana has been with Hetq since 2001, first as a reporter and since 2005 as the deputy editor.

Gegham Vardanyan has more than 20 years experience in journalism, production and media training. He is the editor of the Armenian media news and analysis website Media.am by Media Initiatives Center. Previously, he was a reporter for A1+ TV station. Gegham teaches online content production and data journalism in Armenian universities. He was a producer with Al Jazeera English during the 2020 Artsakh War.

Davit Baghdasaryan is the CEO & Co-Founder of Krisp. Krisp provides voice, video and speech AI technologies to thousands of organizations, helping them have more effective online meetings—regardless of where their employees work. Co-Founded in 2017 by ex-Twilio leader Davit, the company has been recognized as an industry leader, named one of the Time 100 “Best Inventions of 2020” in the Artificial Intelligence category and one of “America’s Most Promising Artificial Intelligence Companies” by Forbes. 

Davit is also a founding partner at BigStory VC, a venture capital firm investing in exceptional Armenian founders.

Shoghakat Mlke-Galstyan is an actress, dancer and art manager. Her passion is the contemporary performing arts. She is the founder and soloist of Mihr Theater, manager of Tiezerk Band and lecturer at the Yerevan State Institute of Theater and Cinematography. She was the executive director of the HIGH FEST International Performing Arts Festival. She has developed projects in the U.S., Germany, France, Cyprus, Georgia, Turkey, Russia, Armenia and other countries. In 2016, she received the honorary Gold Medal from Armenia’s Ministry of Culture. In 2017 she graduated from the Arts and International Cooperation at the Zurich University of Arts. She is also the event and communication coordinator of the KATAPULT AGBU Creative Accelerator Program.

Vaghinak Ghazaryan is an award-winning photojournalist based in Yerevan. He graduated from the Academy of TV and Radio, Department of Film and Photography and later from Art Criticism and Curatorial Training School, AICA Armenia. He participated in the Reuter News Agency’s Photojournalism: Experience Change in Tbilisi, Georgia. In 2021, Vaghinak won 3rd prize in the World Press Photo Contest in the Contemporary Issues, Singles category for the photo “Resting Soldier.” He also won 3rd place in the LensCulture HOME 21 Photography prize for the same photo. That same year, he was also a finalist of Blurring the Lines 2021 Edition, the “The Voice of War” project. Currently Vaghinak collaborates with 4plus Documentary Photography Center.