Child-Friendly Accountability and SDG Target 16.2: Launch Event Speaker Bios

Dr. Nicholas Alipui

Dr. Nicholas Alipui has more than 30 years’ experience in strategic leadership, intergovernmental negotiations, child rights advocacy, and programming in diverse country and regional settings. He has extensive experience in disaster/post-disaster, conflict and post-conflict analysis for prevention, reintegration, protection, and inter-agency activities.

In addition to substantial field experience with UNICEF working on complex emergencies in the Philippines, Kenya, Somalia, and Angola, Dr. Alipui worked at the agency’s headquarters in New York as Director and Senior Adviser Post-2015 Development Agenda and Director of Programmes.

He has served on the boards of GAVI, GAIN, and USI, among others.

Susan Bissell

Susan Bissell is Director of the Global Partnership to End Violence Against Children. The primary purpose of the partnership is to “end abuse, exploitation, trafficking and all forms of violence against and torture of children.”

She spent over 25 years working in various capacities for UNICEF, including, from 2009 to 2015, as Chief of Child Protection in UNICEF’s Program Division. She earned a PhD in public health and medical anthropology from the University of Melbourne in Australia. While completing her doctorate, she joined Trudie Styler and the Bangladeshi film team Catherine and Tareque Masud to produce the documentary “A Kind of Childhood,” which has won awards and been screened widely.

Meg Gardinier

Meg Gardinier is an international, not-for-profit advocate specializing in women’s and children’s issues.

Since July 2015 she has been Secretary General of ChildFund Alliance, a global network of child development organizations working in more than 60 countries. Previous positions include Senior Coordinator for the Elevate Children Funders Group; Director of Arigatou International; New York Managing Director of the U.S. Fund for UNICEF; and Executive Director of the International Catholic Child Bureau, U.S.

Ms. Gardinier is a founding member and Volunteer Chair of the Campaign for U.S. Ratification of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. She is a board member of End Child Prostitution and Trafficking.

 Mina Jaf

Mina Jaf is the Founder and Director of Women Refugee Route (WRR), an NGO that focuses on women and girl refugees’ access to information on their rights and increases visibility and publicity through national and international advocacy.

Born in Kurdistan, she and her family were forced to flee to Denmark as refugees when she was 11 years old. In April 2016, she was awarded the Voices of Courage Award by the Women’s Refugee Commission in recognition of her work.

Ms. Jaf was a speaker at the multi-stakeholder hearing at the recent UN Summit on Refugees and Migrants.