Speakers: The Private sector turn: private equity, financial intermediaries and what they mean for d

Besedova, Isabella

Isabella works with CEE Bankwatch on its campaign monitoring the lending activities of the European Investment Bank. She has had a long standing association with the non government sector and in addition to her work with Friends of the Earth Czech Republic and CEE Bankwatch, she has also been an active volunteer for a number of organisations including the Australian and Czech Red Cross, Amnesty International and the Forum 2000 Foundation. Previously, Isabella worked in banking, specifically focusing on relationship management and lending, holding positions across a variety of divisions. Her last role was as Relationship Manager, Corporate Banking, where she was responsible for a portfolio of business and corporate clients in the SME segment.

Brooks, Richard

Richard Brooks writes for Private Eye and has also written for Accountancy Age. He won the Paul Foot award in 2008 for exposing privatisation scandals at the Commonwealth Development Corporation. He is a former tax inspector

Christensen, John

John Christensen, director of the Tax Justice Network, is a development economist and former economic adviser to the UK and Jersey governments. He has researched tax havens and tax avoidance for many years and is co-author of A Game As Old As Empire: The Secret World of Economic Hit Men and the Web of Global Corruption.

Crutcher, John

John Crutcher is an attorney who has practiced in New York, San Francisco, Hong Kong and Silicon Valley where he specialised in private equity mergers and acquisiitions and fund formation as well as FDI and transnational investments/privatisations. His clients/transaction-participants have included JPMorgan Partners, Apollo Management, Softbank, KKR, and Shanda. John also has experience with assisting Antigua and Barbuda in it’s anti-money laundering and offshore sector improvement efforts.

Fried, Stephanie

Stephanie Fried is the executive director of the ‘Ulu Foundation. She analyses international finance and works to promote protection of the environment and human rights. Twice a Fulbright Scholar, fluent in Indonesian and French, she supports the efforts of indigenous communities to protect traditional territories and natural resources. She played a key role in the establishment of the largest marine protected area on earth, the 84 million acre Northwestern Hawaiian Islands Monument.

Hildyard, Nick

Nick is a founding member of the influential NGO the Corner House, where he has been important in unpicking the implications of financialisation and securitisation in the global economy. A former editor of The Ecologist, which he left for political reasons, Nick has also worked extensively on export credit agencies, leading to improved public accountability for the UK’s Export Credit Guarantees Department, as well as numerous grassroots campaigns with people in developing counties affected by large Western-sponsored infrastructure projects.

Lustgarten, Anders

Anders focuses on the European Investment Bank’s investments outside the EU as part of the European coalition Counter Balance. As well as the financialisation of development, he is working on the evolving EU ‘energy grab’: the large-scale transfer of energy resources to the EU from poor countries via massive new infrastructure projects, which is the subject of his recent report “Conrad’s Nightmare”.

Molina, Núria

Núria joined Eurodad in July 2006 as Policy and Advocacy Officer working on aid and poverty issues. On November 2009 she became Director. Before joining Eurodad, Núria worked as Policy and Development Officer at the European Anti-Poverty Network – EAPN. She has also been Executive Officer at the Ubuntu Network in Barcelona for four years. Other jobs have included consultancy for the World Federalist Movement and the UN Financing for Development Office in New York and lecturing at the Communications faculty of the Fairleigh Dickinson University in Barcelona.

Oloko, Dotun

Dotun is an independent researcher who has played the central role in unearthing the Emerging Capital Partners (ECP) scandal which highlighted the high level corruption associated with investee companies of Development Finance Institutions (DFIs) in Nigeria and the dangers of self regulating private equity funds activities in developing countries.

Tricario, Antonio

Antonio is the current Coordinator of Campagna per la riforma della Banca mondiale (CRBM) – an NGO campaigning for the democratisation and reform of IFIs. He has since 1999 been their lead campaigner on Export Credit Agencies reform. Antonio has co-authored several publications on IFI related issues, including the book “E Noi Italiani?” on the Italian involvement in the controversial Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline project in the Caspian region and the recent book “La Banca dei ricchi” on World Bank related issues. Antonio is the chair of the board of the European NGO network on debt and development, Eurodad, and chair of the steering committee of the Counter Balance coalition, and senior advisor on policy, advocacy and campaigns for the Italian development NGO Mani Tese.

el-Shahat, Samah

Samah is the presenter of the award winning current affairs programme People and Power on al-Jazeera English. Samah is also the channel’s economic analyst and presenter of its business and economics programme Counting the Cost. Samah is a development economist who has advised a number of governments as well as multilateral organizations on economic policy.

Watt, Andrew

Andrew is a senior researcher at the European Trade Union Institute in Brussels, where his research interests include economic and employment policy. Recent publications include ‘EU labour migration since enlargement: Trends, impacts and policies’ and ‘Financial capitalism and private equity – a new regime?’ (both 2009)