ECMI Staff

Prof. Dr. Tove Hansen Malloy (Denmark)
Director

Dr. Malloy is a political theorist by background specializing in the political and legal aspects of national and ethnic minority rights in international law and international relations, especially in the European context. Her areas of expertise cover the major international organizations, the European Union as well as individual countries. In addition to being Director at ECMI, Dr. Malloy heads up ECMI’s research cluster Citizenship and Ethics. Her current research interests include minority citizenship, agonistic democracy, ethno-ecologism, minority indicators, and inter-sectional discrimination. Dr. Malloy has been called upon for expert advisory opinions by local and national governments, the Council of Europe, the OSCE and the European Commission. Her research has been funded by the European Commission, governments and private foundations. Dr. Malloy has taught at the EU's Master Programme in Human Rights and Democratisation in Venice, Italy, the Master in European Integration and Regionalism in Bolzano and the University of Bologna's European Master in Peace-making and Peace-building. She currently teaches political theory in the European Studies programme at the University of Southern Denmark. Before assuming her duties as Director of ECMI, Dr. Malloy was Senior Researcher and Consortium Director at the European Academy, Bolzano/Bozen, South Tyrol. In addition to her academic career, Dr. Malloy has served in the Danish Foreign Service in numerous positions and represented the Danish Government in international fora on post-conflict resolution for Rwanda and Bosnia, transition and development for Albania as well as on indigenous affairs issues. Dr. Malloy holds a doctorate in Government from the University of Essex (UK) and an MA in Humanities and Social Sciences from the University of Southern Denmark.

Ewa Chylinski (Denmark)
Deputy Director

Ms. Ewa Chylinski is ECMI Deputy Director and has joined the team directly from the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights in Warsaw where she was a project coordinator for several years. She has an extensive background in management and development of academic and other projects and advisory experience in democratization and human rights promotion and protection programmes. She also has an extensive research and field experience from the Caucasus, Eastern Europe and Central Asia as a human rights officer at the OSCE and as a former Assistant Professor and Researcher at the Institute of East-West Studies at the University of South Jutland, Denmark.

Email: Click here
Phone: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-23
Fax: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-19

Dr. Oleh Protsyk (Ukraine)
Senior Research Associate

Dr. Protsyk completed the PhD programme in political science at Rutgers University in 2000 with the thesis "Semi-Presidentialism: The Logic of Institutional Conflict and Its Implications for Public Administration Reform in Post-Communist Countries". Afterwards, he was a Policy Fellow at the Center for Policy Studies, Open Society Institute, Budapest. Later, he held Teacher/Fellow positions at the School of Slavonic and East European Studies at London University and at the Chair of Ukrainian Studies at University of Ottawa. At ECMI, he covers in particular the area of political institution design and conducts research on constitutional mechanisms of conflict resolution.

Email: Click here
Phone: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-11
Fax: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-69

PD Dr. Jan Asmussen (Germany)
Senior Research Associate

Privatdozent Dr. Asmussen is heading the Conflict & Security cluster at ECMI. He is a historian and political scientist with research focus on state-building, reconciliation, and political developments in Europe and the Middle East. He previously served as Head of Department of International Relations at Girne American University and as Asst. Professor at the Department of History, Eastern Mediterranean University, Famagusta, Northern Cyprus. After studying History, Political Science, Sociology and Economic History in Kiel and Copenhagen, he completed his PhD in History in Hamburg. In 2009 he gained his habilitation in Political Science at Kiel University with works on Anglo-American diplomacy during the Cold War and recent international state-building strategies. Dr. Asmussen’s work on minority issues includes topics of interethnic relations in Cyprus, Bosnia, Lebanon, and the German-Danish border region.

Email: Click here
Phone: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-61
Fax: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-69

William W. McKinney (USA)
Electronic Services Librarian

Mr. McKinney has been a member of the ECMI staff since May 1997. He has worked in college and university libraries in the United States and in hospital libraries in Germany. His special interests are library automation, document delivery and cooperative collection development. His degrees include a B.A. in History and Political Science from Indiana University, an M.A. in European History from the University of Hamburg, and an M.A.L.S. from Rosary College.

Email: Click here
Phone: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-70
Fax: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-69

Maj-Britt Risbjerg Hansen (Denmark)
Project Coordinator

Maj-Britt Risbjerg Hansen graduated from the Southern Denmark School of Business and Engineering, Sonderburg.
Prior to ECMI tenure, she worked as a trilingual commercial correspondent and other positions in several countries including Switzerland and the United States. Her main tasks at the ECMI are to assist the academic staff in organizing international conferences, research meetings and seminars. She coordinates ECMI public events and provides support to senior management in funding matters, relations with European governments, international organizations, NGOs and other key actors’ involved in minority issues.
Maj-Britt Risbjerg Hansen also manages the ECMI Internship Programme, which enables to bring up to 20 master and Ph.D. students from number of countries in Europe and America per year to advance their knowledge and experience in minority related issues in an international research institution.

Email: Click here
Phone: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-15
Fax: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-19

Gisa Marehn (Germany)
Executive assistant to the senior management

Gisa Marehn holds a M.A. degree in Northern European Studies, Cultural Studies and Geography from the Humboldt University Berlin, with research focus on questions of linguistic discrimination by adolescents in Iceland. She has worked in a variety of fields, e.g. as language secretary at the Icelandic and the German embassies in both countries.
At ECMI, Gisa Marehn’s main tasks are such as organizing diaries, travels, conferences and meetings as well as international and regional correspondence.

Email: Click here
Phone: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-12
Fax: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-19

Bernd F. Dummer (Germany)
Senior Financial Officer

Bernd F. Dummer is ECMI’s Chief Financial Officer and holds a 4-year degree in Business Administration (Flensburg University of Applied Science) with additional education in international accounting and taxes. He combines experience in financial reporting and monthly/annual accounts with a strong background in cost accounting and budgeting. As Head of Finance he serves as the ECMI contact for all financial matters for headquarters and field offices, as well as for auditors, banks and other institutions.

Email: Click here
Phone: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-21

Annette Seesemann (Germany)
Financial Accountant

Annette Seesemann has a Diploma from the secondary Gauß school in Braunschweig. Her working experience within both medium-sized and international public companies has covered both financial and payroll accounting. She also attended a Certified Management Accountant course at the DAA Flensburg. As ECMI’s Financial Assistant she also prepares all financial transactions, accounts and monthly payrolls for headquarters.

Email: Click here
Phone: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-13

George Hill (England)
Project assistant

George Hill is a recent graduate from Coventry University, England with an International Relations and Politics BA Honours degree.

Since arriving at the centre in Flensburg, his main tasks have been to update, research and format data relating to the Bosnia and Herzegovinian entry for the Ethnopolitical map, as well as the Abkhazian and Kosovar entries, all under the supervision of William McKinney. And has also conducted research in Minority investment, laws and cross border provisions.
After an Internship at ECMI he is working as Project assistant at ECMI headquarters and now fulfills such roles. Current project tasks have to support Ewa Chylinski with research on the EU Accession of candidate and applicant countries.

Email: Click here
Phone: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-51
Fax: +49 (0)4 61 14 14 9-19

Michael Mattea (Germany)
Janitor

Michael Mattea is our janitor, who keeps everything sparkling clean and offers a helping hand wherever it is needed. He lives very close by the Institute and keeps an eye on everything, also on weekends. He has two sons and a sweet little dog named Laila.

Tamara Jovanovic (Sweden)
Pre-proposal Fellow

Tamara Jovanovic holds a B.A. in International Relations from University of Malta and an M.A. degree in Euroculture from Uppsala University, with main research focus on minority issues in a European context in reflection to the process of Europeanization.
She has worked with congress organizing in Sweden, assisting primarily to the management of scientific programmes for varied congresses. Her main research areas of interest are Europeanization, EU minority policy and cultural/linguistic aspects of national minorities. It is around this set of issues that Ms Jovanovic will specialize in an upcoming PHD in cooperation with the ECMI.

Antje Walther (Germany)
Pre-proposal Fellow

Antje Walther studied political sciences, English and psychology in Cologne; thesis on “The PDS as governing party in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania”. Master of Comparative Law (M.C.L.) in Mannheim and Adelaide (Australia); thesis on: “Legal requirements for Turkey’s accession to the EU”. Is working as an editorial journalist with “Flensburger Tageblatt” and online media nord GmbH. At ECMI she will be focusing on Minorities and the Media.

ECMI Regionally Based Staff

Tom Trier (Denmark)
Regional Representative for the Caucasus

With a background in social anthropology, he specialises in ethnonational and migration issues in Eastern Europe and the CIS, particularly in the Caucasus region. From 1997-99, he acted as ECMI Regional Representative for Ukraine, and after three years as Country Director for the Danish Refugee Council and the International Rescue Committee in Russia (covering especially Chechnya and Ingushetia) and a shorter deployment for UNHCR in Afghanistan, he returned to ECMI in late 2002 as Senior Research Associate and Head of Department for the Caucasus. In 2003, Tom Trier also acted as Head of Programmes supervising ECMI’s overall project portfolio, while in the second half of 2004 he acted as Deputy Director. As of January 2005, Tom Trier is deployed in Tbilisi as Regional Representative for the Caucasus.

Email: Click here
Contact Details

Adrian Zeqiri (Kosovo)
Office Representative
ECMI Kosovo, Prishtina

Before joining ECMI in Kosovo in 2002, Mr Zeqiri served at the OSCE Mission to Kosovo where he also completed an Academic Training Programme on Political Theories, Conflict Resolution and Project Management Skills.
Being fluent in Albanian and Serbian, Mr Zeqiri has had direct access to local civil society, identifying and implementing projects for the development of NGOs and civil society at large, organizing and developing youth groups and activities in the municipality, establishing and maintaining contacts with local and international NGOs to identify training and material needs as well as key players and potential projects. His contacts at both civil society level and in the Kosovo government structures at the highest level have allowed him to conduct many informal discussions on Kosovo’s status, generating a positive environment for the wide inclusion of various Kosovo minority communities in a constructive approach to the position of communities in the negotiation process.

Email: Click here
Contact Details

Regional Consultants

Magdalena Kuoneva (Bulgaria), Sofia, Bulgaria

She holds a Masters Degree in Law from Columbia University in New York and a Certificate for Achievement in International and Comparative Law from the Columbia University Parker School of Foreign and Comparative Law, as well as a Masters Degree in European Law from the European University Institute in Florence and a law degree from the Sofia University “Saint Kliment Ohridski”.
Ms Kouneva is a legal expert and country director for the ECMI in Bulgaria. She has strong experience in minority policy and implementation, institution-building, administrative reform. On behalf of ECMI, she developed collaboration with senior members of Bulgarian government, the Ombudsman, the Anti-Discrimination Commission, minority experts, and representatives of non-governmental organizations. She is a senior member of the ECMI team that developed the methodology for assessing implementation of the National Action Plans adopted in the framework of the Decade of Roma Inclusion and implemented a pilot project on methodology implementation in Bulgaria. Ms. Kouneva led the identification and assessment of European best practices and formulated specific proposals for improving opportunities for members of minorities and other vulnerable groups to gain employment in state administration and perform successfully in their positions in Bulgaria. She also oversaw implementation of a large legislative reform programme for USAID in Kosovo and Montenegro. For OSCE in Bosnia and Herzegovina, she coordinated administrative reform projects for the municipalities.