Staff & Advisory Board member Biographies
Global Strategy Forum is run by a small team. They are:
Johan Eliasch
President of Global Strategy Forum
Johan Eliasch is the first President of Global Strategy Forum. Born in Sweden but now based in the United Kingdom, Johan is Chairman and CEO of Head, the global sporting goods group and ECJ Holdings, a diversified private investment group. He is a board member of the Centre for Social Justice, a member of the Advisory Boards of Brasilinvest, Societe du Louvre and the British Olympic Association, Chairman of Starr Underwriting Agents, Co-Chairman of Cool Earth and a Patron of Stockholm University. He was part of the shadow foreign office team as special advisor on European affairs (1999 - 2003) and responsible for foreign relations (2003 - 2005). He was Conservative deputy party treasurer (2003 - 2007). Johan was appointed the Prime Minister's Special Representative on Deforestation and Clean Energy in September 2007.
Michael Ancram QC MP
Chairman - Global Strategy Forum
Michael Ancram is the first Chairman of the Forum. Michael Ancram served in the last Conservative Government and from 2001 to 2005 held the portfolios of Deputy Leader, Shadow Foreign Secretary and Shadow Defence Secretary. He currently serves on the House of Commons Intelligence Select Committee. For a full Biography please see Michael's website at: www.michaelancram.com
Jacqueline Jinks
Director, Global Strategy Forum
Jacqueline Jinks is the second Director of Global Strategy Forum. She joined Global Strategy Forum as Research Director in June 2006. From 1997-2005, she was Political Secretary and speechwriter to Lord Moynihan, a former Conservative Senior Spokesman on Foreign Affairs in the House of Lords. She has also worked for the Rt. Hon Michael Howard QC MP and the Rt. Hon Francis Maude MP, during their respective tenures as Shadow Foreign Secretary. She has worked in the US, most notably for the Democratic National Committee during the 1996 US Presidential Election campaign.
Sir Menzies ('Ming') Campbell CBE QC MP
Advisory Board member
Ming Campbell is one of the most respected and successful politicians of his generation. He grew up in Glasgow, was educated at Hillhead High School and went on to the University of Glasgow. As a successful university level athlete Ming ran the 200m for the GB team at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and become captain of the UK Athletics Team 1965-66. He held the British 100m record from 1967 to 1974. In his professional legal life Ming was called to the Scottish Bar as an Advocate in 1968, but continued an association with the Scottish Liberal Party which he had held since University. In 1975 he became Chairman of the Scottish Liberal Party, and in 1982 a QC. Ming won the constituency of North East Fife with a majority of 1,447. Since then Ming and the local team have achieved a Liberal Democrat majority of more than 12,500 as his local, national and international profile has grown. In Parliament he has served primarily as a defence and foreign affairs spokesman, becoming Shadow Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs since 1997 and Deputy Leader of the Liberal Democrats in 2003. He served as Leader of the Liberal Democrats since from 2006-2007.
Rt Hon Frank Field MP
Advisory Board Member
From 1969-79, Frank Field worked as Director of the Child Poverty Action Group, during which time it became one of the premier pressure groups in the country. In 1974 he also became Director of the Low Pay Unit until 1980. In 1979, he was elected Member of Parliament for Birkenhead. Between 1980 and 1981 he served as Shadow Education and Social Security spokesman under the leadership of Michael Foot. In 1990 he took up the chairmanship of the Social Security Select Committee and continued in this role up to 1997. From 1997-1998 he accepted the position of Minister for Welfare Reform in Tony Blairs first cabinet. Since then, he has served as a member of the Public Accounts Committee between 2002 and 2005. Outside of Parliament, he is equally busy and committed. In 1999 he helped set up the Pension Reform Group which he chairs. The group has acted as an important independent think tank for the cause of a long-term, investment led reform to the pension system. Since 2001 he has also chaired the Church Conservation Trust and has helped develop the trust from being one primarily concerned with conserving the best architectural gems of the Church to one which tries to open up such places for alternative use. From 2005, he has also been chairman of the Cathedral Fabrics Commission which is the planning authority for English cathedrals.
HRH Prince El Hassan bin Talal
Advisory Board member
HRH Prince El Hassan bin Talal has been at the centre of Middle East Politics and diplomacy for many decades in the course of which he has won exceptional respect. He is concerned inter alia with humanitarian and interfaith issues and the human dimension of conflicts. This is exemplified by his work with Partners in Humanity and his co-chairing of the Independent Commission on International Humanitarian Issues. Amongst the well-nigh innumerable positions of HRH Prince Hassan of Jordan, he is President and Patron of the Arab Thought Forum and Moderator of the World Conference of Religion and Peace. His Royal Highness is a founder of the recently formed Parliament of Cultures, dedicated to fostering dialogue amongst philosophers, thinkers and those exercising power. HRH Prince Hassan is the author of seven books, which have been translated into several languages, including A Study on Jerusalem, Search for Peace, Palestinian Self-Determination and in 2004 in collaboration with Alain Elkann, To be a Muslim: Islam, Peace and Democracy.
Gerard Griffin
Advisory Board member
Gerard Griffin runs Tisbury Capital Management, a fund management company he founded in 2003. Previously he was a Managing Director at Citadel Investment Group (Europe) Ltd. He received a joint B.A. and M.A. in Political Science from Yale in 1990, and a J.D. from Yale Law School in 1996.
Hüseyin Gün
Advisory Board member
Principal Investor & Managing Director of Avicenna Capital, a privately held direct investment vehicle that invests in strategic sectors such as banking, insurance, oil & gas, mining and with particular focus in emerging and frontier markets. Mr. Gun is British educated and has an Honours Degree in Genetics. He began his career as a commodity trader and thereafter as a banker in Merrill Lynch and Credit Agricole Indosuez. He is a member of International Institute for Strategic Studies, London. Mr. Gun is the former Chairman of the Advisory Board of Global Fairness Initiative (GFI) in Washington DC, where the 42nd US President Bill Clinton acted as Chairman of the Board of Directors. Mr. Gun is also the Founder Board Member of The Iraq Britain Business Council (www.webuildiraq.org). Avicenna Capital is considered to be one of the key principal investors in the Republic of Iraq.
Jonathan J Lehrle
Advisor to the Forum
Jonathan was the first Director of the Global Strategy Forum from May 2006-February 2008. Born in Britain Jonathan spent the first eighteen years of his life in Southern Africa. Upon his return to the United Kingdom he joined the Metropolitan Police, based in West London. In 1994 he went to University to read Latin American Studies, which involved living in Mexico for a year. He also studied for an MA in European Law in the Netherlands. His route into politics was through the Parliamentary Resources Unit (PRU), where he worked for two years covering the International Affairs & Defence portfolio. In 2001 he was appointed Chief of Staff to the Shadow Foreign Secretary and Deputy Leader, Michael Ancram QC MP, a position he held until December 2005. He is now a Consultant at Bell Pottinger Sans Frontieres.
Baroness Neville-Jones of Hutton Roof
Advisory Board member
Dame Pauline Neville Jones Chairs the Conservative Party Group on National and International Security, and the Information Assurance Advisory Council. She is a former BBC Governor, QinetiQ Group Chair, NatWest Markets Managing Director, Foreign Affairs advisor to Prime Minister John Major; Chair of the Joint Committee in Whitehall, Foreign and Commonwealth Office Political Director and leader of the British Dayton Peace Conference Delegation on Bosnia. In July 2007 Dame Pauline was appointed Shadow Security Minister and National Security Adviser to the Leader of the Opposition
Lord Lamont of Lerwick
Advisory Board member
Lord Lamont (Norman Lamont) was at the centre of British politics for many years. He was a Cabinet Minister under both Margaret Thatcher and John Major, and was a member of the House of Commons for twenty-five years. He was heavily involved in the Thatcher reforms including privatisation that transformed the British economy. He was a Minister also in the Departments of Energy, Defence and Industry. Currently Lord Lamont, as well as being a working Peer, is a director of and a consultant to a number of companies in the financial sector. He is a director of RAB Capital (hedge fund company), Scottish Re (a re-investment company quoted on the New York Stock Exchange), Balli plc ( commodities trading house), and he is an advisor to Rotch property. He is also Chairman of the East European Food Fund and a director of a number of investment funds. He was made a Life Peer in July 1998, and sits on the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee.
Sir Malcolm Rifkind MP
Advisory Board member
Since 2005 Sir Malcolm has been the Conservative Member of Parliament for Kensington and Chelsea. In 1974 he was elected as MP for Pentlands and represented that constituency until 1997. In 1979, when the Conservatives were returned to power under Margaret Thatcher, he was appointed a Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, at first in the Scottish Office and then, at the time of the Falklands War, he was transferred to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, being promoted to Minister of State in 1983. He became a member of the Cabinet in 1986 as Secretary of State for Scotland. He was also Minister of Transport until 1992 when he was appointed Secretary of State for Defence. From 1995-97 he was Foreign Secretary. He was one of only four ministers to serve throughout the whole Prime Ministerships of both Margaret Thatcher and John Major. Since December 2005 he has chosen to sit on the backbenches, from where he can focus on international matters.
