Fionna Smyth

In her teen years, she joined PRISM as part of a quest for peacebuilding. She has a Masters in Comparative Ethnic Conflict and a Post Graduate Diploma in International Human Rights Law.

From 2004, she has worked as the Campaigns and Media Officer at Amnesty International in Northern Ireland. For the last 15 years,  she has worked across Amnesty, Oxfam, the UN and Christian Aid.

From 2011 to 2015 at Oxfam,  she was responsible for leading the Middle East  policy and advocacy team  during the time of the Arab Spring focusing specifically on Yemen, Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory and led the Oxfam Advocacy response to the Syria Crisis. She has since worked very closely with Yemeni Women activists and CSOs,  Colombian Women HRDS, Women Lawyers in CAR calling for Women’s representation in the transitional Council,  as well as women leaders in Sudan as part of the transition period, facilitating Ala Salah to address the UN security council.

Last year while at Oxfam, she managed the development and launch of the IMatter campaign, a campaign which worked with women in crisis contexts to gain a seat at the table in peace talks, as part of this campaign.  One of the tactics of this campaign was to use art, poetry and drama.

She also commissioned and co-authored a paper with renowned women peace and Security experts, on how to transform power and put women at the heart of the Women peace and Security agenda.

She currently leads the Global Policy and Advocacy team at Christian Aid.