Year: 2021

Edit Inotai is a Senior Fellow at the Centre for Euro-Atlantic Integration and Democracy, Journalist at ARD and Balkan Insight.

She is a journalist based in Budapest with a background in foreign and European affairs. Currently, she mainly works for German public television ARD and for the English-language new website Balkan Insight. Previously, she used to work as a Foreign Editor of Népszabadság (2010-2014) and as a correspondent in Berlin (2003-2007). She holds a PhD in International Relations, and an MA in English and Spanish literature.

Dr. Peter Kurz, born in 1962, has been the mayor of Mannheim, Germany since 2007. As mayor, he holds numerous positions in municipal subsidiaries and various honorary posts in European and international committees.

Mayor Kurz studied law and completed his legal clerkship in Mannheim, Speyer, Heidelberg, and San Diego (USA). His political career began during his studies. He became a member of the district advisory council and worked as an assistant to a member of the state parliament. He then became a member of the Mannheim City Council and various supervisory boards, deputy district chairman of the SPD, chairman of the SPD City Council Faction and member of the SPD executive board in Baden-Württemberg.

Previously, he worked in a law firm, as a researcher at the University of Mannheim and as a judge at the Administrative Court of Karlsruhe. From 1999 to 2007, Peter Kurz served as Mannheim’s Deputy Mayor for Education, Culture, Sports, and City Marketing.

From April 2018 to January 2020, Dr. Kurz, represented the German Association of Cities and Towns at the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) and since January of 2020 he has actively continued his work as substitute member.

At the European level, Dr. Kurz has also been a deputy member of the Main Committee of the German Section of the Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR) since 2010. He is also active with United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG), where he is one of five German local representatives in the World Council and one of two German mayors in the Executive Bureau. Dr. Kurz was one of the founding members of the Global Parliament of Mayors (GPM) in 2016. He held the position of vice chair of the GPM until he was appointed chair of the organization in November 2019.

Since October 2013, Dr. Fabian Zuleeg is Chief Executive of the European Policy Centre, with overall responsibility, including providing strategic direction, managing its staff and resources and representing the EPC. He remains Chief Economist at the same time (a post he has held since January 2010). Fabian holds a PhD on the political economy of EU accession from Edinburgh University. Before coming to the EPC he has worked as an economic analyst in academia, the public and the private sector.