About Us

Daniel Robinson

Chair of The Board

Daniel is a barrister with a broad practice encompassing crime, road traffic and regulatory work. He is predominantly based in the Crown Courts, where he both prosecutes and defends.

Before coming to the Bar, Daniel worked for NGOs in the UK, Rwanda and Jamaica. His work encompassed genocide and war crimes, crimes against humanity and human rights in which he retains a strong interest. Daniel spent seven months working for the Council for Human Rights based in Kingston, Jamaica, and has advised defendants on Death Row as to their prospects of appeal to the Privy Council. He is experienced in representing defendants with mental health issues, addiction problems and vulnerabilities.

Abdulkarim Ekzayez

Trustee

Abdulkarim is a medical doctor and an epidemiologist from Syria. In 2013, Abdulkarim was training to be a neurosurgeon when his residency was interrupted by the war. He then worked in field hospitals in Aleppo and Idlib before joining Save The Children, where he led the health response in North West Syria until 2017. He is currently pursuing a PhD in health systems in war settings at King’s College London, in addition to his work as a research associate with the Conflict and Health Research Group at the same university. He is also an Associate fellow at Chatham House and serves on the board of two other organisations, Shafak, and Eyes to the Future.

Afsana Safa

Trustee

Afsana is a London-based General Practitioner (Family Physician) with first-hand experience of the European refugee crisis. Amna first met Afsana in 2016, when she travelled to Greece with the Syrian American Medical Society to set up and run medical clinics in refugee camps in the north of the country. She has also volunteered in Bangladesh with Rohingya refugees. Afsana’s other NHS roles include Clinical Cancer lead for North West London and Governing Body board member for Central London CCG.

Kate Adams

Trustee

Kate Adams is a high-level expert in child rights policy and advocacy with over 15 years of experience and the Founding Director of ‘The Y Syndicate’.

As former Special Representative to the UK at the Global Partnership for Education (GPE), she led efforts that secured a £430 million UK pledge and raised a record $4 billion through the G7 and Global Education Summit. In her role as Senior G7 Strategy Lead, Kate ensured five years of G7 education commitments and co-founded GPE’s youth program. She also launched an Education and Climate Change declaration at COP28, endorsed by 40 countries.

Kate has advised leaders like former Australian PM Julia Gillard and sits on the Global Council for STiR Education. She played a key role in expanding the Preventing Sexual Violence Initiative to include marginalized groups, influenced UK policy against overseas orphanages, and developed NATO’s strategy for Children Affected by Armed Conflict.

Niloufer Memon

Trustee

Niloufer Memon is a Partner with The Bridgespan Group, a non-profit advisory firm that provides decision making support to philanthropists and non-profits across the world. Niloufer has over 15 years of experience in strategy consulting having advised organizations in India, the United States, Africa, UK, and Southeast Asia across several issue areas, including in education, sustainability, and healthcare. She has expertise in strategy development, systems change, capacity building and operating model design. Her clients include CAMFED, WHO, Omidyar Network, Landesa, Mothers2Mothers, and National Geographic Society. Niloufer is deeply passionate about serving organizations that are working to drive intersectional gender equity in the world. She serves as an advisor in residence to Led By foundation – the only nonprofit that provides mentorship to Muslim women in India with a vision to increase representation in the private sector- and to Step-By-Step, a women founded nonprofit helping rural artisans navigate an increasing online sales ecosystem.

Prior to joining Bridgespan, Niloufer worked at Dalberg Global Development Advisors where she was primarily focused on a multi-stakeholder engagement designed to accelerate digital payments in India for financial inclusion. She has also advised the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and other corporates in the healthcare and pharmaceutical space.

Niloufer holds a master’s degree in Pharmaceutical Sciences from BITS-Pilani in India. She lives in New York, and she speaks English, Urdu and Hindi.

Najwa Al Abdallah

CEO

Najwa is the CEO of Amna, and has held executive and non-executive positions.

She has 23 years of senior leadership experience in development and humanitarian organisations worldwide. She has overseen multiple aspects of these organisations, including strategy, finance, people and culture, operations, risk management, compliance, and fundraising.

Currently, Najwa serves as a board member of the International Rescue Committee UK, where she also holds the positions of Vice Chair of the Audit and Governance committee and member of the Safeguarding committee.

Additionally, she is a board member of Medical Aid for Palestinians, where she contributes as a member of the Finance and Operations Committee. Her recent role before joining Amna was Director of Corporate Services at Money Advise Trust in London, UK.

Growing up in a small village in Lebanon in poverty during the civil war built her resilience and determination to work in international development.

Natalia Kyrkopoulou

Director of Operations

As Director of Operations and co-founder of Amna Greece, Natalia is Amna’s chief representative for all dealings with Greek agencies, including local government and non-governmental organisations. She has several years of experience in the field, both at large international NGOs and local grassroots organisations, and is Amna’s leading advocate for developing sustainable programmes within Greece. Natalia also leads Amna’s capacity building arm, which provides consultancy and training to organisations to assist them in implementing practices of service delivery and staff care that are both trauma-informed and identity-informed. She speaks French, Greek and English.

“It is so important now to keep focused on the ongoing humanitarian situation here in Northern Greece. The challenges the refugees still face are enormous and complex. We’ve been focusing on the challenge of integration, and for that we need help from two sides: we need practitioners who can communicate with the refugees in their own language; and we need local people who understand the Greek social services system and who can advocate on behalf of the refugees here in Greece.”

Gabriella Brent

Director of Programmes

Gabriella is Amna’s Director of Programmes and a transpersonal counsellor and psychotherapist.

Gabriella oversees Amna’s international training and capacity-strengthening programmes and is part of Amna’s training team, training non-specialists in therapeutically informed healing practices. Her specialism is in taking therapy out of the therapy room to develop and advocate for more holistic, anti-oppressive healing approaches and systems of care for marginalised communities.

Before working with Amna, Gabriella worked across family law, criminal justice, mental health and drug treatment services piloting and scaling more humane, trauma-informed, systemic models of care.

Gabriella was drawn to work with communities experiencing toxic stress and trauma due to her own families refugee history and the impact of intergenerational trauma.

Outside, and inside of work Gabriella loves to dance!