Class XIV (2016-2017)

Sponsor Club: Rotary Club of Cleveland, Ohio, USA, District 6630 

Host Club: Rotary Club of Logan, Logan, AUS, District 9630 

Johannes is from Fulda in Germany, a town that was of strategic importance during the Cold War, because the ‘Fulda Gap’ was seen as a key entry route for a Warsaw Pact advance to Western Europe. The events of 1989/90 and their implications for the lives of people in the highly militarized border area inspired him to focus on International Relations and Conflict Resolution. After his studies in Political Science, Geography and Development Studies, Johannes worked with a wide range of NGOs active in the fields of development cooperation and peace-building in conflict-affected areas of Southeast Asia. In Myanmar, Thailand and Mindanao in the Southern Philippines, his work focused on the protection of civilians, ceasefire monitoring and the prevention and transformation of armed conflict.

Before his fellowship at the University of Queensland, he worked as the Protection Project Manager with the International Rescue Committee (IRC) on preparedness for voluntary return of refugees and internally displaced persons in Kayin State, Myanmar. Johannes facilitated the provision of medical, legal and psycho-social responses to grave child rights violations as part of the UN-led Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism in Mindanao. He also worked as a researcher on land governance, development and economic reforms in Myanmar, and as a consultant on program development and capacity building related to organisational development, conflict transformation, democratisation and political education. Johannes’s main research interests are the dynamics around community-based protection in the context of ceasefires and peace processes as well as conflicts over natural resources.