The Rogatchi Foundation is very pleased to announce two new members of its International Advisory Board – World Champion and Member of the European Parliament Sari Essayah, and famous musician Evgeny Kissin.
Both new members of the Foundation’s International Advisory Board are highly acclaimed international personalities. MEP Sari Essayah, who was once the Finnish Sportswoman of the Year, has been the European and World race-walking Champion. She is an experienced politician – before becoming a European parliamentarian, Sari was member of the Finnish Parliament and the chair of the Christian-Democratic party there. Currently, she is an active and highly notable Member of the European Parliament. Sari has also been a candidate for the Finnish presidency in 2011 from the Christian-Democratic party. She is a very well-known politican and public figure, both in Finland and globally, and she is known and highly respected for her stand on human rights and for actively defending and promoting high-standard moral values all over the world, from India and Bahrain to Central Africa. Significantly, Sari was the instrumental figure in the acceptance of a very important resolution in the European Parliament on Mikhail Khodorkovsky and the situation of political prisoners in Russia.
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Evgeny Kissin is a great musician of our time, who lives in London, Paris and New York, and who has been a world famous pianist since the mid-1980s when he started to perform widely as a child prodigy. He is most famous for his unparalleled interpretation of the music of the most complex composers such as Chopin and Liszt. He has played with the most outstanding conductors of our time, from Herbert von Karajan to Zubin Mehta, and he has also performed with the most famous of his colleagues such as Martha Algerich and Isaac Stern, among many others. He has been awarded numerous prestigious awards, such the Grammy awards and many others, and he is also a honorable member of many distinguished world institutions such as the Royal Academy of Music, the Honorary Patron of the City Opera of Vancouver. Evgeny is a honorable doctor of many leading universities including the ones of Hong Kong and Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Additional to his outstanding musical achievements, Evgeny is a very knowledgeable historian, and is a firm and courageous fighter for human rights and dignity. He was co-organiser of the widely known special concert of the stars of classical music in Strasbourg in July 2011 in support of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Platon Lebedev and other of Russia’s political prisoners. Evgeny is justly known as the ‘Pianist for Freedom’.
The Rogatchi Foundation is highly honored to have two such good friends, outstanding professionals, and highly courageous personalities as new members of our International Advisory Board. We warmly welcome both Sari Essayahand Evgeny Kissin as our dear and very distingushed colleagues.