Zvezdana Kovač, Strategy and Outreach Director

Zvezdana Kovač has been working for more than two decades in leading positions in both the non-profit sector and the media in the Western Balkans. From 2020 to 2024, she was Secretary General of the European Movement in Serbia, a civil society organisation that aims to initiate and monitor the comprehensive process of European integration, and a member of the Executive Board of the International European Movement (EMI). Prior to that, she was the Executive Director of the Thessaloniki-based Centre for Democracy and Reconciliation in Southeast Europe (CDRSEE), a regional and impact-oriented NGO working to promote democratic, pluralistic and peaceful societies in Southeast Europe. Before joining CDRSEE in 2010, she worked for a Greek European development NGO and was a journalist in leading positions at various TV stations in the region. Among other roles, she was Editor-in-chief of a national television station in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) and a journalist and editor at RTV Montenegro for over a decade. Also, she supervised the production of multi-perspective books within the Joint History Project (JHP) for 13 countries in Southeast Europe, covering the tumultuous period – 1944 to 2008.  She was Editor in Chief and moderator of the pioneering talk show Okruzenje/Vicinities broadcast in all the countries of Former Yugoslavia and Albania, for which she received the Initiative of the Year Award (2016) from the European Citizenship. She graduated in literature from the University of Montenegro. In addition to her native Montenegrin, she is fluent in English and Greek.