US Board of Directors

Linda joined the CFP Board in 2011 when she retired as Vice President of Finance at the American Frozen Food Institute (AFFI) and Executive Director of the American Frozen Food Foundation. She became CFP’s Chairman in 2015.

Prior to joining AFFI, Linda founded and operated the consulting firm LKL Consultants for 25 years.  In this capacity she provided a variety of services to a client list that included Fortune 100 companies, non-profit organizations and law firms of all sizes.  Initially, she developed and modified mainframe software applications for the financial and banking industries.  With the advent of the personal computer, the focus of her consulting switched to PC based business applications and systems – designing, installing, and maintaining local and wide area networks for the legal and educational sectors.  She also provided statistical and numerical analysis services for legal defense groups involved in complex class action lawsuits and expert witness testimony with respect to the methodologies used.  In addition, she provided entrepreneurial advice for small technology firms seeking government contracts.

Before starting her own business, Linda worked for the Institute for Defense Analysis writing scientific computer programs and analyzing and developing investment and support cost methodologies for the military.

Linda graduated summa cum laude from the George Washington University with a degree in mathematics and has served on the boards of many non-profit and community organizations including her church, her sons’ school, as well as cultural, social, and international organizations. She and her husband, Jim, have three sons and daughters-in-law and nine grandchildren.

Ken Crognale is CFP’s Teasurer and is responsible for finance and accounting as well as grants administration.

Prior to joining CFP, Ken was Director of Finance and Administration at the Migration Policy Institute since 2014. Prior to MPI, he held senior roles in the accounting and finance departments at the Landon School, the German Marshall Fund of the United States, and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Earlier in his career, he worked in the banking regulation sector of the U.S. federal government.

Ken is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) with more than 20 years in the not-for-profit sector. He holds a bachelor of arts degree in economics from the University of Pittsburgh and did additional coursework in accounting and finance at American University.

Ambassador (retired) Susan M. Elliott is President & CEO of the National Committee on American Foreign Policy (NCAFP), a position she assumed in August 2018. During her 27-year diplomatic career, Ambassador Elliott held a variety of leadership positions at the U.S. Department of State. In her current position as NCAFP President and CEO, she continues to promote resolution of conflicts and create understanding among people in many areas of the world. She oversees Track II discussions and plans programs to educate the public about important foreign policy issues. Ambassador Elliott’s commitment to promoting peace and stability motivated her to support organizations like Creating Friendships for Peace who share her vision.

From 2015 to 2017, Ambassador Elliott served as the Civilian Deputy and Foreign Policy Advisor to the Commander of the United States European Command. Ambassador Elliott was the U.S. Ambassador to Tajikistan from 2012 to 2015. Prior to her Ambassadorial appointment, she served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, Bureau of South and Central Asian Affairs, U.S. Department of State.

Ambassador Elliott served on the faculties of Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana and the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia before joining the U.S. Department of State in March 1990. During her Foreign Service career, Ambassador Elliott worked in a variety of overseas and Washington-based assignments. Her previous overseas assignments include Minister Counselor for Political Affairs in Moscow, Russia; Principal Officer in Belfast, Northern Ireland; Deputy Economic Counselor and Visa Section Chief in Athens, Greece.

Bob Baggott is a retired Minister in the United Church of Christ, currently, serving with his wife, Dr. Casey Baggott, as co-pastor of the Chapel at Lost Tree Village in North Palm Beach, FL. When not serving this seasonal chapel (Nov.-May), he resides in the Twin Cities, where he serves as Chaplain to the Carver County Sheriff’s Department, along with enjoying his role of being a grandfather to 6 grandchildren and their pets.

He has been President of the Coconut Grove Rotary Club in Miami, Chair of the Protestant Appeal of Miami, Board Member of the Year for the Community Renewal Society, and Board Member of the Nazareth-Galilee Educational Institute in Nazareth, Israel, beside one of his mentors Father Abuna Chacour, former Bishop of the Galilee in the Melkite Church. He serves on the national Day 1 Advisory Board in Atlanta, Georgia (formerly the Protestant Hour) and is a member of the United States Seniors Golf Association.

Mr. Belmar serves as Managing Director of Capitol Counsel Group, LLC (CCG), a firm that assists clients in the energy and financial services sectors to navigate federal regulatory and grant programs.  From 2006 to 2009, he served as Deputy General Counsel for Energy Policy at the US Department of  Energy, where he was a principal legal advisor to the Secretary and senior DOE officials. Prior to that,  Mr. Belmar’s legal career had been spent in private practice in Washington DC, primarily with the law firm of Fulbright & Jaworski LLP, including 22 years as a partner representing clients in the energy and financial services sectors on regulatory and legislative matters. He is an honors graduate of Brooklyn College and Columbia Law School, and he currently serves as a Member of the Town of Palm Beach Shore Protection Board, a Senior Fellow at the Administrative Conference of the United States, a Senior Counsel at the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies, and a Life Member of the American Law Institute. He resides in Palm Beach, FL.

Jonathan Berger recently retired from the U.S State Department after 21 years of service. His tours included Denmark, Serbia, Lithuania and Israel. Before that he worked on Capitol Hill for almost eight years, both on the House and Senate side. He currently lives in Wilmington, NC with his wife Liz and daughters Lillian and Eve.

Born in Cyprus, Nick Germanacos was brought up and educated in Wales and England. He moved to Greece in 1965, where he taught and translated Modern Greek poetry and prose.  Together with his wife Anne, he ran the Ithaka Cultural Studies Program on the islands of Kalymnos and Crete.

He now lives in San Francisco, his wife’s native city, and travels to Greece where they have a home and farm. He is the author of Ora et Labora and Potshards, both collections of poems.

Mary lives in Maine and Florida and has hosted students from Europe and Eastern Europe through her many international friendships. She holds a BS in Education from C.W. Post College and a MA in Education from New York University. A former chairman of the Sustainers of the Junior League of the Palm Beaches, Mary is active in her communities and her churches.

John McKinney M.Sc. OBE. – a retired Senior Public Servant living in Northern Ireland.  Since he retired from the N.I Public Service in 2004, he is engaged as an International Business and Management Consultant and Advisor with NI-CO [Northern Ireland cooperating overseas]. NI-CO is a not for profit, a public body dedicated to the pursuit of building efficient, accountable and sustainable public service institutions capable of managing donor aid effectively and implementing positive change.

John, a three times graduate from the Ulster University, including a spell at the Federal Executive Institute in Virginia, is a committed Community Person. His career spans 30 years in Local Government. He held positions as CEO in two Local Authorities the last being in Omagh during the worst atrocity in the N.I troubles when on the 15^th August 1998 thirty-one people lost their lives in a terrorist car bomb. For his efforts and support to the Community and in giving rebirth to Omagh, he was honoured by her Majesty the Queen and received the OBE in the year 2,000.  John then moved away from Local Government to set up the New Multi-million euro Special European Peace Programme that flowed from the Good Friday Peace Agreement.

During this time in the Peace Programme, the famous Warren Muir, then President recruited him to join the N. I.  Children Friendship Programme [CFP] where they stayed together until it came to a natural end when Peace took hold.  John and Warren then met up again when John started work in Cyprus, and Warren had an idea for the Cyprus Peace Project.  He travelled to Cyprus, and that was the start of our current Cyprus Programme; another step towards Peace.

Thomas McCarthy has been an Investment and Financial Advisor for 33 years. Prior to that he was a co-founder and Associate Director of a national non-profit organization of youth service programs for 13 years. He has served as a CFP Coordinator for over 25 years, beginning with the Children’s Friendship Project for Northern Ireland, where he also served as Vice-President for two years. A member of many Boards of Directors of non-profit organizations over the years, he currently serves on the Board of “Bikes for the World”, “Project PLASE” (PLASE = People Lacking Adequate Shelter and Employment), and “Project Change” (a youth development and leadership program). An active Rotarian, he is Chairman of the Maryland Rotary endowment for Gallaudet University.

Warren Muir is one of the founders, a five-year host, chairman, and executive director of the Cyprus Friendship Program (CFP), which has expanded and been renamed Creating Friendships for Peace. Before that, he served as fifteen-year host, chairman, and president of the Children’s Friendship Project for Northern Ireland, upon which CFP has been based.

Warren is a Ph.D. chemist with post-doctoral studies in Epidemiology/Public Health at The Johns Hopkins University. He spent 42 years in the nation’s capital working on the interface of science and public policy in several capacities. For ten years, he served as a senior staff member in the Executive Office of the President, Council on Environmental Quality in the Nixon and Ford Administrations and as the first director of the USEPA Office of Toxic Substances in the Carter Administration. After that, he founded and led the Hampshire Research Institute, an independent environmental research and data analysis firm, for 18 years while serving on the faculty of The Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health. His last 14 years in Washington were served as Executive Director of the Division of Earth and Life Studies at the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine/National Research Council.

H.R.H. Queen Elizabeth honored Warren in 1988 with the title of Officer Brother and in 1994 with the title of Commander in the Order of St. John.

Warren currently serves as a member of the Town of Wolfeboro, NH’s Conservation Commission and its Wolfeboro Waters Committee and is on New Hampshire Public Radio’s Community Advisory Board.

Michael was a member of CFP’s first class of students in 2009 and one of the four who were privileged to be included in The Elders movie Cyprus: Digging the Past in Search of the Future. Currently living in London, he is a member of Akin Gump’s Financial Restructuring Practice.