President

Lieven Taillie

Lieven is an independent journalist accredited to the European Commission, covers essentially economic and social policy issues for CAPresse. He is also interested in cultural subjects. Since 2013 President of the Association of European Journalists in Belgium (AJE / AEJ).

Previously active for Euromedia Services in Brussels (Quinzaine Européenne, Européenne de Bruxelles, Europabericht, Eurinfo, European Library of Agence Europe, and more), now a member of CAPresse and moderator in multilingual debates (German, English, French, Dutch). Member (and formerly administrator) of the Steering Committee of the Jean Monnet Association which manages the house of Jean Monnet, founding father of Europe, the European Parliament. Previously also a member of the Scientific Committee of the Schuman House in Scy-Chazelles (Metz).

Vice President

Alia Papageorgiou

Alia Papageorgiou Is in charge of special projects and English-language social media content.

As a social media specialist, Alia is able to draw on over 12 years of journalism and digital editorial experience. She has led and reported in print newsrooms which were early adopters, including Brussels’ New Europe of which she was Managing Editor in 2012-2013. She worked as a journalist for eight years in Brussels accredited to the EU institutions.

Most recently, she was Press Officer at the EU Delegation to Australia for three years. An avid writer and fan of the printed press Alia is also a staunch supporter of peace journalism, media law, pluralism of the media, rights and protection of journalists working in increasingly difficult conditions and the availability of tools and assistance to journalists. She has previously curated the Personal Democracy Forum in Brussels, the Twestival, ran a Hacks/Hackers meetup at IHECS in 2014 and currently also works on the Athens Democracy Forum for the International New York Times in Athens, Greece. She is studying for a Masters, and holds an LLB in European Law. In her spare time she runs a Facebook ephemeride called The Brussels Chronicle and lives in Brussels with her partner, and their cat Henry.

Vice President

Christian Bouvy

Editor in Chief

Elena Sánchez Nicolás  

Elena Sánchez, as an editor in chief of AEJ Belgium, is responsible for the content published on the different media channels used by the organization – together with the director of publications, Lieven Taillie, as part of part of his responsibility as president of the organisation. Vice-president Alia Papageorgiou remains responsible for special projects and social media content in English, while vice-president Christian Bouvy remains in charge of the podcasts on the website, relationships between AEJ Belgium and Belgian-French speaking media and French publications. Additionally, Dirk Vandereyken, who is chief operating officer, is responsible for pitching and social media promotion. µElena is a Brussels-based freelance journalist working for EUobserver on European affairs, previously she also worked at VoteWatch Europe and the Spanish news agency EFE. She holds a MA on New Media and Society in Europe from the Vrij Universiteit Brussels and a MA in Transmedia Journalism from UNED. Elena is an accredited journalist to the EU Institutions, specialised in climate and tech policy.

Chief Operating Officer

Dirk Vandereyken 

Dirk started his writing career at age 11 by authoring his first science fantasy novel, IJs, de verloren planet. It was published 3 years later. Since then, Dirk has written hundreds of articles, columns, reviews, books, film scripts and audio plays. Aside of being a journalist and editor, he heads PR bureau Badass PR and teaches acting, communication, NLP, hypnosis, writing, singing, lie detection, directing, presenting, debating and more at Badass Intensive Courses and Badass Intensive Acting. As COO of the Association of European Journalists – Belgian Branch, his goal is to catapult the organization into the future by helping to modernize its online and social media presence.

Previous Boards

2017-2018

Lieven Taillie, President
Alexandros Koronakis, Vice President
Niels Schreuder, Treasurer
Christian Bouvy, Board Member

2014-2017

Lieven Taillie, President
Jo Buelens, Secretary & Treasurer
Christian Bouvy, Board Member
Cerasela Radulescu, Board Member
Mathijs Hendrix, Board Member

2013-2014

Lieven Taillie, President
Jo Buelens, Board Member
Peter Mast, Board Member
Maria Sanchez Bellerin, Board Member

2011-2012

Michel Theys, President
Johan Cuppens, Vice-President
Ahmed Belhaloumi, Secretary (from end 2011)
Niels Schreuder, Treasurer (also Secretary in 2011)
N. Peter Kramer, Board Member
Lieven Taillie, Board Member

2008-2010

Michel Theys, President
Johan Cuppens, Vice-President (from 2009)
N. Peter Kramer, Secretary
Niels Schreuder, Treasurer

2006-2008 

Michel Theys, President
N. Peter Kramer, Secretary
Frederik Ronse, Treasurer

2005-2006

Michel Theys, President
N. Peter Kramer, Secretary
Lodewijk Buschkens, Treasurer