Vedran Obucina is a political scientist and theologian from Croatia. He holds an MA in Political Science from the University of Zagreb and an MA in Theology from Old-Catholic Patriarchy. He is a PhD researcher at the University of Regensburg in Germany. His academic work is based on religion and politics, with a focus on the peacebuilding possibilities of religious institutions around the world. He focuses mainly on the Balkans, Mediterranean, Middle East, Caucasus and Central Asia and has written a book about the political system of the Islamic Republic of Iran. He occasionally teaches at various Croatian universities and has participated in international seminars, conferences and academic events. As a priest in the Old Catholic Church – Utrecht Union, Vedran is also active in religion-based peacebuilding, reconciliation and conflict prevention/resolution, participating in activities in countries such as Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and Macedonia, as well as in the Middle East (in cooperation with the International Interreligious Institute in Qom, Iran), and recently in the Caucasus. He applies his knowledge and expertise at a worldwide level and has worked in various capacities with: the Maydan Association network; the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Affairs of the Islamic Republic of Iran; Chulalongkorn University, in Thailand; and as the IEP Ambassador. He worked for six years in public diplomacy, and since 2005 has been involved in journalism (he is the senior editor in Matica hrvatska, the leading cultural institution in Croatia). He writes opinion articles for the Polish National Bank, Croatian foreign policy website Advance.hr and Al Jazeera network. Since 2022 Vedran heads the Centre for Interreligious Dialogue, situated in Rijeka, Croatia.