Meet Our Executive Team
Belquis Ahmadi
Belquis Ahmadi is a human rights lawyer and senior policy and advocacy professional with nearly three decades of experience working in Washington and in the field, advancing human rights, peacebuilding, rule of law, and democratic governance across Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, and Jordan. She has an extensive background in international legal frameworks, gender, accountability, and civil society capacity building.
Ahmadi spent over eleven years at the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP), leading Afghanistan-focused programs supporting peace education, women's participation in peace processes, civil society strengthening, and justice and accountability initiatives. Working closely with advocacy coalitions and multilateral institutions, including U.S. government and UN bodies, she has advocated for accountability for crimes committed against women and girls, documenting systematic rights violations and advancing international recognition of gender apartheid as a crime under international law.
Ahmadi has managed programs ranging from targeted initiatives to multimillion-dollar projects, overseeing strategy, partnerships, and implementation in challenging political and security environments. A key component of her work has been designing and leading capacity-building initiatives for civil society organizations, human rights advocates, and government officials, strengthening their ability to advance gender mainstreaming, document abuses, and pursue rights-based reforms.
Previously, Ahmadi worked with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) during the Afghan civil war, contributing to humanitarian response in highly insecure environments, and later supported relief and recovery initiatives with CARE International. Her governance and democratic development work has included engagements with The Asia Foundation, UNDP, and the International Organization for Migration (IOM), supporting free and fair elections, governance reforms, and civic participation.
Ahmadi has produced numerous publications, book chapters, analytical reports, and policy briefs on security, women's rights, governance, peace processes, and countering violent extremism, contributing to international policy discussions on Afghanistan and global debates on gender equality, accountability, and conflict prevention.
Founder, President and CEO
Scott Worden
Scott Worden has over two decades of experience working in Washington and in the field in senior roles with the U.S. government, United Nations, and non-profit organizations concentrating on development and security issues in Central and South Asia. He has an extensive background in reconstruction, development, democracy and governance policy.
Worden is currently a capstone faculty member at Yale’s Jackson School of Global Affairs and a Senior Advisor to Cambridge Global Advisors. Worden recently served as the Director of the Afghanistan and Central Asia Program at the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) from 2016 through 2025. In this role, he spearheaded projects on counter-extremism, women’s rights, and building the rule of law, while advising senior U.S. officials, Congress, and international partners on regional policy.
Previously, Worden served as Director of the Lessons Learned Program at the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), producing independent reports that shaped U.S. reconstruction strategy. Worden was a Senior Policy Advisor at USAID’s Office of Afghanistan and Pakistan Affairs, focusing on civil-military integration to improve governance and stabilization.
Internationally, Worden served as Commissioner of Afghanistan’s Electoral Complaints Commission, adjudicating election disputes during the 2009 presidential elections, and as a Legal Advisor with the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan. His work also extended to Cambodia, Ethiopia, and Laos, where he advised on anti-corruption, justice reform, and accountability efforts. He has managed multiple track 1.5 dialogues aimed at increasing regional security cooperation in Central Asia. Before his public service career, Worden practiced corporate law with an international firm in New York.
Worden has published widely on governance and security issues, with commentary in Foreign Affairs, The Washington Post, The Hill, and the Journal of Democracy. He has testified before Congress and is a frequent voice on Afghanistan’s elections, peace process, and governance. Worden was a Luce Scholar and received his BA from Colgate University and a J.D. from Harvard Law School.
Founder, Chief Strategy Officer
Chief Financial and Operations OfficerMaria Antonia Montes
Maria Antonia Montes has over 12 years of experience working in Washington and in the field building bridges across U.S. government agencies, international NGOs, philanthropy, academia, and local communities in Latin America, concentrating on peacebuilding, citizen security, and democratic processes. She has an extensive background in nonviolent action, women's inclusion, and youth engagement.
Prior to joining PeaceBridge , she served as Acting Director of the Nonviolent Action Program and was a founding member of the Latin America Center at the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP), where she worked for a decade across diverse thematic teams. As NVA team lead, she implemented the Synergizing Nonviolent Action and Peacebuilding (SNAP) program with regional partners and frontline activists, training proximate actors in nonviolent collective action, civil resistance, and strategic planning to support democratic transitions in closed civic spaces.
In 2020, Montes founded USIP's Latin America Center, opened a regional office in Bogotá and managed interagency-funded programs critical to implementing the 2016 Colombian peace process with the FARC. These programs included a two-year USAID/Colombia-funded citizen security program across 10 rural municipalities that restored trust with local authorities and strengthened post-conflict governance. She also managed a Participatory Action Research (PAR) program with 20 rural youth leaders on drivers of internal migration in Colombia.
Montes has deep experience advancing women's participation in peace processes, establishing a network of locally-led women mediators in Colombia and co-creating a network of women peacebuilders in Venezuela. In 2017, she helped launch USIP's Generation Change Fellows Program in Latin America, training youth peacebuilders on conflict resolution in Colombia, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Nicaragua.
She has written for USIP's Olive Branch blog, briefed congressional offices and special envoys on Latin America peace and security. She served as an OAS electoral observer in the Western Hemisphere. She was recently selected as an inaugural fellow for the International Geneva Peace Fellowship Programme, through which she will be seconded to the International Federation of the Red Cross (IFRC).
Montes holds a graduate degree in Conflict Studies and Peacebuilding from Pontificia Universidad Javeriana (Bogotá) and a BA in Political Science and Latin American Studies from Wake Forest University.