[FoME] Tea Talk on 28 July 2022, 5-7.30pm at Berlin Global Village

[Christine Liehr]

A view from the other side of the border - Afghanistan/Pakistan regional security and potential consequences for women media professionals and civil society
Thomson Media gGmbH invites you to a tea talk with Afghan and Pakistani media experts Katri Merikallio and Said Nazir on 28 July 2022 from 5pm onwards.

Where: Berlin Global Village, Am Sudhaus 2, 12053 Berlin - 4th floor lounge and rooftop terrace.
The lounge is currently showing the photo exhibition "Her Dream, Her Pain" by Tahora Husaini<https://www.berlin-global-village.de/ausstellung-her-dream-her-pain/>, which depicts the dreams and fears of women and girls in Kabul shortly before the Taliban returned to power in August 2021.

Roughly one year ago, the Taliban forcibly captured large parts of Afghanistan, finally closing in on Kabul and eventually installing a new government under their leadership. The upheaval has undone decades worth of development. Women in particular have suffered from a series of restrictions which have stripped away their right to travel alone, work outside healthcare or education, or receive a secondary education. The segregated actions by the Afghan Taliban, also referred to as "gender apartheid", hamper women from being active members of society. Most women journalists have lost their jobs, gone into hiding or have taken up positions in public institutions where they are subordinate to the Taliban Government and cannot afford any missteps.
Under this light, the negotiations starting in June this year between the newly installed Pakistani government and the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), brokered by the Afghan Taliban and the Haqqani Network, are particularly worrying. The status of ex-FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas), which once served as safe haven for Taliban operations, is on the negotiating table for the TTP, who want to regain political control and impose Sharia law. The ongoing economic crisis and rising inflation has further entrenched poverty in the region and led to supply shortages, further compounding political instability, and laying the groundwork for religious extremist groups and the radicalisation of parts of Pakistani society, further endangering the already limited freedom enjoyed by female workers and journalists. Both countries have furthermore experienced heatwaves with temperatures well above 40 degrees Celsius, coupled with severe drought and other extreme weather events, which are linked to the climate crisis.
During the tea talk, we would like to shine a light on how these developments have impacted civil society and media professionals, as they uphold their daily fight to care for and serve their communities under threat from multiple crises.

Speakers:
Said Nazir is the founder and director of the Tribal News Network (TNN)<https://tnnenglish.com/> based in Peshawar, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province. Born in erstwhile FATA region, he helped the government to establish Khyber radio as the only alternative to militant media in 2006, recruiting and training six female reporters with the aim to give more voices to women in the tribal region. Since the launch of TNN in 2013, he and his team have filled the information gap in the border region by providing local and relevant news to an increasing female audience. In 2019, Said joined Thomson Media as a fellow of ifa's annual CrossCulture Programme (CCP); since 2020, TNN is an implementing partner of the Valley Voices project that supports women in local media, funded by the German Federal Foreign Office through ifa (Institute for Foreign Cultural Relations) as part of the zivik funding programme<https://www.ifa.de/en/fundings/zivik/>


Katri Merikallio is a freelance journalist and author of three books. As a staff writer of the weekly Finnish news magazine Suomen Kuvalehti she covered developments in Afghanistan from 2001 till 2020. Currently, she is the chair of the organisation Learning Together Network, which has been training Afghan female journalists since 2009. In August 2022, she will begin a study on how the Finnish involvement - development policy and EUPOL - in Afghanistan was perceived by Afghan women human rights defenders, journalists, as well as politicians.

Moderation: Sabina Matthay
Sabina Matthay is a senior journalist working for rbb24 Inforadio, Rundfunk Berlin Brandenburg (RBB). Serving as editor, presenter, and reporter at BBC World Service's German Language Service in London in 1990, she went on to report from South Asia where she became an ARD correspondent based in New Delhi, India from 2008 to 2011. Her special focus on Afghanistan led to a master's degree in International Relations at Center for Global Politics at Freie Universität Berlin and training assignments on broadcast journalism in Kabul between 2012-2015.

Date: Thursday, 28 July 2022 (RSVP until Tuesday, 26 July 2022 to christinel at thomsonfoundation.org<mailto:christinel at thomsonfoundation.org>)
Time:
5pm reception with Pakistani tea and biscuits
5:30pm start of the panel discussion with opening remarks by Tim Hülquist (Head of Division, CrossCulture Programme at ifa) and David Quin, Managing Director at Thomson Media, followed by a Q&A session (60-75 minutes max.)
7.30pm: end of event

Given the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, we would appreciate if guests could get tested and wear a medical mask when moving around inside the building.

We hope to see you there!


Christine Liehr
Development manager

Thomson Media gGmbH
Brunnenstrasse 3
10119 Berlin
T:   +49 (0) 30 9147 4081
M: +49 (0) 157 51809308
Just landed on site, our 2021 annual review<https://www.thomsonfoundation.org/about/annual-reviews/>
[cid:image001.png at 01D89DC2.C505D660]<https://www.thomsonfoundation.org/about/annual-reviews/>


-------------- nächster Teil --------------
Ein Dateianhang mit HTML-Daten wurde abgetrennt...
URL: <https://listi.jpberlin.de/pipermail/fome/attachments/20220722/5a07df53/attachment-0001.htm>
-------------- nächster Teil --------------
Ein Dateianhang mit Binärdaten wurde abgetrennt...
Dateiname   : image001.png
Dateityp    : image/png
Dateigröße  : 199159 bytes
Beschreibung: image001.png
URL         : <https://listi.jpberlin.de/pipermail/fome/attachments/20220722/5a07df53/attachment-0001.png>