Events Around the World

ABAAD-Resource Center for Gender Equality in partnership with the International Rescue Committee is planning to conduct a Five-full day’s workshop on “How to Use Social Animation Techniques through Creative Arts” over April 29, 30 & May 02,09,10, 2013 in North (at Arc en Ciel premise) and May 07,08,15,16,17, 2013 in Bekaa (at Dari Association premise). 

The workshop aims at introducing new and unconventional tools and techniques to enhance the psychological wellbeing of Syrian women and girls refugees and improving the positive coping mechanisms among them. 

Over the workshop, participants will learn creative art techniques to encourage a healthy self-expression and a normalizing experience among their beneficiaries, connect and build support network, assist them in releasing war related stress, to create a safe and playful environment where healing can take place, to maintain self-awareness and self-care, and to become aware of one’s qualifications and restrictions on using arts with trauma survivors.

The training is geared toward social workers and service providers fulfilling the following requirements:

1. Operating in the North or Bekaa;
2. Working as social worker, animators, community facilitators or psychologist;
3. Working with Syrian women & girls.

To express interest, kindly fill and return the Participant Questionnaire to:

lama.naja@abaadmena.org & abaad@abaadmena.org

Participant Questionnaires will be screened by an expert committee – including IRC and ABAAD members and the expert trainer to determine eligibility to participation.

Kindly specify your preferred workshop location.

RSVP as seats are limited.

Deadline for registration is Wednesday 25 April, 2013.

There has been a great deal of hope, and some very real progress, in the enhancement of gender equality and women’s rights in many of the Muslim majority nations following the surge of freedom and democracy of the Arab Spring. This program will try to put those advancements in historic context and explain and explore both those changes and the likelihood of their becoming permanent or becoming negated, or even reversed, by fundamentalist forces.

Moderator: ROBERT E. MICHAEL, Chair, Subcommittee on Islamic Law, Council on International Affairs, New York City Bar Association; former Chair, Committee on Foreign and Comparative Law; Chair, Islamic Law Committee, American Branch, International Law Association; Adjunct Professor, Pace University Law School; Managing Member, Robert E. Michael & Associates PLLC

Speakers: NORAH AL-TAWEEL, Saudi Arabian lawyer; May 2013 candidate for an L.L.M. Degree in International Law, Pace University Law School; CAROLE BASRI, Adjunct Professor, Fordham University Law School; Vice President, Women’s Alliance for a Democratic Iraq; President, Corporate Lawyering Group LLC; Senior Vice President, Balint, Brown & Basri LLC; KARIMA E. BENNOUNE, Professor of Law, University of California Davis School of Law; Author, Your Fatwa Does Not Apply Here, Untold Stories From The Fight Against Muslim Fundamentalism (forthcoming August 2013); ZEINA AL-JALLAD, Visiting Scholar and Research Fellow, Columbia Law School Center for Gender and Sexuality Law; Member, Faculy of Law and Public Administration Law, Birzeit University, Palestine; SALI A. RAKOWER, Senior Fellow and inaugural Director, West Point Center for the Rule of Law

Sponsored by: Council on International Affairs, Bettina Plevan, Chair; Committee on Sex and Law, Pamela Zimmerman, Chair; Committee on Women in the Profession, Angela Rella, Chair

Co-sponsored by: New York Women’s Bar Association; Women’s Bar Association of the State of New York, International Women’s Rights Committee; Muslim Bar Association of New York; PILnet: The Global Network for Public Interest Law

Event Location: 42 West 44th St. (bet. 5th & 6th Ave.)

This will contribute to the youth understanding of devolution as well as encourage participation in governance.

Areas to be covered are:

• Understanding devolution.
• Public procurement process in the devolve system of government.
• Eligibility requirements for conducting business with the government.
• Process and requirements for registering sole  proprietorship, business name or a company among others.
• Strategic planning for business
• Filling out tender forms and bids

Investment required: KSHS 650/-
Participants will be given lunch and a certificate after the training.  Payment can be made on the 11th May at the venue or via Mpesa through 0724986209. Call 0735794346 or visit our Facebook page for more details. 

The Human Rights Volunteer Initiative (HURVI) and Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA) invite application for a Training on Investigating, Monitoring & Reporting Human Rights in Nigeria for young professionals. The training seeks to develop the skills of young professionals to effectively conduct research, investigate human rights abuses and report violations in a professional and objective manner. The process of monitoring and reporting human rights violations in a professional manner requires honing of intuitive, analytical, organizing and writing skills. This training will hone those skills and improve the quality of human rights investigation and reporting in Nigeria. Beyond investigating and reporting human rights, the trainees will be trained on how to host human rights campaigns, undertake advocacy and human rights litigation in defense of victims.

This training is highly recommended for young undergraduates, graduates, NYSC members, young lawyers, leaders of youth groups, NGOs, journalists etc. Certificates will be issued at the end of the training.

Training Content

• Human rights standards;
• Understanding the Human rights landscape in Nigeria;
• Fact-finding and Investigation;
• Principles of research on human rights violations;
• Information gathering;
• Interviewing;
• Monitoring specific human rights issues like sexual violence, torture, unlawful arrest & detention, extra judicial killings, access to information, freedom of expression and peaceful assembly etc;
• Reporting within human rights field operation, African Union and United Nations Mechanisms
• New media and human rights reporting
• Working with National Institutions, Sub-Regional Institutions, Regional Institutions, International institutions and Foreign missions with human rights mandate
• Overcoming challenges associated with human rights defense.

At the end of the training, participants should be able to:

• Gather ad evaluate research materials;
• Plan research missions and other on-site investigations;
• Determine evidence to look out for on different human rights issues;
• Determine appropriate actions to take in any case of human rights violation;
• Conduct interviews with victims of human rights violations and other informants;
• Write simple human rights reports;
• Use social media to monitor and report human rights in professional and objective manner;
• Understand national, sub-regional, regional and international mechanisms for addressing human rights situations in Nigeria e.g. National Human Rights Commission, Legal Aid Council, Nigerian Police Force, African Commission on Human & Peoples’ Rights, African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights, United Nations Human Rights Council etc.
• Monitor governments' compliance with international treaty obligations.

To Apply

Interested applicants must sign up as HURVI volunteers or contact Amalachukwu Nwazota or Segun Ogundare

Training Fee: FREE

Application Deadline: 13th May 2013

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Human Rights Volunteer Initiative (HURVI) is a youth-based human rights mobilization initiative that aims to reduce the level and impact of human rights abuses by empowering youths with necessary human rights knowledge and skills to become human rights advocates and build a community of volunteer young professionals who will intervene in cases of human rights violations by providing #rightsRescue which includes advocacy, campaigning and litigation. http://www.hurvi.org/ Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA) was established in 2000 and forms part of the global Open Society Foundations Network of autonomous foundations founded and supported by George Soros. OSIWA works to build vibrant and tolerant democracies whose governments are accountable to their citizens. To achieve this mission, the organization seeks to shape public policies that assure greater fairness in political, legal, and economic systems and safeguard fundamental rights. http://www.osiwa.org/

Take a quick look at our instructions for how to participate in the online conversation on our new website. If you get stuck, contact us! We’re here to help.

Next Conversation: Tactics for Combating Militarisation

Join War Resisters International and the New Tactics community for an online conversation on tactics for combating the militarisation of education, public spaces, vulnerable communities, entertainment and culture, from June 10 to 14, 2013. This conversation is an opportunity for teachers, students, lawyers, peace activists and practitioners from around the world  to share their experiences and challenges in combating the culture of militarism in their communities.

If you are interested in helping to lead this conversation, please contact us!

 Featured Resources for the Strategic Use of Social Media

This month, we are focusing on the strategic use of social media. We believe that by sharing examples of successful social media tactics, we can think of ways that these tactics might apply to our own work. To that end, here are a few examples of social media tactics that we think you'll find interesting. You can explore all of our tactics related to social media on our website, under the tag 'social media'.

• Mobilizing supporters on social media to get the attention of strategic targets - It’s not everyday that you can get the United States State Department to respond publicly to your concerns, this is - unless you have an enormous global network on Twitter! Amnesty International USA was able to get the attention of the Assistant Secretary of State, Mike Posner, with the help of several thousand supporters from around the world who used Twitter to urge the United States to respond to human rights violations in Bahrain. Join Christoph Koettl (the man behind this action) in this month's online conversation!
• Using social media to collectively document abuses and honor victims and activists - To honor people and cities that had a profound effect on the course of the Syrian revolution, anonymous artists created special stamps and published them on Facebook. Stamps of the Syrian Revolution are mock postage “stamps” that feature photos of events ripped from the headlines, or of influential people in the uprising.
• Using social media to engage supporters in documenting their acts of solidarity - The Facebook campaign "Kurd Men for Equality" was launched to send a message to authorities in Iran: Being a woman is not a tool to humiliate or punish anyone. The campaign was launched in response to a court case in which a man, convicted of domestic abuse, was ordered to wear women's clothing as punishment. This punishment was meant to be a form of public humiliation. But instead, because of this campaign, this punishment has been transformed into an opportunity for men to show their support and solidarity with the women in their communities.

Join this month's Arabic online conversation on monitoring places of detention in the MENA region. The dates of this conversation are May 12 to 15.

Follow three courageous Indigenous women of Colombia, over the span of three years, as they are compelled to react and, finally, take nonviolent action, with their communities, against the brutally violent occupation of their lands. Both harrowing and hopeful, We Women Warriors is a shrewd reminder of the grave injustice taking place in Colombia’s Indigenous villages, as well as the startling beauty, resilience and inner strength of the remaining individuals who persevere peacefully to combat the annihilation of their people.

The screening of "We Women Warriors" will be followed by an enlightening discussion of issues raised by the film, and will be led by Kathy Price, Amnesty International Canada’s campaigner for Latin America.

There will also be an action centre for audience participants to take action for the rights of Indigenous Peoples in Colombia.

Forums and Conferences Will be on May 17^th and 18th

Kaos GL, a strong proponent of peace all the time, will focus on the “peace process” on the first day of the meeting.

Inviting LGBT society to participate in the peace process, Kaos GL claims that unless the Kurdish feel free and equal regarding being “Kurdish”, no one will really be free.

Pointing at links between homophobia/transphobia and sexism, nationalism, racism and militarism, Kaos GL aims at making connections between various kinds of discrimination. It also aims at forming lateral networks between struggles and practices against discrimination.

Scholars, unionists, film directors and politicians from Turkey as well as the USA, Poland, the Netherlands and France will attend the meeting on May 17^th and 18^th.   

The 8^th International Anti-Homophobia Meeting will be held in Ankara, at Çağdaş Sanatlar Merkezi (ÇŞM – Center of Contemporary Arts). 

We Will Parade on May 19^th!

Since 2008, International Anti-Homophobia Meeting ends with a “parade”.

This year “Parade Against Homophobia and Transphobia” will take place on May 19^th. For a world that LGBTs and heterosexual can live freely together, those against homophobia and transphobia will gather at Kurtuluş Park at 2 pm.

From May 1^st to 17^th!

Kaos GL will parade from May 1^st to 17^th this year as well against heterosexist colonialist system destroying all ethnic, cultural and sexual differences and enforcing a monolithic identity.

Before the meeting, several events will be organized at Ankara University, Middle East Technical University (METU) and Hacettepe University. Details of the events will be announced on April 30^th, Tuesday.