September 25th, 2021

This week’s highlights

  • Our Kabul evacuation count reached 111 this week — help us save more lives!
  • Are you ready for Night for Rights on October 20?
  • JHR trainee Kouane Diarra’s child marriage report wins at the Mali Media Awards
  • Job opportunity: Junior Curriculum Associate – MMFC program

Our Kabul evacuation count reached 111 this week –
help us save more lives!

JHR and our coalition’s evacuation effort was featured on CTV on Thursday evening
– Screenshot

 

This week, JHR and our coalition of concerned organizations, including CWA Canada, evacuate eleven more at-risk Afghan journalists and their families from Kabul. Our Thursday night/Friday morning evacuation took place over two days and hit several obstacles, but the family was finally delivered to safety in the wee hours of Friday morning; the Friday night/Saturday morning evacuation was remarkably smooth and straightforward, and gives us confidence that a new route can now be made to work for many more people. All of these efforts brought our total count of rescues to 111. We’re in the triple digits of successful evacuations and are not slowing down. And we are not alone in this: our partners, the Veterans Transitions Network and Aman Lara, are also experiencing success.

As I stressed to CTV on Thursday night, many journalists we are trying to help are moving from location to location every 24 to 48 hours to keep themselves safe from the Taliban. They cannot shelter in place. We need to get them out of danger as soon as possible. To do that at the scale required, we’ve invited the newly elected Liberal government in The Globe & Mail this week to partner with us. We are encouraged by signals the government is working to make this an early priority, and ask them to collaborate in a full and open way, including with funding.

We are grateful to David Walmsley and Phillip Crawley of The Globe and Mail for ongoing stalwart support, and we thank coalition members Jane McElhone, Mark MacKinnon and Martin O’Hanlon for strong assists this week. We are also most grateful to Kiran Nazish of the Coalition for Womenin Journalism for ongoing partnership in this fiendishly difficult task, and to CTV National News for helping us keep these life-saving efforts in the headlines.

In the absence of government funding, we can only do this work on your donations. We’re particularly grateful to TD Bank which joined CIBC in making a substantial commitment to the Evacuate Journalists Out Of Kabul fund. And we’re so encouraged by the incredible support we have seen from our community of donors. Any amount helps to get people safely out of harm’s way.

Are you ready for Night for Rights
on October 20?

JHR Board Chair Michael Cooke at the 2019 Night For Rights.

 

On the gala front, we are going full speed ahead in planning Night For Rights, taking place at the Evergreen Brick Works on October 20, from 6pm to 9pm! After COVID-19 forced our annual fundraiser on a hiatus in 2020, it is more important this year than ever before for JHR to raise funds to support our work and the teams that execute it in Toronto and around the world. We are grateful to our friends in corporate Canada for their sponsorships, including Gold level contributions from Power Corporation and Global News, as well as table purchases from dedicated Board supporters including Derek and Adrienne Fisher and Peter Donolo and Mary Cruden, and we continue to welcome support. Tables for up to 8 people are available for $8000, individual tickets for $1000, and please visit www.night4rights.com to contact us for sponsorship opportunities.

This year, mindful of potential public health concerns, we’re also offering our supporters the opportunity to join the party online with a fabulous virtual experience in the works! Virtual attendees may sign up for the premium experience available to residents of the Greater Toronto Area (that comes with a virtual table for 8 people, three-course meals delivered at home and sponsor recognition). Please contact us to express interest in purchasing individual virtual tickets and international tickets at discounted rates.

We will be announcing speakers and other event highlights in the coming days. Stay tuned!

JHR trainee Kouane Diarra’s child marriage report
wins special prize at the 2021 Mali Media Awards

Kouane Diarra at the 2021 Mali Media Awards.

 

JHR trainee Kouane Diarra has won the special ‘Eve Award’ for his radio report on child marriage at the 2021 Mali Media Awards, held in Bamako on August 21, 2021. In his report, Diarra explores the consequences of early marriage for students at the Mafouné primary school. This latest honour follows his runner-up position in the radio category at JHR’s inaugural Human Rights Journalism Awards in June this year.

About his latest win, Diarra said, “I owe this recognition to JHR, thanks to which I have learned how to include all parties’ perspectives using the P.A.N.E.L approach in a report.”

The 2021 Mali Media Awards, or MAMI 2021 for short, are organized by Tuwindi, a local not -for profit organization whose main mission is to strengthen good governance practices and democracy in Mali.

Read more about Diarra’s work here.

WORK FOR THE MMFC PROGRAM:
We’re hiring a Junior Curriculum Research And
Development Associate!

 

Journalists for Human Rights (JHR) is looking for a Junior Curriculum Development Associate to support the coordination, communication, and administrative work for initiatives relating to the organization, review, update, and improvement of curriculum that are part of its programs overseas and in Canada.

The associate will work under the supervision of the Director of Policy and Project Manager and in collaboration with the international department of JHR to implement its new project ‘Mobilizing Media to Fight COVID-19’ in 12 African and Middle Eastern countries.

LOCATION: Toronto, Head Office
CONTRACT DURATION: Short term
START DATE: As soon as possible

 

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