He was born in Paris in 1957. In 1983, he and his friends founded İletişim Publishing in order to support the return to democracy and civilian rule after the September 12 coup through popular publishing. The Marmara Earthquake was a turning point in his life; he supported civic networks created in the region in the wake of the earthquake. In 2002, together with people from the business circles and civil society, he founded Anadolu Kültür in an effort to spread and scale up culture and arts events and to advocate cultural diversity and rights. In the 1990s, to help bind the wounds left by the fighting in Turkey’s eastern and southeastern provinces and build a culture of dialogue and peace through arts, he played a pioneering role in Anadolu Kültür’s first project, the establishment of the Diyarbakır Art Center. The Kars Arts Center, also with Anadolu Kültür’s support became a cultural meeting space not only for Turkey, but for Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan as well. During negotiations for Turkey’s membership in the European Union, he concentrated on projects to establish ties between European and Anatolian cities. After the 2011 Van Earthquake, he held photography workshops. He also created projects and published books for Yazidi and Syrian refugee children living under harsh conditions. He has brought together hundreds of artists as well as their works of art in an effort to contribute to the opening of the sealed border between Turkey and Armenia, which have had no diplomatic relationship since 1993.
She was born in 1979 to an Egyptian family in Saudi Arabia. In 2007 she and ten other young Egyptian women activists founded a civil society organization called ‘Nazra for Feminist Studies.’ Through Nazra and on her own, she documented the human rights violations taking place in Tahrir Square during the Egyptian Revolution in 2011. She worked with local organizations to protect the rights of women who experienced sexual violence and gang rape in Tahrir Square. She coordinated the efforts to provide women with medical, psychological and legal support. She followed the cases on sexual violence. After the revolution, Nazra started a hotline for women survivors of sexual assault. Following the revolution, she took part in a coalition of women’s organizations and played a major role in the inclusion of women’s rights in the Egyptian Constitution. Together with her colleagues at Nazra, and in cooperation with state institutions such as the National Council for Women, the National Council for Human Rights and the Ministry of Justice, she ensured that women’s rights were incorporated into laws and political decisions, and had a special unit established within the Egyptian police force to combat violence against women. She brought up the subjects of women’s rights violations, and violence and discrimination against women on several international platforms such as the United Nations. In 2015 she was one of the pioneers in the establishment of a coalition of civil society organizations called the Coalition of Women Human Rights defenders in the Middle East and The Caucus of Women Politicians in the Arab Region.
He was born in Konya in 1974. He studied economics and history at Bogaziçi University. He also completed his PhD in the same university in the Institute of Ataturk’s Principles and Reforms in the field of Modern Turkish History. He was interested in cinema, theater and literature since his secondary and high school years. While studying at Bogaziçi University he attended the activities of the theater club. In the club, with his friends, he organized events in which movies were discussed and he invited prominent directors from the movie sector in Turkey. During his university years, he started writing draft scenarios and with his friends they published the ‘Görüntü’ journal. His first feature, Beyond the Hill (2012), received numerous awards, including the Caligari Film Prize from the Berlin International Film Festival; Best Film Award in Istanbul Film Festival. He continues to write in the field of cinema and political science in many journals and teaches in the Humanities and Social Sciences Department at Istanbul Technical University.
He was born in Ankara in 1963. He graduated from Istanbul High School and Ankara University Faculty of Political Sciences. Between 1984-88, he worked as a journalist in the weekly news magazine Yeni Gündem. Since 1988, he has been the editor of research-analysis series in Iletisim Publishing. From 1993 to 2014, he was the editor of the quarterly social sciences magazine ‘Toplum ve Bilim’ (Society and Science). He has been the editor of chief of the monthly published socialist cultural magazine ‘Birikim’ since 2012, which he has been writing regularly since 1989. He translated more than twenty books, including works by Karl Karx, Jürgen Habermas, Franz Kafka, Ernst Bloch, Wilhelm Schmid. As a member of the board of founders of Human Rights Foundation of Turkey, he is taking part in the organization of the annual conference on "Turkey Human Rights Movement Conference" since fifteen years. He has been working as the general secretary at the Board of Directors of the History Foundation since 2017.
He was born in 1953 in Marseille. He is a film director and a scriptwriter whose films are strongly marked by the local and regional environment of the city of Marseille. He has been in the film industry since 1980. He studied at the Social Sciences Department of Paris University. His films were shown at many festivals. Marius and Jeannette won the Certain Regard Prize at Cannes IFF, the Delluc, Lumiere Prizes, the Grand Prix of IFF in Geneve, Figueira da Foz (Portugal), Hayfa (Israel), and Ariane Ascaride received Cesar for Best Actress. In 2006, Robert Guédiguian won Silver Apricot in Armenia in Golden Apricot Festival.
She received her law degree from the University of Buenos Aires, has a master's degree in Latin American studies from Stanford University, and a master's degree in law from Harvard University. She is the Executive Director of the Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL), a civil society organization that works throughout the America to promote human rights through the use of international law and the Inter-American System for the Protection of Human Rights. In this capacity, she has litigated numerous leading cases on behalf of victims of human rights violations before both the Inter-American Commission and Court of Human Rights. She has helped shape international human rights standards in key areas through her litigation, advocacy, and writing. Since 2015, she is also a founder and member of the Gqual Campaign, an initiative to promote gender parity in international representation. Additionally, together with other regional and international experts, she is currently developing a protocol on investigating threats against human rights defenders.
She was born in 1949 in the United States. She is the Founder and Creative Director of Tostan NGO, headquartered in Dakar, Senegal that aims at empowering African communities to bring about sustainable development and positive social transformation based on respect of human rights.Having lived and worked in Senegal since 1974, she has received international recognition for her groundbreaking educational programs in national languages. Molly’s early experiences in rural Senegal reinforced her beliefs that many development efforts were not addressing the deeper priorities of African communities. In collaboration with Senegalese villagers, she developed a new type of education program for promoting African values and using traditional ways of learning for adults and children. Their efforts grew throughout the 1980s, heading to the establishment of Tostan in 1991. Tostan’s innovative grassroots, human rights-based education model has led communities to make significant progress in the areas of health, education, governance, environment and financial empowerment. To date, more than 8,500 communities in 8 African countries have held public declarations to abandon the practices of female genital cutting and child marriage.
She was born in Ankara in 1976. She graduated from the Department of International Relations at Westminster University, London. She completed her master's degree in London School of Economics. When she was in Zurich to study art at the University of Geneva, due to an accident she had while she was trying to help her friend in wheelchair to get on train, she lost her left arm and leg. She worked as a translator, independent journalist and documentary filmmaker.
In 2003, Pavey worked for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. Between 2003 and 2010 she worked on humanitarian missions in countries such as Algeria, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Hungary. Between 2010 and 2011 she worked as the Secretary to the CRPD Secretariat at the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. Between 2011 and 2017, she served as a deputy in the Republican People's Party. She is the first disabled woman ever elected to the parliament of Turkey and she is a member of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
She currently carries out global activities and reconciliation between parliamentary diplomacy, local governments, and faith and opinion leaders.
She was born in Ankara in 1955. She completed her undergraduate education at Ankara University, Faculty of Political Science. In 1980-81, she attended the graduate program at Johns Hopkins University in Bologna, Italy. In 1982, she became a research assistant at Istanbul University Faculty of Economics. She received her doctorate from AÜSBF in 1987. She worked as a lecturer at Istanbul, Marmara and Galatasaray Universities between 1982 and 2017. Her researches on nationalism, identity and citizenship issues are published in academic journals.
Rakel Dink became involved in human rights activism following the tragic assassination of her husband, the prominent Turkish-Armenian journalist and founder of Agos newspaper, Hrant Dink.
Born to an Armenian family in Silopi, southeastern Turkey, Rakel moved to Istanbul with tens of kids from Anatolia in order to receive education in Armenian Schools. She met with Hrant Dink at Camp Armen, where Armenian children orphans or those away from their families would spend their summers. Rakel and Hrant got married and became managers at Camp Armen in the following years until the property was seized by the state.
Following the death of Hrant Dink in January 2007, Rakel devoted her life to preserving her husband’s legacy. She established the Hrant Dink Foundation in 2007, with a mission to protect and uphold human rights in Turkey, preserve the identity and culture of minorities, address polarization, and normalize Turkish-Armenian relations. Rakel continues to be an optimist and maintains that despite the various challenges that she was forced to overcome throughout her life, she has been surrounded by love and kindness. She is hopeful for the future of Turkey and finds joy in her work and her family.