Past Events and Screenings

The UK’s separation from the EU means separation from the European Court of Justice, and may presage leaving the European Court of Human Rights as well. Will significant sections of the UK press continue to argue for the scrapping of the Human Rights Act post-Brexit, or will they recognise that Article 10 provides numerous safeguards for responsible journalism and thus protects press freedom? We will be joined by journalists, human rights law experts and media analysts to discuss the role journalism will play as the Brexit leads human rights in the UK into an uncertain future.

Subtitled, ‘A Riot of Free Speech’, Byline is Britain’s first ever festival of journalism. There will be a mix of comedy, music, workshops, screenings, activism and debate. A gaggle of the great and the very-funny: John Cleese, Martin Bell, The Blow Monkeys, Luke Harding, Lenny Henry, Tom Holland, Hugh Grant, Jack Monroe and plenty of other people and bands you admire and love, all in one forest clearing.

Over the last twelve years, as Mexico has become the epicentre of the international drug trade, more than one hundred journalists, a generation of writers, has been killed or disappeared. The Sorrows of Mexico is a collection of essays from the leading writer-journalists of Mexico, each one concentrating on a single issue among the many which afflict their country. We will be joined by two of the book’s contributors, Anabel Hernandez and Lydia Cacho, who will discuss their experiences as female journalists working in one of the most hostile environments for human rights reporting.

The Frontline Club is pleased to welcome the 7th Laureate of the Carmignac Photojournalism Award, Mexican photographer Narciso Contreras, for a discussion on his recent work in Libya. Contreras travelled through the complex tribal society of post-Gaddafi Libya from February to June 2016, photographing the brutal reality of human trafficking.

We are very happy to be joined by celebrated photographer Guillaume Bonn to discuss his new book The Mosquito Coast: Travels from Maputo to Mogadishu in conversation with journalist Jon Lee Anderson. Born in Madagascar, Bonn seeks out and preserve a legacy of the past in East Africa. He has called the eastern African coast the Mosquito Coast, because of the malarial curse shared shared by the four countries—Mozambique, Tanzania, Kenya, and Somalia—whose coastlines he has documented.

The election of President Donald Trump has raised tensions between the US and Iran just as an intense power struggle plays out ahead of Iran’s presidential election in May. Ahead of the election we will reflect on Iran under President Rouhani and where the country’s international relations are headed.

In the backdrop of Turkey’s April referendum, escalating tensions between Turkey and major European powers has signalled a new era of hostile relations. President Erdogan’s bid to radically remodel the parliamentary system in Turkey has led to opposition groups fearing the creation of one-man rule. The Turkish government, which has been carrying out brutal crackdowns on political dissenters following the failed coup last year, is now looking toward European countries as a stage to strengthen its agenda. Our panel will reflect on President Erdogan’s fraught relationship with the EU in the context of the country’s political future after the April referendum.

Hugh Purcell and Jessica Mayberry invite you to an event presenting Video Volunteers. The evening will begin with a film screening of videos produced by Video Volunteer participants, followed by a discussion with Jessica Mayberry. All ticket revenue will support Video Volunteers’ change-making community media projects in India. RSVP to jessica@videovolunteers.org

It is the news media’s major preoccupation – how can journalists best serve audiences in a world riddled with misinformation and ‘alternative facts’, and when the President of the United States makes baseless claims and labels accurate reporting as “fake news”? We will discuss how journalists new to these challenges learn from reporters elsewhere in the world who contend daily with misinformation and state hostility. This event, held to mark World Press Freedom Day 2017, will bring together journalists from a selection of countries to discuss these issues and explain how they are dealing with the “post-truth” environment.

A monthly social evening for journalists and others in the London media world. The London Press Club, which has been bringing the industry together since 1882, has resurrected the tradition of regular drinks, on the back of popular demand. The Frontline Club hosts the evening on the first Tuesday of each month. No entrance fee is required and there is a pay bar.

We are delighted to present a screening of Five Broken Cameras, followed by a Q&A with director Emad Burnat. Since its release in 2011, Five Broken Cameras has received more than 40 awards worldwide and was nominated to the 85th Academy Award for Best Feature Documentary. Filmed from the perspective of Palestinian farmer Emad Burnat, 5 Broken Cameras was shot using six different video cameras – five of which were destroyed in the process of documenting Emad’s family’s life as well as Palestinian and International resistance to Israeli appropriation of land and occupation.

In her groundbreaking new book No Friends But the Mountains, veteran war correspondent Judith Matloff describes her journeys to remote mountain communities across the globe — from Albania and Chechnya to Nepal and Colombia — to investigate why so many conflicts occur at great heights. Matloff will join us in conversation with journalist Nawal al-Maghafi to discuss the links between geography and conflict, and reflect on her discoveries from the world’s most remote regions.

The Hetherington family and the Tim Hetherington Trust invite friends, colleagues and everyone interested in Tim’s extraordinary life to spend an evening at The Frontline Club exploring his dynamic legacy through the work of artists and journalists who continue to expand his innovative approach to visual media. The evening will introduce new work by some familiar friends, as well as some hitherto unknown voices who are bringing fresh energy to today’s media.

Correspondent Seyi Rhodes and Director Kate Hardie-Buckley report from the set of the hit South Korean TV show that’s made defectors from North Korea into TV stars. More than 400 defectors have been interviewed on the show, and their stories chart the very latest about life under Kim Jong-un. For many South Koreans, it’s become a key source of information about their northern neighbour.

Luminary journalists Ed Murrow, Martha Gellhorn, Walter Cronkite, and Clare Hollingworth were among the young reporters who chronicled World War II’s daily horrors and triumphs for Western readers. In his fascinating new book Reporting War, Ray Moseley, himself a former foreign correspondent, mines the writings of these legendary journalists. The result is an exhilarating parallel narrative, reflecting on events across every theatre — Europe, Pearl Harbor, North Africa, and Japan — as well as the lives of the courageous journalists who doggedly followed the action and the story, often while embedded in the Allied armies.

Letters from Baghdad is the story of a true original — Gertrude Bell — sometimes called the “female Lawrence of Arabia”. Voiced and executive produced by Academy award winning actor Tilda Swinton, the film tells the dramatic story of this British spy, explorer and political powerhouse. Bell traveled widely in Arabia before being recruited by British military intelligence during WWI to help draw the borders of Iraq. This unforgettable documentary takes unique look at both a remarkable woman and the tangled history of Iraq, while transporting us into a past that is eerily current.

Kleptoscope returns with an evening focussed on Nigeria, a country criticised by former Prime Minister David Cameron as “fantastically corrupt”. Chaired by investigative journalist Oliver Bullough, a panel of experts will address the roots of Nigerian corruption, ask why so much of the stolen money ends up in London, and discuss why more isn’t being done to give it back.

Of the many questions that remain to be addressed as Brexit negotiations commence are the status of EU nationals resident in the UK, and how Europeans will be economically and socially impacted by the UK’s exit of the EU. Meanwhile official reaction on the continent to the high court’s ruling on article 50 has been quiet, with national governments regarding the decision as an internal matter. We will be joined by EU correspondents and European journalists to discuss European reactions to Brexit negotiations and explore how UK press coverage matches up to sentiments on the continent.

More than 20,000 people disappeared in Mexico during the horrifically violent war on drugs waged by former President Calderon. With each missing person, a family is left behind in a desperate search to get answers from a government that is suspiciously ambivalent. Putting a human face on the most harrowing of statistics, director Alicia Calderon courageously captures the stories of three mothers – Natividad, Guadalupe, and Margarita – as they search for their children who have gone missing.

Since Yemen’s civil war began in 2014, the country has been embroiled in fighting between forces loyal to the president, backed by a Saudi-led coalition, and Shia Houthi rebels. Is enough consideration of Yemen’s humanitarian contexts being taken in arms exporting and counter-terrorism? With a judicial review aiming to halt UK arms sales to Saudi Arabia beginning in February – and US involvement in the country changing under the Trump administration – we will discuss the role of foreign powers in Yemen’s civil conflict.