Past Events and Screenings

The recent KONY 2012 campaign video has been met with strong criticism, but nobody can question its effectiveness in reaching a mass audience.

Despite its inaccuracies this campaign has created wider awareness about Joseph Kony and the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) than any news report or campaign that has come before it, so what can be learned? Join us for April’s First Wednesday as we debate whether the KONY 2012 campaign is a force for good or a worrying development in campaigning.

When he came to power in June 2000 few perhaps expected the UK graduate of Medicine Bashar al-Assad would prove to be a ruthless dictator. Syria, Assads’ Twilight looks at the history of the Assad regime and its chances of survival.

Every year hundreds of people, most of them women, are attacked with acid in Pakistan. Saving Face is a heartbreaking and human documentary that follows two of these survivors as they reveal their internal and external scars.

Before any political revolution was in sight in the middle east, filmmakers Javeria Rizvi Kabani, Jonny von Walstrom and Alexandra Sandels visited Egypt, Tunisia, and Lebannon to witness the network revolutions already taking place. Following young activists, journalists, and bloggers we learn that silence is no longer an option among those with access to the new digital tools and networks created in the last few years.

From Senegal in the West to Somalia in the East runs a fault line, ‘the knife edge where Islam and Christianity meet’. This area of land separates the continent’s 400 million Muslims from its 500 million Christians.

Join us to discuss Africa’s fault line with New York Times bestseller Eliza Griswold and the BBC’s Africa Editor Solomon Mugera.

There’s a long tradition in Afghanistan of families with no sons choosing to bring up one of their daughters as a boy. For the girls this means growing up dressed in boy’s clothes, answering to a boy’s name and being allowed the freedoms and privileges Afghan boys enjoy both within the family and outside.

Tahir Qadiry’s film looks at the issue from a number of different perspectives. He spends time with a girl currently growing up as a boy, talks to a young woman who’s still coming to terms with her experience being raised as a boy, seeks the opinion of a mullah and hears from a human rights activist.

Vladimir Putin is back in presidential office for a third term after four years as Russia’s Prime Minister. We will be asking what the people of Russia think of the man who has dominated the country’s politics for more than 12 years and will now be President for a new extended term of six years?

Tens of thousands of Muscovites have taken part in protests to demand free and fair elections. But how deep and how far does the disaffectedness go? Join us to discuss the outcome of the presidential elections in Russia and what they mean for the future of the people of Russia and its development on the world stage.

Screenings from the Frontline with Al Jazeera is a new initiative to contextualise the news and working experiences of journalists and filmmakers reporting from the political hotspots of our time.
Each screening of a pre-broadcast special report will be attended by the producers, cameramen and directors who will discuss the process of making them.

Since the start of the 2003 conflict in Darfur, questions have been raised about the role played by the United Nations and the viability of its mandate.

Join us at the Frontline Club to discuss the actions of the UN and whether they are still failing Darfur.

How are the rules of reporting being rewritten by risk? What innovative methods are journalists using to report from some of the world’s most dangerous places?

Journalists working in areas of conflict reveal how they get information when traditional techniques are insufficient. The discussion will focus on the interaction between local hires and foreign journalists. 

EXTERNAL EVENT HELD AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION OF GREAT BRITAIN

Join us at the Royal Institution of Great Britain to discuss the growing tensions between Iran and the West, the internal power struggle within Iranian power elites and what the future could hold for the pro-democracy Green Movement.

EXTERNAL EVENT HELD AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION OF GREAT BRITAIN

Join us as we bring together a prominent panel to discuss the growing tensions between Iran, its neighbours and the West, the impact of the power struggles at the heart of government and looking at the future of the pro-democracy movement.

DOX BOX Global day is an initiative to keep the Syrian film festival alive by hosting a screening night on 15 March. The date marks not only what would be the closing night of the fifth festival that originated in Syria, but also the one year anniversary of the uprising in the country.

Governments and security forces are becoming increasingly wise to the role of social media in organising and enhancing protest movements.

One of the most popular sports in the Middle East, camel racing is a prestigious and wealthy sport. Desert Riders exposes how the use of young boys as jockeys and the trafficking industry that has developed to bring them from Bangladesh, Pakistan, Mauritania and Sudan.

Jasad and the Queen of Contradictions is a documentary about Lebanese poet and writer Joumana Haddad who has stirred controversy in the Middle East for having founded “Jasad” (the Body), a cultural quarterly Arabic-language magazine. Dedicated to the body’s art, science and literature, “Jasad” is one of the first of its kind in the Arab world.

Political tension are rising in Pakistan following the the Supreme Courts decision to charge Prime Minister Yousef Raza Gilani with contempt for failing to re-open corruption cases against President Asif Ali Zardari.

We will be bringing together a panel of experts to discuss the deepening political crisis in Pakistan and ask what lies ahead.

Marwan Bishara Al Jazeera English’s senior political analyst and editor will be joining senior BBC presenter and special correspondent Lyse Doucet to discuss the roots of the uprisings across the Arab world, how they have evolved from country to country, the shifts they have created in the region and asking what lies ahead as people continue to battle for freedom and justice?

A year after the Arab Spring Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen are still coming to terms with the realities that the fall of their respective dictators created. Some other countries are still struggling and revolts are ongoing in Syria and Bahrain. But what about countries in the Middle East that have born witness to the Arab Spring but haven’t been noticeably been touched by it?

In this documentary Shaimaa Khalil speaks to young Saudis, opposition leaders and tribe elders and asks whether the Arab Spring could ever find it’s way to The Kingdom.

As journalists are increasingly expected to multi-task and provide the text, photography, video and tweets for their stories, writer A. A. Gill and photographer Tom Craig will mount a defence of their increasingly rare form of partnership and the insights and enrichment two sides on each story can bring. Before the opening of an exhibition of their work, the pair will speak at the Frontline Club about their close collaboration and the stories they have explored together.