The Annual Front Line Defenders Lecture was established in 2013 to provoke discussion and debate about the range of issues affecting human rights defenders as they work tirelessly to bring about changes and build robust civil societies. Held in partnership with universities in Dublin, Belfast and Galway, the lecture is broadly accessible to a general audience with an interest in philosophy, law, human rights, current affairs and politics.

Website: https://www.frontlinedefenders.org/en/annual-front-line-defenders-lecture

About the Lecture

Title: How Afghan Women are Defying the Taliban

Description: The Taliban’s takeover in August 2021 sparked a new period of prolonged and profound repression of human rights in Afghanistan, which has impacted Afghan women and girls in particular.

Horia Mosadiq’s lecture will address human rights, particularly the situation for women’s rights under the Taliban and the struggle of Human Rights Defenders and Women Human Rights Defenders in this context, as well as what we can do to support them.

About the Lecturer: Horia Mosadiq is an Afghan Woman Human Rights Defender (WHRD) and journalist with more than two decades of experience in human rights, peace, justice and reconciliation, transitional justice, gender, security, and violent extremism in Afghanistan and South Asia. A well-known and well-respected WHRD, Horia is the founder of a number of organisations, including Conflict Analysis Network (CAN), a research, advocacy, and capacity-building think thank focusing on violent extremism, radicalisation, and its impact on human rights; as well as Safety and Risk Mitigation Organization (SRMO), which focuses on the protection of Human Rights Defenders.

With ample experience as a researcher and advisor, she has worked with many international organisations and think thanks including European Institute of Peace (EIP), Geneva Call, Safer World, PEN International, International Alert, Amnesty International, UNICEF, Action Aid, CIVICUS, UNICEF and UNDP among others. She has received numerous awards including the 2007 National Human Rights Award in Afghanistan, the 2012 and 2015 Women Rights Defender Award from Amnesty International, and her most recent one, the 2020 Award from Afghan Women’s Network (AWN) for her outstanding work on women, peace, justice and reconciliation.