expression is the forum newspaper, bringing you news and updates from the Global Forum on Freedom of Expression. #3 out now! Download the pdf-version here.

expression is the forum newspaper, bringing you news and updates from the Global Forum on Freedom of Expression. #2 out now! Download the pdf-version here.

This is the absolute last chance to complete registration for the Global Forum on Freedom of Expression.

We will be closing down the registration pages on Friday, May 15th at 5pm GMT.

If you would like to join the most prominent international advocacy networks and champions for free expression, you must complete registration now! Go to https://www.rsvpbook.com/event.php?490966&ph=DNFJD2, and you will be reserve your space at:
Seminars:
• From Tiananmen to the Olympics: Campaign Review
• For God’s Sake: the Line Between Religion and Censorship
• Expressing Sexual Identity
• Media in Conflict: Propaganda and Counterstrategies
Training Sessions:
• Campaign Strategy Building
• Web advocacy
• Donor Clinics
• Pitching Campaigns to International Media
Events:
• Reception at City Hall on the Oslo Waterfront
• Boat trip through the Oslo Fjord
• The IPA Freedom to Publish Award Ceremony
Exhibitions and Performance:
• Theatre from the Belarusian underground and the prisons of Burma
• Exhibitions of banned books, photography and an international cartoonists
• Oslo city day of Music
• Film festival

In just two months, leading organizations, activists, journalists, academics and thinkers will gather in Oslo for the Global Forum on Freedom of Expression. Join more than 500 registered participants, guests and speakers for a unique opportunity to meet, discuss and network for free expression across sectors and fields.

From the leaps of technology and globalization to the polemics of culture and religious dignity, from strategic advocacy to technical solutions, the Global Forum offers a full week of SEMINARS, NETWORKING, TRAINING and FESTIVAL EVENTS.

Strengthen your skills, broaden your horizons, hear from individuals who have made the difference and seize this unique opportunity to connect with the thinkers and activists shaping the way censorship is understood and challenged across the globe.

This is the only event of its kind, gathering political actors, experts and grass-roots champions from across sectors and across the globe to engage on the breadth of contemporary challenges facing this internationally protected freedom of expression.

Register NOW

The Global Forum’s REGISTRATION DEADLINE is April 15th. You must pay the registration fee by this date in order to reserve a space at individual seminars, training workshops, exhibitions, ceremonies and concerts, or to secure a hotel reservation at our Forum nightly rates.

Information on the Forum’s program and practical information is available at the Forum website in 5 languages. Visit us online at: http://expressionforum.org

Register at www.expressionforum.rsvpbook.com

Information on hotels and transportation is available in the online payment system. If you have already registered, pay the registration fee now at: https://www.rsvpbook.com/event.php?490966&ph=DNFJD2

PROGRAM:

The Global Forum on Freedom of Expression (GFFE) has added a number of exciting and inspiring people to our list of panelists and speakers. Through more than 25 different panels as well as numerous workshops, keynotes and network opportunities, themes such as free expression in times of financial crisis, religion and free expression, challenges of technology to free expression and minorities right to expression, the Global Forum will address both prevailing and current issues to the right to free expression.

These are a few of the speakers we have confirmed:

• Jonas Gahr Støre, Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs, will speak on global challenges for freedom of expression at the forum´s opening ceremony
• Tariq Ramadan, professor at Oxford University and Irshad Manji of NYU will meet to discuss the fine line between respect for religion and self censorship, and whether religious dignity deserves special protection.
• John Kampfner, chief executive of Index on Censorship will moderate a panel on how the economy can be a stimulus to increased acceptance of censorship. Also on the panel is Maxim Trudolubov, Russian newspaper editor
• UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights, Mr. Frank La Rue will join the former Special Rapporteur for the Americas Eduardo Bertoni and Special Rapporteur for the AU, Pansy Tlakula to discuss their role in the human rights and free expression debate.
• From the frontlines of the struggle for the right of free expression comes Sami El Haj, the Al Jazeera journalist who spent six years as an enemy combatant at Guantanamo, Lydia Cacho Ribeiro, recipient of the 2008 World Press Freedom Prize who continues to be harassed and jailed for her work as an investigative journalist in Mexico and Serkalim Fasil who was imprisoned in Ethiopia on charges of treason for her journalism.

Also amongst the speakers at the Global Forum: Aryeh Neier, President of the Open Society Institute, Malalai Joya, suspended Afghan Parliamentarian, Jameel Jaffer, Director of the National Security Program at the ACLU, Hanne Sophie Greve, former judge at the International Court of Justice and internationally renowned cartoonists Martin Rowson (UK), Plantu (France) and Maxim (Pakistan).

For a complete program and details, visit our website at http://expressionforum.org. Information on our website is available in English, French, Spanish, Russian and Arabic

For further information, please contact:

Christopher Wilson
Project Manager
Uranienborgveien 2
N-0258 Oslo, Norway
info@expressionforum.org”

To pay your registration fee and reserve your spot at the Global Forum, click here.  Please note that you must have paid your registration fee in order to register for specific seminars and training workshops, and to reserve a spot at the various event taking place during the Forum. The deadline for paying registration fees is April 15th.
To apply for a sponsorship grant with the Forum organizers, click here.  The Global Forum organizers are providing a limited number of grants to support the participation of local actors committed to the principles of free expression. To qualify for a sponsorship, one must demonstrate both financial need and attempts to raise participation funds elsewhere.  The deadline for sponsorship applications is  March 16th.

Please note that you will need the PIN you received in your original confirmation email to perform both of these tasks and do let me know if you have any questions.