Conferences

The 84th (6th year) Goftegu, a bridge between the elite and the citizens, of Armanshahr Foundation, was held at the French Cultural Institute in Kabul on 24th November 2011 with the title of “People’s message to Bonn Conference.”[1] The meeting marked the approaching Human Rights Day, the National Day of Victims in Afghanistan and the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women and it was organised in cooperation with the working group.[2] About 120 members of the civil society, students and human rights activists took part in the meeting.

The 83rd (6th year) Goftegu, a bridge between the elite and the citizens, of Armanshahr Foundation, marking the 15th anniversary of Armanshahr/Open Asia, was held at the French Cultural Institute of Kabul on 27th October 2011, with a performance by Master Wahid Qasemi, singer, composer, musician and music researcher.

The film had been chosen, because it portrayed methods of wiping out collective memory by burning books and controlling the public opinion on the one hand, and the people’s resistance and disobedience on the other, where the people burned among their own books but save them to defend the human experience and collective memory.

81st Goftegu Public Debate: Against Oblivion (screening of Fahrenheit 451 by Francois Truffaut)

The literary circles of Afghanistan have been talking about postmodernism with all its contradictions since 10 years ago. There are three groups that endorse, reject or critique it, mostly on a non-serious basis. There has hardly been a serious discussion of its relationship to war, traditions and fundamentalism.

The 79th (Year V) Goftegu public debate, a bridge between the elites and the citizens, of Armanshahr Foundation was held in cooperation with the French Institute Afghanistan and Physicians for Human Rights at the Institute’s amphitheatre on 21 July 2011 under the title of “In search of truth and justice, a study of half a century of crisis in Afghanistan” and to introduce to newly published books: ‘A Review of War Ruins’, and ‘A selection of Simorgh Stories’. The speakers were: Messers Stefan Schmidt (from Physicians for Human Rights), Alireza Rohani (Senior adviser at the AIHRC and Director of Law faculty Ibn Sina University), Rafigh Shaheer (Member of Parliament), Aziz Rafiee (Managing Director of Afghanistan Civil Society Forum.( About 60 human rights activists, students, academics and media representatives were present at the meeting.

Armanshahr Foundation in collaboration with Physicians for Human Rights and the French Institute of Afghanistan in Kabul is pleased to invite you to its 79th (year V) public debate GOFTEGU and the public presentation of […]

Invitation to 78th Goftegu Public Debate: The Role of Citizens in Building a Peace of the Just

Speakers: Lucia Direnberger (Researcher and PhD student at l’Université de Paris VII), Mazari Safa (ex-Vice minister of Women’s social affairs), Mohammad Aslam Jawadi (Director of Sociology department of Kateb University)

Speakers: Ms. Fatana Ishaq Gailani (Founder and chairwoman of Afghanistan Women Council), M. Mohammad Sarwar Hosseini (Deputy-head of Literacy and Informal Training at the Ministry of Education), M. Mohammad Aslam Jawadi (Director of Sociology Department of Kateb University), Ms. Safa Mazari (Director of orphanages, Ministry of Labour and Social affairs)