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Afghan Activist Malalai Joya in Capital District
By maudeaster on 2013-10-05 10:01:33
Malalai Joya, an extraordinary young Afghan woman, known around the world for her courageous voice for justice
and
District on Wednesday, October oth, She is on a speaking tour across the US focused on the Afghan experience of the 12
long years since the US invasion.
peace while a member of the Afghan parliament, will speak in the Capital
In 2010, Time magazine called her one of the world’s 100 most influential people, Foreign Policy magazine listed
her among its Top Global Thinkers and BBC termed her “the bravest woman of Afghanistan”. Malalai’s powerful
story is told in A Woman among Warlords.
Since 2003, when Malalai was elected at age 25 to a convention to write a new Afghan Constitution, she has condemned
loudly and publicly the US policy of promoting into power the same warlords who destroyed much of her country during the
Afghan civil war.
In 2005, as one of the only 68 women elected to the 249-seat parliament, she demanded to speak, had her mike cut off after
2 minutes of truth-telling about the warlords in the room and was suspended from the National Assembly. Since then she
has courageously continued to speak out, surviving six assassination attempts.
Now, in year 12 of the Afghan War, Malalai calls for the end to all foreign intervention in Afghanistan, including the
removal of all US forces. She believes strongly that Afghans themselves must work out their future. Listen to her Oct.
34 interview on Democracy Now: “Imperialism and Fundamentalism Have Joined Hands.”
Malalai has worked tirelessly since her teens in support of the rights of Afghan women, first as a teacher in secret girls’
schools and then establishing a free medical clinic and orphanage in her impoverished home province of Farah.
Malalai will speak twice on Wed, Oct. 9". She will speak first at 1 PM at Bush Memorial Auditorium at Russell Sage
College (Congress & First St in Troy). Then at 7 PM, she will speak at Emerson Hall of the First Unitarian
Universalist Society of Albany (405 Washington Ave, free parking in the U Albany Hawley lot across Washington
from FUUSA). Both events are free and open to the public.
Malalai’s presentations in the Capital District are organized by Women Against War and Bethlehem Neighbors for
Peace, with 16 other local organizations co-sponsoring her visit. Malalai’s presentations are part of a national
speaking tour sponsored by the United National Antiwar Coalition.
For information contact:info@WomenAgainstWar.org or Joe Lombardo 518-281-1968
