Lebanese authorities halt a conference on gender rights

Lebanese authorities attempted to stop NEDWA, the annual regional conference on gender rights organized by the Arab Foundation for Freedoms and Equality (AFE) in Lebanon. The 3-day event (September 28-30) had gathered more than 100 activists from 12 MENA countries. In the details, the General Security and the Muslim Scholars Council tried to shut the conference after accusing the organizers of promoting “perversion” and “drug abuse”. On the second day of the conference, AFE executive director, George Azzi, refused to sign a pledge to cancel this year’s event and any similar future event. Accordingly, the GS forced Le Crillon Hotel to stop the conference, which drove organizers to move it to another hotel but faced the same pressure. This is not the first time that religious groups collaborate with Lebanese officials to end gender related activities. In a press conference held by AFE at Small Ville hotel in Badaro, Azzi described the incident as part of a systematic war against freedoms that has been unleashed in Lebanon recently. He said that AFE chose Lebanon to host its annual conference counting on its repute as a venue that still celebrates liberties contrary to other countries in the region. Azzi cautioned that the space for freedom is getting smaller every day, pointing to the coconspirator role of the security apparatus against this human rights issue, which instead of protecting liberties, support extremist factions. (AL Akhbar, October 5, 2018)

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