Next week, representatives from more than 50 countries and 300 institutions around the world will gather in Manila, Philippines at the RightsCon Summit, where they will strategize on ways to protect the open internet and defend the digital rights of its users. We are pleased to announce that Urgent Action Fund will be participating in this leading forum on the intersection of human rights and the internet.
Partly informed by the growing concern Urgent Action Fund grantees and colleagues have expressed regarding online attacks as a response to their activism on social media and other internet spaces, Urgent Action Fund organized a panel titled Religious Fundamentalism Online and Human Rights: Perspectives and Solutions. The panel is in response to the growing presence of religious fundamentalism on the internet. Panelists will discuss how religious fundamentalism is reflected and magnified in online spaces, and its influence on the advancement of human rights, particularly women’s and LGBTQI rights. In particular, the panel will explore the impact of free expression of these groups, and linkages between online and physical violence and harm. Examples from Pakistan, Indonesia, and the Philippines will be utilized to give attendees a unique opportunity to model the potential solutions to implement strategies to keep activists safe – physically and psychologically, in the digital world. The panel will be moderated by Senior Program Officer, Meerim Ilyas .
For more information on RightsCon sessions, including Urgent Action Fund’s panel, click here. For live updates from the conference, follow @rightscon @MeerimKG @UrgentAct.
