10th Geneva Summit – Feb. 20, 2018

9:00  Welcome

• Hillel Neuer
  Executive Director of UN Watch, on behalf of the 25 NGO co-sponsors of the Geneva Summit

9:10  Opening Address

• Luis Almagro
  Secretary General of the Organization of American States

9:30  Fighting Authoritarianism 

Moderator:  Javier El-Hage, Chief Legal Officer, Human Rights Foundation

• Asli Erdoğan
  Renowned Turkish novelist, human rights advocate, former political prisoner
• Guillermo Fariñas Hernández 
  Cuban psychologist, journalist, former political prisoner
• Pastor Evan Mawarire
  Zimbabwean dissident, founder of #ThisFlag movement protesting Mugabe regime
• Effy Nguyen 
  Son of Vietnamese activist and political prisoner Nguyen Trung Ton

10:30  Journalist under attack : the case of Pakistan 

• Taha Siddiqui 
  Award-winning Pakistani journalist, attacked for criticizing the military

10:45  China After Liu Xiabo

Moderator : Yang Jianli, President of Initiatives for China, former political prisoner

• Lam Wing-kee
  Hong-Kong bookseller abducted by China for selling banned books
• Golog Jigme 
  Tibetan monk, human rights activist, former political prisoner

11:30  The Girl Who Escaped ISIS

Interviewer: Jonny Gould, British journalist and broadcaster

• Farida Abbas Khalaf
  Yazidi who escaped slavery, author of “The Girl Who Beat ISIS”

12:00  Presentation : 2018 International Women’s Rights Award

Presenter: Ruth Dreifuss, First female president of Switzerland

Recipient : Julienne Lusenge
Congolese women’s rights champion fighting rape as a weapon of war, president of Solidarité Féminine pour la paix et le développement Intégra (SOFEPADI)

————————- 12:30  Lunch ————————

14:00  Should Venezuela Be On The United Nations Human Rights Council?

Moderator : María-Alejandra Aristeguieta Álvarez, Coordinator of Iniciativa Por Venezuela

• Irwin Cotler
  Chair of Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights, member of OAS inquiry on Venezuela and the ICC, former Canadian MP, Minister of Justice & MP, Attorney General
• Antonio Ledezma
  Mayor of Caracas, recently escaped political prisoner
• Luis Almagro
  Secretary General of the Organization of American States

15:00  Equal rights : Decriminalizing homosexuality in Uganda

• Kasha Jacqueline
  Ugandan LGBT activist, director of Freedom and Roam Uganda

15:15  Iran: The 2018 Protests

Moderator : Maryam Nayeb Yazdi, human rights activist, founder of Persian2English.com

• Maziar Bahari
  Journalist and filmmaker jailed and tortured by Iran, author of New York Times bestseller “Then They Came For Me”
• Maryam Malekpour
  Sister of Saeed Malekpour, an innocent software developer imprisoned in Iran for “spreading corruption on earth”

16:00  Tortured in North Korea

Interviewer : Hillel Neuer, Executive Director of UN Watch

• Fred and Cindy Warmbier
  Parents of the late Otto Warmbier, an American student who died after being tortured in North Korea
  
• Kenneth Bae
  Korean-American missionary jailed and tortured by North Korea

16:30  Universal Declaration of Human Rights : Reflection on the 70th Anniversary

• Amb. Alfred H. Moses
  Chair of UN Watch, former U.S. Ambassador to Romania, Special Presidential Envoy for the Cyprus Conflict, Special Counsel to President Jimmy Carter

16:40  Presentation of Geneva Summit 2018 Courage Award 

Presenter : Irwin Cotler
Chair of Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights

Recipient : Vladimir Kara-Murza
Leading dissident against the Putin regime, Chairman of Boris Nemtsov Foundation, survivor of two poisoning attempts

17:00  Summit Wrap-up

• Irwin Cotler
  Chair of Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights

17:15  End of Summit