HARPAS/REUTERS Media Training Workshop
Cairo, Egypt, 8-11 September 2007

From the 8th to the 11th of September 2007, HARPAS has organized a regional training workshop co-facilitated by UNDP and the Reuters Foundations employing UNDP's transformative leadership and development enhancement methodologies that have generated highly effective responses to the epidemic in the region, in synergy with the Media professional expertise of the Reuters Foundation. The workshop gathered 35 elite journalists from all Arab Countries.

The main objectives were to project the HIV response as one of the key human rights and developmental challenges facing the Arab region; point out that the underlying causes that fuel the HIV epidemic include stigma and discrimination against peo[ple living with the HIV (PLWH) and finally mobilize and empower press members to be able to better present HIV related issues in a way that dispel stigma and promote the rights of PLWH.

The expected outcomes are as following:

1. Building-up the capacity of press members to promote the rights of PLWH and limit HIV/AIDS stigma and discrimination

2. Building-up the capacity of press members to ensure human rights based and professionally effective coverage of HIV related stories in the Arab press.

3. Increase the capacity of leading high profile journalists to promote a positive cultural change.

4. Increase the capacity of press members to ensure a human rights based and professionally effective HIV prevention/awareness messages.

5. Generate individual and collective action to address barriers and provide networks of support towards a press protecting and promoting the rights of PLWH and vulnerable group.

As one result, HARPAS has partnered with the Arab Film industry through a Memorandum of Understanding with the award-winning Arab production house, Arascope Films. Currently 26 documentary television episodes titled "Baheb El Hayat" (Love Life) on HIV/AIDS are being created from a human rights and development perspective to be aired regionally. HIV/AIDS Arts and Media (A&M) experts have also put their talents to work at regional festivals including the Cartage and Cairo film festivals. HARPAS is also working in partnership with MediaHouse Films (12 episodes) and with the regional radio Saut Al-Arab (3 series of 12 episodes) on the creation of a year long series focusing on PLWH and a range of awareness raising issues that will promote healthy, destigmatizing behavior.

- Facilitation of two workshops for Civil Society Leaders and Media
Tripoli, Libya, 22-25 March 2006

- Regional Media Workshop
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, 27-29 November 2006

- Regional training for Arab Media
Cairo, Egypt, November 2005

In early March 2003 in Cairo, an A&M panel composed of leading Egyptian artists and media professionals discussed their potential responses to HIV/AIDS in the region. Building on commitments made in March, in July 2003, UNDP organized the first regional HIV/AIDS workshop for Arts and Media Professionals'. Over 130 prominent A&M professionals from 13 Arab countries participated in this milestone meeting, committing themselves to a number of far-reaching initiatives. This included regular talk shows, producing songs, promoting lectures and discussions at schools and universities to raise awareness among younger audiences, increasing press coverage, and donating proceeds from music concerts to local HIV/AIDS organizations.

A year later, another workshop for Francophone countries followed in Agadir, Morocco September 2004. Forty key artists and journalists from Algeria, Djibouti, Morocco and Tunisia participated in the workshop. As in the pioneering Cairo A&M meetings, artists and media professionals in Agadir committed themselves to producing films, poems, paintings, drawings and stories about HIV/AIDS that have new depth. They agreed to fight AIDS discrimination and misinformation with sensitive, balanced, and accurate reporting and art that challenges the discursive foundations of misperceptions of HIV/AIDS.

Dr. Khadija Moalla
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