Linked with The Afghan Independent Journalists Association, and with The price of free speech.
She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.
Shereen Maira Sazawar, born in Afghanistan, is a talented journalist. She writes regularly in the local newspapers on issues concerning women and human rights. She is an active member of the Women’s Council in Mazar-e-Sharif. For the past three decades Shereen has been active through the media and has also penned numerous poems in Dari and Uzbeki. She has recently written an article in a local newspaper about the grievous condition of women and the degrading attitude of the warlords towards them, thus risking her life and attracting accusations of blasphemy by the religious extremists.
She says: « Peace is the continuation of life … Peace is life ».
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Shereen Sazawar – Afghanistan
She works for the Journalist Association of Afghanistan JAA, for the Women’s Council in Mazar-e-Sharif, and for the Independent Writers Association IWA. No one of these associations was found, but see below some links for Afghan women and Afghan Journalists).
Maria Shereen Sazawar was born in 1956 in Emam Sahib Village of Sar-e-Pil province. She received her early education at Mirman Khatool girls’ school. Due to her family’s unstable financial conditions she could not pursue her higher education.
But, later she joined the work in a local newspaper and for 28 yaers she has been an eminent journalist and correspondent for the Balkh Print Media. She also wrote several poems in both Dari and Uzbeki languages. All her poems are about peace, love, patriotism, ending of violence against women and peaceful coexistence. Many of her poems and articles are printed in several local and national newspapers and magazines.
During the Taliban era, that banned the education of girls and women, she was involved in providing home schooling for girls and women, which put her life at grave risk from the Taliban guerrillas. She has been selected as representative of women from Balkh area to both the Emergency Loya Jriga and Constitution loya Jirga.
In March 2004, she was invited to participate in the acts of a civil society conference in Berlin, Germany, where she represented the Association of Civil Society of Mazar-e-Sharif. Shereen is member of Independent Writers Association, Member of Association of Women Journalists and member of Amir Ali Sheer Nawayee Cultural Foundation. She is currently the editor-in-chief of a leading local governmental newspaper. (1000peacewomen).
Nach fast drei Jahren Arbeit sind jetzt die Namen der 1000 Frauen aus über 150 Ländern bekannt, die in diesem Jahr für den Friedensnobelpreis vorgeschlagen werden. Die Zahl 1000 ist ein Symbol, denn die Kandidatinnen stehen stellvertretend für unzählige Frauen, die sich weltweit für Frieden und Menschenwürde einsetzen: von Afghanistan bis Zimbabwe … (ganzer 12-seitiger Text).
Sorry, I can’t find more informations about Shereen Sazawar, Afghanistan in the Internet.
Links:
Association of Self-Publishers and Independent Writers;
The Afghan Independent Journalists Association;
Iran Dokht /Afghan Women;
Amnesty International /Women in Afghanistan: The violations continue;
Directory of Writers Associations;
The Asia Foundation names four Afghan Associations;
Iranian Writers Association (in farsi), and in english: Iranian Writers Association’s open letter to Gabriel García Márquez;
Islamic Writers Alliance News Archives, October 2006;
Afghan journalist gets death for insulting Islam;
Sentenced to death: Afghan who dared to READ about women’s rights (not in Taliban times, but six years after « liberation »);
Afghan officials apologize after police beat journalist;
The Community Fora Process in Mazar-e-Sharif, Afghanistan: a case study, December 2004, 29 pages;
U.S. support for Afghan women, children, and refugees;