Abraji confirms 30 international speakers for the 16th Congress

foto: Catherine Gicheru/ Code for Keyna

Abraji's 16th International Congress of Investigative Journalism, to be held remotely again from August 23 to 29, has already confirmed 30 international speakers. Registrations are now opened.

From the United States, Julie Brown of the Miami Herald, author of the investigative series that revealed the child sex abuse network headed by businessman Jeffrey Epstein; Neil Brown, president of the Poynter Institute; Cade Metz, coordinator of technology coverage with The New York Times; Raney Aronson-Rath, executive producer of the Frontline program on PBS public network; Sean Sposito (Paranoids/ Verizon Media), digital security specialist who helps media and reporters to protect themselves against coordinated attacks, Viktorya Vilk,  director of digital safety and free expression programs at PEN America,  Garrett Therolf,  reporter at UC Berkeley's Investigative Reporting Program, who worked for the Los Angeles Times for a decade, focusing on stories about children and families living on the margins, Sally Lehrman, CEO of The Trust Project; Charity Brown,  deputy editor of Newsroom Product and Digital News Projects at The Washington Post; and Willa Crolius, from Tata Consultancy Services.

Julie Brown, from Miami Herald

To debate the decline of democracy in India and the attacks on women journalists, the speaker will be Neha Dexit, an award-winning investigative reporter and freelancer for several international media who has suffered threats since last year. At the same panel will be Vidya Krishnan, health expert who writes for Atlantic (USA) and Caravan (India), author of the book "Phantom Plague: The Untold Story of How Tuberculosis Shaped our History".

Zaffar Abbas, editor of Pakistan's Dawn newspaper, the country's oldest and largest English-language outlet, will show the difficulties of doing investigative journalism in Southeast Asia. In 2019, he won the press freedom award from the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) for his career history, devoted to covering civil wars, religious extremism, and terrorism in Southeast Asia. A journalist from Hong Kong who Abraji will not identified for security reasons. Cédric Alviani, a French national who serves as East Asia Bureau Director for press freedom watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) was also invited.

The award-winning Kenyan journalist Catherine Gicheru, founder of the Africa Women Journalism Project (AWJP) and an expert in combating disinformation and newsroom innovation, will discuss successful experiences on the African continent with Hannah Ajakaiye, a nigerian journalist who leads a project to build collaborations and digital strategies among journalists, fact checkers and social media influencers to combat health misinformation.

Paul Bradshaw, who leads the master's courses in Data Journalism and Mobility and Multiplatform Journalism at Birmingham City University, England, joins a debate on how universities need to incorporate the new demands of the market. Giancarlo Fiorella, a specialist in investigative techniques using satellite images, will explain the work of Bellingcat, the British investigative journalism collective responsible for exposing the lies about the Malaysian Airlines plane crash in Ukraine and the war in Syria.

The amazing line-up of speakers also include Nathan Jaccard, editor for Latin America at OCCRP (Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project,  spanish Antonio Baquero, editor of Europe for OCCRP, Milagros Salazar, a peruvian investigative journalist and university professor specializing in database use and director of Convoca, Juan Marin Diaz, data science and co-funder of Datasketch, and Alejandra Ibarra Chaoul, who created and directs Defensores de la Democracia, a project in memory of murdered reporters in Mexico, is also on the program.

Abraham Jiménez Enoa, from Cuba, nicaraguan-costa rican Lucía Pineda Ubau and colombian Jonathan Bock Ruíz will discuss the decline of democracy in their countries. Enoa works in Havana for The Washington Post and magazine Gatopard. Ubau was arrested for six months in Managua accused of “inciting violence and hate” and “promoting terrorism". Jonathan is the executive director of FLIP (Fundación para la Libertad de Prensa). 

To discuss international projects to investigate environment and climate change, Abraji invited Brazilian Gustavo Faleiros to be a host in a session with  Andrés Bermúdez Liévano, based in Colombia and the coordinator at the Latin American Center for Investigative Journalism (CLIP), and Alice Ross and Lucy Jordan, from Unearthed, a Greenpeace Investigative unit.

Themes

The central themes of the 16th edition of the Congress will be attacks on the press, business models and sustainability, digital security, environment, risks to democracy, pandemics, and misinformation. The activities will be divided into five axes: Works and ways of doing; Scenarios and trends; Journalism under attack; Learning and theory; and Learning and practice.

"Producing an online version of the Abraji Congress was a great challenge in 2020, but it worked well, and I believe that with the integration of several suggestions from the participants, this year's event will be even better. Besides, we wanted a greater international diversity in the sessions, bringing experiences from Asia and Africa, for example", says the president of the association, Marcelo Träsel.

As in 2020, the largest meeting of journalism in Latin America will have two parallel events. On Saturday (28 August 2021), the VIII Research Seminar on Investigative Journalism will take place, with the presentation of scientific articles and students' undergraduate thesis (TCCs). The third edition of Data Sunday, scheduled for 29.Aug.2021, gathers courses and workshops focused on data journalism, and lectures with experts on the area. 

Pay as much as you can - or nothing!

Like in 2020, in view of the health and economic crisis, the Congress will be free of charge. However, those who can afford it will be asked to donate any amount for Abraji to continue defending the freedom of speech and of the press and the right of access to information. 

Held annually since 2005, the Abraji Congress brought together more than 1,200 people in 2019. In 2020, it broke attendance records with 10,000 registrants. The sessions will be live and recorded. For debates with English-speaking guests, there will be simultaneous translation and it will be possible to choose the language.

*Translated for Abraji by Cau Duarte
* Updated in August 11, 2.00 pm, by Maria Esperidião