U.S. Embassy in Manama, Bahrain has denied a visa to keynote speaker Esra’a Al Shafei
By admin on August 18th, 2009
Social South has recently received word from Esra’a Al Sahfei that officials at the US Embassy in Manama, Bahrain have denied her application for a visa to enter the U.S. to speak at Social South. As Director of Mideast Youth Foundation, she makes numerous trips to the US to speak to church organizations. The reason given, in my opinion, seemed to be weak and arbitrary (I don’t feel it’s appropriate to disclose). This means of course that Esra’a will not be joining us live on stage. We are disappointed because her story is so compelling and her use of social media for social change is so inspiring. In fact, we’re determined that her word gets out, whether or not she can physically step on American soil. We will be bringing you her keynote address via video feed. You’ll still have a chance to hear Esra’a and ask questions as though she was a few feet, not thousands of miles, away. How do you feel about the Embassy’s decision? Tell us what you think.
What a shame. I was really looking forward to meeting her. It’s great that we’ll still get to hear from her via video feed.
I was really disappointed to learn that her visa was denied. What she does is so important in today’s world, she should have a free pass to any country that is open to social change, and we are supposed to be on the top of that list! If there were a petition to appeal the decision, I’d be the first to sign!
Still, I am glad that she will still be able to share, and hopefully we’ll get her out here some other time.
Some places think by preventing access to travel around the world will prevent her from speaking about her experiences but I’m so happy to hear that she can’t be filtered and stopped, truly powerful!
Technology trumps borders.
Social South for the win.
[...] planned to be in Birmingham last month during the successful inaugural Social South conference but was unable to appear in person. Instead her moving presentation via Skype has been considered by many people to be the highlight [...]