A passionate and articulate presentation

ICTV Victoria, December 22, 2009

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Afghan Parliamentarian Malalai Joya spoke in Victoria recently. She revealed what is really going on in Afghanistan and it is not at all the picture relayed to us by our Corporate Media. She discusses the massive corruption of the Karzai government, the thriving opium trade, and the reasons why 'Warlord Harper' and his NATO cronies should leave Afghanistan immediately... A passionate and articulate presentation.

"The price you are now paying deserves more than a song but this is the only way we have to make people know your dreams and your story."

Flavio Oreglio and Dario Canossi, track number 2 from "GIU" album

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To Malalai Joya,

We wrote the song Kabul after reading by chance an article talking about you. We took interest in your story and searched news concerning you in internet. In every line we read, we found in you the only real novelty in the new story of Afghanistan, the only sign of a possible change, the only path leading out of the dark ages.

Your bravery in facing openly power, of the Taliban and of those who sat next to you in the Loya Jirga, has filled our hearts.

Joya’s opposition to the U.S.-NATO occupation of Afghanistan began shortly after foreign troops arrived in 2001

Text: Aaron Glantz / Video: Cliff Parker, New America Media, December 9, 2009

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Malalai Joya has been called “Afghanistan’s bravest woman.” When the Taliban ruled her country, she braved death, running an underground girls school. When the US military overthrew the Taliban she ran for parliament.

But that doesn’t mean she’s a supporter of the U.S. military, or President Obama’s decision to double the number of American troops in her country.

“Unfortunately, President Obama’s foreign policy is a lot like [the] criminal Bush,” she said in a sit-down in interview during a recent visit to San Francisco. “He follows war in Afghanistan, in Iraq, in Pakistan.”

This feisty woman packed the house at the University of Winnipeg and spoke with passion about the oppression of her people

Peace Alliance Winnipeg, November 23, 2009

Malalai Joya visited Winnipeg on November 16 and 17 as part of her 2009 cross-country tour to convince Canadians to press for the withdrawal of their troops from Afghanistan.

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Full video of Joya's in depth lecture about her perspective on the situation in Afghanistan

By Kriss Bacon, The York Life Blog, November 21, 2009

On November 19th Malalai Joya, an outspoken and controversial MP in her country of Afghanistan, came to York University and spoke in depth about her perspective on the situation in Afghanistan. She discussed Human and Woman rights in Afghanistan, drug and war lords, the Afghan government, democratic elections in Afghanistan, NATO involvement and occupation, George Bush, and President Obama.

Interview: A woman among warlords

The Real News, November 21, 2009

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Malalai Joya is an Afghan politician who has been called "the bravest woman in Afghanistan." As an elected member of the Wolesi Jirga from Farah province, she has publicly denounced the presence of what she considers warlords and war criminals in the parliament.

Malalai Joya speaks about the current status of women in Afghanistan

CTV News, November 19, 2009

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"Today's situation is as catastrophic as it was under the domination of the Taliban in most provinces of Afghanistan," Joya said

CTV.ca, Nov. 18 2009

Malalai Joya, author of 'A Woman Among Warlords,' speaks on CTV's Canada AM, Wednesday, Nov. 18, 2009.

The thousands of NATO forces currently fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan will never bring democracy to the war-torn country, says the youngest person ever elected to the Afghan parliament, who is calling on Canada to withdraw its troops and step up humanitarian aid to the region.

Malalai Joya spoke to packed halls in Victoria (300 people), Vancouver (1000) and Winnipeg (300)

Peace Alliance Winnipeg, November 17, 2009

Malalai Joya speaking at Convocation Hall, University of Winnipeg, Nov. 16, 2009. Photo: Glenn Michalchuk

Malalai Joya spoke to a pack house of in Winnipeg last night at the University of Winnipeg. Three hundred people jammed into Convocation Hall to hear the Afghan MP’s passionate denunciation of the occupation of her country by NATO forces. Her contempt for the Taliban, the Karzai government and the warlords who back it was equally fierce.

Joya's verbal attacks on the warlords prompted death threats and cost her her job in parliament.

abc7news.com, November 10, 2009

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BERKELEY, CA (KGO) -- A former female member of Afghanistan's parliament is in the Bay Area urging the president and NATO to remove foreign troops from Afghanistan.

Malalai Joya wrote a book called "A Woman among Warlords." She says Afghanistan does not need more foreign troops, it needs education and jobs. She feels her people will get rid of the Taliban and warlords.

Joya writes: "But it is all a lie."

Press Pass TV, November 5, 2009

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Malalai Joya, now 31, was the youngest ever woman elected to the Afghan Parliament in 2005 and is an outspoken critic of the Karzai government and NATO occupation. Press Pass TV caught up with Joya and supporters at an event hosted in Dorchester by Dorchester People for Peace and United for Justice with Peace.

Malalai Joya: An Afghan Voice on the War

On October 25 Malalai Joya delivered a lecture in Brown University in Rhode Island which was sponsored by Anti-War Action at Brown and the RI Mobilization Committee.

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Filmed by Paul Hubbard

Eric Garris, Antiwar.com, October 28, 2009

“The Bravest Woman in Afghanistan,” Malalai Joya did two CNN interviews on Thursday. Joya is an elected member of the Afghanistan parliament who has been suspended for “insulting fellow members of parliament” in a television interview. She is articulate and firm in her position that the Western occupation is feeding the violence.

The first interview was broadcast on CNN (US). In the middle of the interview, as Joya made clear she opposed US occupation, interviewer Heidi Collins said “occupation would certainly your word, a lot of people would take great issue with you calling the US presence in your country an ‘occupation’.” Joya went on to defend her position as Collins’ interrupted snidely. As Joya tried to respond to Collins, she was cut off.

GRITtv, October 28, 2009

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“I don’t fear death, I fear political silence against injustice,” says Malalai Joya, the youngest person elected to the Afghan parliament and a delegate to the Loya Jirga, the constitutional convention. Joya was 25 when she spoke to the Loya Jirga, decrying the warlords who controlled her country. She is equally scathing in her critique of the Bush administration and the U.S. occupation, calling for the troops to leave and for Americans to raise their voice against the war.

AMY GOODMAN, Democracy Now, October 28, 2009

Malalai Joya, one of Afghanistan’s leading democracy activists. In 2005, she became the youngest person ever elected to the Afghan parliament. She was suspended in 2007 for her denunciation of warlords and their cronies in government. She has just published her memoir, A Woman Among Warlords: The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Woman Who Dared to Speak Out, co-written by Derrick O’Keefe.

AMY GOODMAN: To talk more about Afghanistan, we’re joined here in our firehouse studio by Malalai Joya, one of Afghanistan’s leading democracy activists. In 2005, she became the youngest person ever elected to the Afghan parliament. She was suspended in 2007 for her denunciation of warlords and their cronies in government. She has just written her memoir, A Woman Among Warlords: The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Woman Who Dared to Speak Out. It was written with Derrick O’Keefe.

CNN, October 28, 2009

Joya speaks against US occupation of Afghanistan in her interview with CNN.

CNN International:

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Malalai Joya's speech in New York at the Northeast Socialist Conference

Democracy Now, October 27, 2009

Malalai Joya is one of Afghanistan’s leading democracy activists. In 2005, she became the youngest person ever elected to the Afghan parliament. She was suspended in 2007 for her denunciation of warlords and their cronies in government. She has just written her memoir, “A Woman Among Warlords: The Extraordinary Story of an Afghan Woman Who Dared to Speak Out.”

She spoke in New York at the Northeast Socialist Conference on October 23, 2009.

Malalai Joya: The woman who will not be silenced

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An opportunity to hear prominent Afghan politician Malalai Joya

Frontline Club (London), July 28, 2009

An opportunity to hear prominent Afghan politician Malalai Joya, who has been called the "the bravest woman in Afghanistan" speaking at the Frontline Club.

Elected in 2005 to the new Afghan Parliament Malalai Joya, who has campaigned for women’s rights and taken on the warlords in 2003 with a powerful speech objecting to their presence at a conference to draft the Afghan constitution, has recently been in Australia to packed audiences.

Women’s rights activist courts controversy, rails against warlords

Reporter: Kerry O'Brien, ABC-Australia, The 7.30 Report, June 30, 2009

Malalai Joya spent much of her childhood in refugee camps in Iran and Pakistan, before returning to Afghanistan in the 1990s, working to promote women's health and education. Joya was elected to parliament, has survived assassination attempts, travels with a bodyguard, but may stand again at the August election. A secular Muslim, she's a critic of fundamentalists in the Taliban and the northern alliance and says her country needs to find its own way to democracy without military intervention.

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Transcript

KERRY O'BRIEN, PRESENTER: Malalai Joya spent much of her childhood in refugee camps in Iran and Pakistan before returning to her Afghanistan home in the Taliban-era of the late nineties, working underground to promote women's health and education for girls. She burst into the public eye with a brief but electrifying public appearance at a constitutional assembly in Kabul in 2003 called Loya Jirga.