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Rumi Forum Podcast


Rumi Forum was founded in 1999 with the mission to foster interfaith dialogue and intercultural understanding. The Forum aims to stimulate exchange of opinions in order to advance culture of democracy, freedom of thought, human rights and peace. For over 20 years, the Forum provides a common platform for building relationships, mutual learning and information exchange among adherents of different faiths. Our work has a particular focus on pluralism, peacemaking, interfaith dialogue, intercultural understanding, social harmony and community cohesion.

Jan 4, 2016

In the last couple of years, criticism of the government has become a risky business in Turkey. Hundreds of journalists critical of the government, including some prominent ones, have been dismissed. Turkey even found itself for a period in the same camp as North Korea, China and Iran by banning Twitter and YouTube. Enormous tax evasion fines have been levied against the free enterprise that dare to remain critical. Offices of numerous businesses have been raided and their assets have been frozen through illegal seizure.

Join us for a luncheon talk with Kerim Balci to hear insights into the extent and changing nature of government infringement on individual, enterprise and media freedoms over the last few years.

Biography:
Turkish writer, journalist and academician Kerim Balci is recently the Editor-in-Chief of Turkish Review, a bimonthly journal published by Zaman Media Group of Turkey. Balci is a frequent columnist in Today’s Zaman and Zaman dailies, both the largest circulating newspapers in their boulevards, and correspondents to several local and international TV channels on issues related to the Middle East.

Apart from his professional job in journalism, Balci works with interfaith dialogue groups in Europe to promote multiculturalism in Europe. He served as the President of the London based Dialogue Society for two and a half years before his current assignment in Istanbul. He has edited a book named Whose War? in Turkish dealing with the Iraqi War and published an album called Ottoman Jerusalem in Photographs (IRCICA, Istanbul, 2009, Published in Turkish, English and Arabic.) and another album with modern photographs of the city called Kutsallığın Başkenti Kudüs [Jerusalem: Capital of Sanctity](TİMAŞ, Istanbul, 2011). Balcı published several articles in academic and popular books and encyclopedias, mainly about the Middle East, Turkish Politics, US Policy in the Middle East, and interfaith dialogue.

Kerim Balci studied Physics and Political Science and International Relations in the Bosporus University of Turkey. He has an MA from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the city where he served as the representative of Zaman Turkish Daily for eight years. Balci is currently a PhD candidate at the Durham University of the UK on linguistic philosophy.

Event Date: Wednesday, December 2, 2015