He will
talk about the situation of the Kurds in Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey, and
about the many successes of the KHRP which he founded in 1992 after
arriving in Britain as a refugee. Kerim, who has himself been a prisoner in
Turkey's notorious jails, works tirelessly for KHRP. He is a great
inspiration - full of energy, intelligence and good humour.

The Kurds are the largest ethnic group in the world without their own
state. They have suffered repression in all the countries where they are
found, and while things are now looking much better in Iraq, there is still
very active repression in Turkey. The Kurdish Human Rights Project
campaigns on a wide range of issues affecting Kurdish people, and has been
spectacularly successful in bringing cases against Turkey to The European
Court of Human Rights. Over 500 cases have been brought to the Court by
KHRP. Disappearances and murder by state forces, the use of torture and
rape in prison, denial of fair trials, censorship and many other state
crimes are exposed in this way. The fact that Turkey has a string of
judgements against it has helped to mitigate the repression to some extent,
and there may now be a more hopeful future for Turkish Kurds. The Ilisu Dam
Campaign was another success for KHRP and its co-campaigners.

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Preview of Cambridge Forum for the rest of this year:

The meeting in October is entitled 'The Rise and Rise of Corporate Power'.
It is still in the planning stage, but the speakers will probably include a
Brazilian activist, and there will be a report on the European Social Forum
in London which is taking place the weekend before.

On November 16th we have David Corson-Knowles of Forest Monitor talking
about Deforestation and Human Rights. David has first-hand knowledge
having recently made fact-finding journeys to Russia and Burma. James
Hewitt who spoke about illegal logging for us last December will also be
there, and we will be reporting on our ongoing dialogue with Ridgeons about
the Indonesian timber in their Cambridge depot.

Meetings planned for 2005 and beyond will include: the environmental impact
of air travel and air freight (February 15th); asylum seekers in Britain;
the problem of access to clean drinking water for the world's poorest
people; population growth; globalisation and 'Localisation'; the future
of the UN & proposals for an alternative world parliament; human rights
vs business interests in countries such as Nigeria, Burma and Papua New
Guinea; the world arms trade and the environmental impact of conflict.

There will also be updates on topics we have covered already, such as
climate change, the IMF and the World Bank, the World Trade Organisation,
and oil pipelines.