The Asia Leadership Fellow Program (ALFP) is a joint program of the International House of Japan and the Japan Foundation Asia Center that seeks to create a close, personal, and professional network of public intellectuals in Asia who have demonstrated outstanding abilities in leadership and are deeply committed to improving civil societies beyond their respective backgrounds and professional arenas.

Asia Leadership Fellow Program (ALFP)

ALFP Lecture Series#3 Religion in Asia: A Possible Role for Peacebuilding

This lecture series invites leading public intellectuals, mainly ALFP fellows, as speakers on different themes. As the previous lectures, please check from our website.
In the third session, three peace activists from Thailand, Sri Lanka and Pakistan will share their thoughts on the ongoing conflicts afflicting those in a vulnerable position, how each has worked to create mutual understanding among different groups of people, and what could be done to further foster peace in their respective country and region.

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＊Due to unforeseen circumstances, Mr. Albert Alejo has had to cancel his speech. We welcome Mr. Somboon Chungprampree as a speaker for our lecture.

Overview

Speaker

Somboon Chungprampree (Moo)
Executive Secretary, International Network of Engaged Buddhists / Thailand

Mr. Chungprampree is a Thai social activist working for peace and justice in Asia. Since 2010, he has served as Executive Secretary of the International Network of Engaged Buddhists (INEB), an organization established in 1989 to promote mutual understanding, cooperation and networking among inter-Buddhist and inter-religious social action groups. His activism began while he was at university where he got involved in social movements, especially those focusing on environmental justice. Since 1997, he has held different positions with leading civil society organizations both in Thailand and Asia, and also served on the boards of several international and national foundations. He is the editor of the Seeds of Peace journal issued three times a year. Under the Thai-based Spirit in Education Movement (SEM), his focus has been on grassroots efforts to empower civil society in Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia and Thailand.

Jehan Perera
Executive Director, National Peace Council of Sri Lanka / Sri Lanka

Dr. Perera is the Executive Director of the National Peace Council of Sri Lanka, a nonpartisan and independent peace advocacy group founded in 1995 to facilitate a people's movement for peace and a negotiated political solution to the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. He has also been on the boards of several other civil society organizations, including the People's Action for Free and Fair Elections (PAFFREL), and served as a member of a government-appointed advisory committee on national integration. He has written extensively on war and peace in Sri Lanka and is a regular political commentator with the Sri Lankan media, writing newspaper columns in English, Sinhala and Tamil. He obtained a Doctor of Law degree from Harvard University, and has received international peace prizes from institutions in Japan, India and Sweden. (ALFP 2011 Fellow)

Fouzia Saeed
Social Activist / Pakistan

Dr. Saeed is well known in activist circles in Pakistan, working for the promotion of human rights, democracy and diversity, especially focusing on women and folk culture. For over 30 years, she has developed and headed several organizations and platforms, including Bedari, the first women's crisis center in Pakistan, and a UNDP Gender Program Unit. Since the late 1990s, she has worked on the issue of sexual harassment at the workplace; her achievements include bringing changes to the work environment in the entire UN system. At the community level, she has helped empower the women of Pakistan suffering at the hands of religious fundamentalists, by illuminating positive dimensions of religion and culture including Sufi traditions. With a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota, she is the author of Taboo! The Hidden Culture of a Red Light Area (Oxford University Press, 2001), which shed light on the red light area of Pakistan. In 2012, she received the Battle of Crete Award for her three-decade struggle for women's rights. (ALFP 2010 Fellow)

Moderator

Ogawa Tadashi
Professor, Atomi University

Since entering the Japan Foundation in 1982, Dr. Ogawa has been engaged in international exchange for the enhancement of mutual understanding between Japan and other countries. He has contributed to the development of ALFP since its start-up in the mid-1990s. Prior to joining Atomi University, he served as Director General at the Japan Foundation in New Delhi as well as in Jakarta, and Manager Director for the Planning Department at the Japan Foundation HQ. His research covers international cultural exchange policy, contemporary cultures of Southeast and South Asia, and comparative religion and sociology. He has a Ph.D. from the Graduate School of Asia-Pacific Studies, Waseda University, and has written several books and articles on international politics, particularly focusing on the Islamic world.