Sobre Al-Mesalla (English)

 

 

Al Mesalla

Presentation

 

 

Al Mesalla Center is a non profit, non governmental organization that is based on volunteers, with an independent financial administration. The mission of the organization is to strengthen the role of the Iraqi civil society, supporting networks of NGOs working on human rights and nonviolence, and carrying out workshops on these topics. The organization intends to enhance the culture of civil society on democratic principles and nonviolence ethics. Al Mesalla is partner of Un Ponte Per… in projects dealing with Iraqi civil society such as JNP (Justice Network for Iraqi Prisoners), Hiwar (Art of Dialogue) and in the programme “Ponti di Pace”. It is partner of NOVA-CIS and Un Ponte Per… in projects related to Active Nonviolence, implemented through the network LAONF.

 

Activities

 

 

JNP (Justice Network for Prisoners)

 

“Justice Network for Prisoners” project supports the creation and the growth of a coordinating network including approximately 30 Iraqi organizations that work with human rights’ issues in order to guarantee the defence of Iraqi prisoners’ rights. Given the increasing number in the violation of prisoners’ rights- and in general of Iraqi society’s rights- the organizations asserted the need to promote human rights starting from the enforcement of international agreements. In this period the Iraqi organization “Al Mesalla” decides to promote training workshops addressed to Iraqi activists and organizations working with human rights. During these meetings the idea of a building capacity project, sustaining Iraqi organizations, was conceived. This project, called “Justice Network for Iraqi Prisoners and promoted by “Un Ponte Per….” and “Al Mesalla” is funded by the EU through the UNOPS, for the defence of prisoners’ rights.  The organizations joining this project have been selected during a 2 year training process and they are distributed in all the Iraqi territory. These organizations carry out some activities both aiming at protecting detainees and promoting the awareness of the laws among the civil society. The organizations are helped by volunteering experts on training, lawyers, scholars, psychologists and social workers.

 

Service Centre “Hiwar” in Erbil (Iraqi Kurdistan)

 

The establishment of a Service Centre in Erbil aims to assist the process of growth of a strong and vital civil society in Iraq that could support the country’s democratization. The Service Centre provide capacity building and training services to Iraqi Ngos on strategic planning; project cycle management; Ngos and projects administration; fund raising; role and procedures of main donors; social communication; advocacy and main issues regarding democratization in Iraq: human rights and rule of law, conflict prevention and transformation, promotion of gender equality. The Service Centre provide assistance on legal and financial issues concerning Ngos (registration; statute; code of conduct; accountability; labour legislation for Ngos) and promote research on the Civil Society context in Iraq. The target groups are individuated among the about 2500 Ngos actually registered at the Iraqi Ministry of Planning and Development Cooperation.

 

 

LAONF (Nonviolence Network)

 

Since April 2006 we coordinate a network of about twenty Iraqi civil society organizations, religious groups and trade unions that organize common activities to promote nonviolence ethics and action. The network has local groups in twelve cities, a website (www.laonf.org) and an internal mailing-list for coordination of the activists (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/laonfgroup/). It animated the Iraqi weeks of nonviolence in 2006 and 2007, which are known worldwide as the only national initiatives taking place in Iraq to promote nonviolent methodologies for achieving a Just Peace.

This field of action has been initiated since our coordinator Ismaeel Dawood, in January 2005, asked NOVA-CIS to organize training programmes on Active Nonviolence for Iraqi activists. Since then we recruited participants from all over the country for three training programmes (located in Amman and Erbil) organized by NOVA-CIS, “Un ponte per…”, Centro Gandhi and Mouvement pour une Alternative Nonviolente.

Members of Al Mesalla involved in LAONF activities:

–          Yasser Jasim (Basra)

–          Basil M. Abdulkarim (Baghdad)

–          Zaid Wardi (Baghdad)

–          Majeed Shaker (Baghdad)

–          Roa’a Basil (Baghdad)

–          Soaad Hasson (Baghdad)

–          Abdulla Kalid (Erbil)

–          Ibrahim .I.Ismaeel (Erbil)

–          Wali Waleed (Erbil)

–          Ismaeel Dawood (Amman)

 

 

The organization headquarters are located in Iraq (Baghdad, Erbil)

 

Telephone Contact:  00964 -1- 5581821

                                     00964 – 7901864249

                                     00964 – 7901634030

E-mail contact:          almesalla@yahoo.com

 

Web site related to projects:

www.jnpiraq.net

(Justice Network for Prisoners Project in partnership with “Un Ponte per…” and UNOPS)

www.laonf.org

(Nonviolence network in partnership with NOVA-CIS and “Un Ponte per…”)