Day 0: Sunday, May 3rd 

Time Location Description
10:00 - 22:00 Hotel Lobby Arrival & Registration

 

Day 1: Monday, May 4th

Time Location Description Session
8:00 - 10:00 Al Gassar Registration
10:00 - 10:30

Main Theatre
(Al Gassar)

Opening Remarks:

  • Sheikh Hamad Bin Thamer Al Thani, Chairman of the Board

  • Dr Mostefa Souag, Director General of Al Jazeera

 
10:30 - 11:30

Main Theatre
(Al Gassar)

Keynote Speeches:

  • Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al-Thani, Minister's Assistant for International Cooperation Affairs, Qatar
  • Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, Former Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs of the UK
 
11:30 - 12:00 Theatre Lobby Coffee Break
12:00 - 12:30 Theatre Lobby

Keynote Speech:

  • Seyed Mohammad Kazem Sajjadpour, Adviser to the Iranian Foreign Minister
 
12:30 - 14:00 Main Theatre
(Al Gassar)

Regional and International Scope of Conflict in the Arab World:

  • Nikolay Mladenov, UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process

  • Ayman Nour, Founder and Chairman of El Ghad Party

  • Tawakkol Karman, Nobel Prize for Peace Laureate, Yemen

  • Hassan Ahmadian, Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Strategic Research in Iran

  • Khalid Saleh, Head of the Syrian National Coalition

 
14:00 - 15:00

Ballroom 1 - 2
(St Regis)

Lunch
15:00 - 16:30 Main Theatre
(Al Gassar)

Conflict in the Arab World: Causes, Manifestations and Repercussions:

  • Maha Azzam, Head of the Egyptian Revolutionary Council
  • Lina Khatib, Director of the Carnegie Middle East Center
  • Juan Cole, Richard P. Mitchell Collegiate Professor of History at the University of Michigan
  • Abdelwahab El-Affendi, Reader in Politics at the Centre for the Study of Democracy, University of Westminster
  • Hemin Hawrami, Head of Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) Foreign Relations Office
 
 

Al Fanna
(Al Gassar)

How Will Turkish Politics Change after the June 2015 Elections? (AJ Turk)  
 

Amber
(St Regis)

[Starts 14:00] Pilot Interview Studio (AJ Media Training and Development Center)  
 

Ballroom 3
(St Regis)

Interactive and Digital Media (AJ Net)  
16:30 - 17:00 Lobby Coffee Break  
17:00 - 18:30 Main Theatre
(Al Gassar)

The Economic Aspect of Conflict:

  • Elena Ianchovichina, Lead Economist in the Chief Economist Office of the World Bank’s Middle East and North Africa Region
  • Adeel Malik, Globe Fellow in the Economies of Muslim Societies at the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies
  • Ahmed Ould Dadah, Head of the Rally of Democratic Forces Party in Mauritania
  • Elyes Fakhfakh, Former Finance Minister of Tunisia
  • Kamal Field, Director of Research at the Iraq Institute for Economic Reform
 
Al Fanna
(Al Gassar)
Capturing the Digital Generation: Lessons from AJ+ (AJ+)
Ballroom 3
(St Regis)
Education Online and E-Interaction (AJ Net)
Abalone
(St Regis)
[Starts at 16:00] News Stories from the Sky (AJ Media Training and Development Center)
    News Verification (AJ Media Training and Development Center)  
18:30 - 20:00 Abalone
​(St Regis)
Immersive Storytelling (Innovation & Incubation Department)  

 

Day 2: Tuesday, May 5th

Time Location Description Session
9:00 - 10:00 Main Theatre
​(Al Gassar)

Keynote Speeches:

  • Abdelilah Benkirane, Prime Minister of Morocco
  • Seyed Mohammad Kazem Sajjadpour, Adviser to the Iranian Foreign Minister (TBC)
 
10:00 - 11:30

Main Theatre
(Al Gassar)

The Role of Media inConflict:

  • Nadia Al-Sakkaf, Former Minister of Information in Yemen

  • Yasser Abuhilala, Managing Director of Al Jazeera News Channel

  • Razan Ghazzawi, Programme Coordinator at Institute for War and Peace Reporting

  • Jamal Khashoggi, Director of Al-Arab News Channel

  • Ian Black, Middle East Editor for the Guardian

 

Al Fanna
(Al Gassar)

The Plight of Journalists in the Absence of Justice (AJ Human Rights Centre)

11:30 - 12:00 Theatre Lobby Coffee Break
12:00 - 13:30 Main Theatre
(Al Gassar)

The Palestinian Cause and the Prospects for Peace:

  • Salma Karmi Ayyoub, British-Palestinian barrister

  • Osama Hamdan, Head of the International Relations Department of Hamas

  • Abdullah Abdullah, Chair of the Political Committee of the Palestinian Legislative Council

  • Mohsen Saleh, Director of Al Zaitouna Center fo Studies

  • Susana Khalil, Founder of CANAAN Association in Venezuela

 
Ballroom 3
(St Regis)
Will Syria Follow the Bosnian Scenario? (AJ Balkans)

Al Fanna
(Al Gassar)

The UN Plan for the Safety and Security of Journalists: Opportunities and Challenges (AJ Human Rights Department)

13:30 - 14:30

Ballroom 1 - 2
(St Regis)

Lunch
14:30 - 16:00

Main Theatre
(Al Gassar)

The Military and Politics in the Middle East:

 

  • Mohamed Al-Amin Khalifa, retired military officer and political activist in Sudan
  • Wathaq al-Hashimi, President of the Iraqi Group for Strategic Studies
  • Ayesha Siddiqa, Charles Wallace Fellow at St Antony’s College, Oxford
  • Tareq Al-Zumour, Founder of Building and Development Party in Egypt
  • Tewfik Hamel, a researcher in military and defence history Ismail Numan Telci, Deputy Director of the Centre for Middle Eastern Studies in Sakarya University
  • Ismail Numan Telci, Deputy Director of the Centre for Middle Eastern Studies in Sakarya University
 
Al Fanna
(Al Gassar)

Perspectives on the Yemen Crisis (AJ Centre for Studies)

Ballroom 3
(St Regis)
The Role of Media and Civil Society Organisations in the Fight against Hate Speech and Intolerance (AJ Human Rights Department)

Amber
(St Regis)

[Starts at 14:00] Pilot Interview Studio (AJ Media Training and Development Center)
16:00 - 16:30 Lobby Coffee Break
    The Future of Syria and Iraq (AJ Centre for Studies)  
16:30 - 18:00 Main Theatre
​(Al Gassar)
The Struggle for Digital Freedom (Al Jazeera English Web)  

Abalone
(St Regis)

[Starts at 16:00] Geopolitics Animations (AJ Media Training and Development Center)

 
   

Media and Social Change (AJ Media Training and Development Center)
 

 
18:00 - 19:00 Main Theatre
​(Al Gassar)
The Future of Interactive Storytelling (Al Jazeera English Web)  
20:30 - 22:30

Ballroom 1-2
(St Regis)

Gala Dinner  

 

Day 3: Wednesday, May 6th

Time Location Description Session
10:00 - 11:30 Main Theatre
​(Al Gassar)

Authoritarianism and the Future of Democracy in the Arab World:

  • Rola Dashti, Former Minister of Planning and Development and former Member of Parliament in Kuwait

  • Salman Al-Sheikh, Director of Brookings Institute in Doha

  • Meherzia Labidi Maïza, Member of the Tunisian Parliament

  • Abdel Wahab Badrakhan, journalist and political analyst based in London

  • Gamal Heshmat, leading member of the Freedom and Justice Party in Egypt

  • David Hearst, Editor of the Middle East Eye

 
11:30 - 12:00 Main Theatre
​(Al Gassar)
Closing Remarks  
12:00 - 13:00

Ballroom 1-2
(St Regis)

Lunch