Refugees International's Washington Circle presents

PROTECT PEOPLE FIRST:
Eyewitness Reports from Afghanistan and Pakistan


featuring
DEXTER FILKINS
Pulitzer Prize Winning Journalist and Author of The Forever War

with
JOEL R. CHARNY, Acting President, Refugees International
and
Reporting on Refugees International's recent Pakistan mission
PATRICK DUPLAT, Advocate, Refugees International


Hosted by Cathy Brentzel

Friday, December 4, 2009
6:30pm to 8:30pm

Brentzel Residence
1607 28th Street, NW, Washington, DC 20007

There is no charge to attend this event.
Kindly RSVP at www.refugeesinternational.org/dccircle.

For more information, contact Ellie Stamatopoulos at (202) 828-0110 ext. 227 or ellie@refintl.org.


Washington Circle Committee
Trish Malloch-Brown, Co-chair ~ Eileen Shields-West, Co-chair

Jodi Bond ~ Ghislaine Boreel ~ Cathy Brentzel
Gay Cioffi ~ Isabel Ernst ~ Rebecca Fishman
Elizabeth Galvin ~ Reneé Gardner ~ Meehee Hwang
Fran Kenworthy ~ Nancy Ordway ~ Rachel Pearson
Roya Rafei ~ Virginia Rice ~ Katy Sadeghian
Ashley Taylor ~ Mariella Trager ~ Chang Turkmani
Frederica Valanos ~ Martha Webb ~ Sandy Boek Werness


Dexter Filkins is widely regarded as one of the finest war correspondents of our generation. He won a Pulitzer Prize in 2009 as part of a team of New York Times reporters for their groundbreaking coverage of America's deepening military and political challenges in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Filkins was based in the newspaper's Baghdad bureau from the beginning of the war in 2003 until 2006. Prior to that, he covered the war in Afghanistan in 2001 and 2002 and was the New Delhi bureau chief for The Los Angeles Times. Filkins' book, The Forever War, is about his experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq, and is a New York Times best-seller. It won the National Book Critics Circle Award and Time Magazine's Best Non-fiction Book of 2008; and was also named a Best Book of the Year by The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, and Amazon.com. The Forever War provides us a first-hand understanding of the experiences of the people on the ground.

Refugees International (RI) recently returned from Pakistan, a country in the midst of internal conflict. Last summer, more than a million and a half people were displaced in just a few weeks, in what was the largest and fastest forced displacement since the Rwandan genocide. Military operations are ongoing, and civilians are caught in the middle. Too often aid is not reaching vulnerable families, who depend on host families or stay in camps. RI found that relief efforts are fraught with problems: discrimination in assistance, lack of access to vulnerable communities by aid agencies, and serious protection concerns. This discussion will explore the plight of civilians, the role of the U.S. government, and why we need to "Protect People First."