Central European - 1 years ago

Cameran Ashraf, assistant professor in CEU’s Department of Public Policy, has played a pivotal role with an international coalition to create the Iranian Archive. The landmark digital archive was launched on March 18 following the release of the United Nations Fact-Finding Mission report to the Human Rights Council, which focused on the Islamic Republic of Iran. The collection is intended to support human rights investigations and accountability proceedings.   Ashraf, whose current research focuses on artificial intelligence and the digital space, has a practice-oriented background in tech and human rights, which makes its way into the CEU classroom. Students who chose to participate in the Iranian Archive project gleaned practical experience in video archiving, evidence analysis, historical memory and digital accountability.   “It s important for students to understand how human rights work looks in the broader world. How does an investigation operate with these elements? he said. The Iranian Archive fits into my belief in practice-oriented teaching.”   In developing the collection, the team, which included students, rigorously scraped and forensically preserved X (Twitter), Instagram, Facebook and Telegram information shared by Iranian protesters since the death of Mahsa Jina Amini in September 2022. Working across different time zones to capture as much as possible, including important early videos, the team also included participants fluent in Farsi, aiding in the analysis of items.  The coalition behind the Iranian Archive is led by the Atlantic Council’s Strategic Litigation Project and Mnemonic, in partnership with Ashraf’s Azadi Archive, The Promise Institute for Human Rights at UCLA Law, UC Berkeley’s Human Rights Center, Amnesty International’s Digital Verification Corps and the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center.  “The archive wouldn t be possible if it wasn t for this strong coalition that has come together,” said Ashraf, who is the head of Human Rights at the Wikimedia Foundation and co-founder of AccessNow, dedicated to defending and extending digital rights. “Whenever there is a human rights crisis or catastrophe in the world, even after it is out of the newspapers, there are still committed people who are doing investigative work.”   The Iranian Archive is composed of more than one million vulnerable artifacts documenting human rights violations committed against the Woman, Life, Freedom movement protesters. The coalition maintains that social media continues to be a crucial tool for capturing such violations. The project joins other standalone archives created to support international investigations in Syria, Yemen, Sudan and Ukraine.  Ashraf highlighted that the collection provides a tool for moving meaningfully towards accountability. “The Woman, Life, Freedom movement protest was such an important moment. It was the first women-led protest there, a very remarkable event in the Middle East, and I think, more broadly,” added Ashraf, whose father emigrated from Iran to the United States.   The Iranian Archive’s organizers are currently making the records available only to academic researchers, prosecutors, international investigative mechanisms and organizations working towards accountability for the violent repression of civilians during the nationwide protests in Iran which began in 2022.   Unit: Department of Public PolicyCategory: NewsImage: Content Priority: High

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