Asian Social Forum (ASF),January 2nd to 7th, 2003 at Hyderabad, India

WSF, India
21/10/2002
Dear Friends,

We take great pleasure in inviting you and your organisations to participate in the Asian Social Forum that is being held in Hyderabad from 2nd – 7th January, 2003.As you might be aware, the Asian Social Forum is a follow up of the two successful World Social Forum events organised in Porto Alegre and the decision to have regional and thematic events.

The Asian Social Forum (ASF), being organised by WSF India, will be held in the city of Hyderabad, in the Southern Indian State of Andhra Pradesh between January 2nd to 7th, 2003. It is an open forum: the only criteria is that the participants be opposed to imperialist globalisation as well as religious sectarian violence, and have a commitment to democratic values, plurality and peace.

We hope that the ASF will provide an inspiring space where movements/ organizations/ groups/individuals / will come in from all over India and Asia to carry the message of the World Social Forum. We expect about 7000 delegates to participate in the ASF, out of which about 1000 would be from outside India. Organisations both in India and Asia and also the rest of the world, are invited to participate by organising conferences, seminars and workshops broadly falling under the themes of the ASF.

Main Themes of the ASF are the following:

Peace and Security
Debt, Development and Trade
Nation State, Democracy and Exclusions
Ecology, Culture and Knowledge
Social Infrastructure, Planning and Cooperation
Alternatives and Peoples Movements.

The events that are envisaged over a period of 6 days, from 2nd to 7th January are:

2 public/ plenary sessions, i.e. opening session on 2nd afternoon/evening and closing session on 7th morning.
2 conferences daily (total 6-8)
25 parallel seminars daily (total 50-100)
Up to 50 workshops daily (total 100-200)
Testimonials, and open "spaces" for mass movements
A Youth Camp
Cultural Events
Film Festival

The Opening and Closing plenary session will be open to the public and will be organized on 2nd (afternoon-evening) and 7th (morning) respectively.

We hope that you and your organisation will participate in the Asian Social Forum event. More details of the event including organising seminars and workshops, registration details, etc., cab be found in the website www.wsfindia.org. Please write to us for any further details that you may require. Those who would like to be kept informed about the Asian Social Forum event can do so by going to the website and registering for the Asia Social Forum newsletter or giving a mail to wsfindia@vsnl.net

Please circulate this mail to other organisations or individuals that may be interested in the Asian Social Forum event in Hyderabad.

Out apologies for such a late invitation.

Thanking you

WSF-India Secretariat

204 Elite House
36, Community Centre
Zamrudpur, G.K.-I
New Delhi-110048
Tel : 011-6221870
Email : <wsfindia@vsnl.net>
Url : <www.wsfindia.org>