Ms Informed Newsletter | Real talk mit Tamana über Afghanistan
Our first German episode is here!
This week’s distraction
This week’s distraction is the recent activities involving Erdoğan and Putin.
”The Turkish president will attempt to persuade Vladimir Putin to re-enter the Black Sea grain deal that he quit two months ago claiming the west was not keeping its side of the bargain covering Russian food and fertiliser exports.
Erdoğan, the chief negotiator behind the initial deal signed in July 2022, has not met the Russian president face to face since the deal collapsed. The immediate backdrop to the meeting in Sochi, Russia, on Monday was another Russian drone strike on a Ukrainian grain-exporting port that damaged warehouses and set buildings on fire.
Russian drones have been systematically attacking Ukrainian grain stores since Moscow’s withdrawal from the deal and the latest attack on the Danube River port of Izmail in Ukraine’s southern Odesa region hit warehouses and production buildings. More than 220,000 tonnes of Ukrainian grain have been destroyed in the Russian assaults, Ukraine says.
It is the first in-person meeting between the two leaders since October, and if wider peace talks do ever start, Erdoğan is likely to be a leading intermediary.”
Read more in the Guardian here
This week Madhvi wrote
This week Madhvi has been writing and performing some sound-text stories at the Radio Sound Art Festival Floating Transmissions in Hamburg. Much fun! If you want to see me perform these again, sign up to my newsletter or follow me on Insta — I’ll let you know on one of those channels.
This week Rina read
This week Rina started reading Shelf Life: Chronicles of a Cairo Bookseller by Nadia Wasser. A magical insight into one of Cairo’s iconic bookstores. This book takes you on a journey that shows you the ins and outs of what it takes to run a bookstore in a culture that abandoned them.
This week’s inspiration
This week’s inspiration is Afghan journalist and women’s activist Tamana Zaryab Paryani. Born in 1997, she is known for her protests against Taliban rule in Afghanistan. She currently lives in Germany, after fleeing from Afghanistan in August 2022 and Women's rights activists recently went on hunger strike to draw attention to the struggle of women in Afghanistan.
Follow her on Insta here.
Email us at msinformed.podcast@gmail.com with comments, suggestions or just to say 'hi'. Or message us via Insta, FB, Twitter. We are independent and non-profit, so if you'd like to show us some love, become a patron, donate via PayPal or subscribe and telling your friends to listen — all links to listen here.