Interviews with Namees Arnous

I’d love to say to the international community to be with the freedom, the people and the rights – not be with the governments – because the governments gone, gone. It will gone and it will fall, no other choice. They must take decisions with the people, decisions to protect the human rights, decision to protect the people who were killed day after day without – no one ask about them.

So I think international community are very important pressure against the dictatorship governments. They have no diplomatic in these cases. They have to be with the side of the people and the side of the right. It’s my message to them – stop diplomatic messages, just take a position, protect humans in other places and Arab Spring. Protect the humans and people in Syria, protect the people in Bahrain, protect people died every day in Egypt with the military. Take a decision, respectful decision, make people respect the international community. They have to.

Namees Arnous is a well-known television reporter and civil society activist in Egypt. During the Egyptian Revolution, Namees was asked to spread inaccurate stories by El Mehwar Television, her employer. When Namees used social media to publicize the channel’s stance against the Revolution, she was characterized as being a foreign agent and receiving money from foreign governments. She resigned from El Mehwar.

Namees then founded a new media production company which includes television, radio and social media outlets. She aims to promote human rights and democratic principles by training individuals in new media. She is currently working on a project to produce a new television program aimed at Egyptian women, focusing on issues of concern to them.

Namees has worked on a number of civil society campaigns. These include the Change Your Life Campaign, which aims to encourage women to be independent and the Be Free Campaign, which addresses young Muslim women extremists.

She worked on a civic journalism campaign to cover youth participation in elections in their respective regions. The campaign was broadcast on her NGO’s radio station and website.

Namees was among the inaugural group of the George W. Bush Institute’s Women’s Initiative Fellowship Program in 2012, a leadership program designed to empower and equip women to catalyze change.

Namees has her Bachelor’s degree in Mass Communication with a focus on Television and Radio.