Whirlwind Middle East trip, talking, training, tweeting

I'm getting ready to leave for a two-week jaunt through the Middle East and looking forward to reconnecting with old friends, getting updated on the latest trends in cyberactivism, and meeting some of the amazing women who are using new technology for political and social activism.

My first stop is Cairo, where I'm taking part in the Yahoo! Change Your World summit as moderator of a panel exploring women’s rights, human rights and technology. We'll be looking at the increasingly critical role technology, and the internet in particular, play in amplifying the voices of those advocating for human rights and the advancement of women in society. The panelists include:

• Rebecca Chiao, USA/Egypt, co-founder of HarassMap , an online crowdsourcing mapping project created by and for women to track incidents of sexual harassment in Egypt
• Fadi Salem, UAE, Fellow and Director of the Governance and Innovation Program in the Dubai School of Government and recent author of the 3rd Arab Social Media Report, which focuses particularly on the gender divide
• Raja Althaibani, Yemen/USA, Witness, Middle East and North Africa Program Associate
• Dalia Abdelhameed, Egypt, Gender Program Officer at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights

We will be discussing the key issues related to women’s rights, human rights and social justice that women are addressing, and how are they using technology, social/digital media platforms to create solutions and increase awareness of those issues. We will also examine innovative technological and media applications for addressing human rights and social justice issues have emerged. Friend Mona Eltahawy is moderating the summit, so you know it will be good! There are too many amazing women (ok, and men) who are part of the summit to list now but will try to post more details later. In the meantime follow #changeyourworldcairo and check out the agenda

After that I'm headed to Iraq, or more specifically Kurdistan, to do a training for civil society and journalists. I'm really looking forward to this as I have not been in Iraq before, and with the devolving security situation there may be a limited window of opportunity to so safely. Iraq has consistently been ranked among the most dangerous places in the world for journalists and continues to face serious threats to press freedom, and I'm interested to learn more about the situation on the ground.

I will be tweeting as much as possible from the conference (#changeyourworldcairo) and the rest of my travels, follow me on Twitter at @courtneyr