I recently flew to Azerbaijan — the country wedged between Russia and Iran — as a researcher with the University of Oregon-UNESCO Crossings Institute, which examines issues related to reporting on conflict and intercultural dialogue. I found that once-disparate cultures now collide in fast, often exciting ways.
The Azeri government has made headlines for its rabid crusade against free speech. The Committee to Protect Journalists just rated it the world’s fifth-most-censored country, behind Ethiopia, Saudi Arabia, North Korea and Eritrea.
In the capital, Baku, I was met by a surprise: the president of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, kicked off the opening ceremony of a gathering I came to attend, the World Forum on Intercultural Dialogue, a global conference on improving relations between cultures.
Read the full opinion piece by former UNESCO Crossings Institute research fellow Jonathan Bach in the Register Guard here. The views expressed in this column do not necessarily reflect those of the UNESCO Chair or the University of Oregon-UNESCO Crossings Institute.
