Piece Description

A lively one hour special keyed to Women’s History Month (March), and specifically International Women’s Day, March 8.  Host is Martha Burk, with guests Laura Liswood, Secretary General of the Council of Women World Leaders, T. Kumar, Advocacy Director for Amnesty International, and Karen Fragala Smith, Foreign Editor at Newsweek Magazine.  Topics include women’s political leadership around the world, the plight of women in Afghanistan and how U.S. policy affects them, and what the Obama administration can do to improve outcomes for women internationally.

Bios:

Martha Burk is Money Editor for Ms. Magazine, and former Chair of the National Council of Women’s Organizations in Washington, D.C.  She is a syndicated columnist, and blogger for the Huffington Post.  Dr. Burk serves an advisor to candidates on women’s issues, and she appears regularly on national television and radio.

Laura Liswood (Washington, D.C.) co-founded the Council of Women World Leaders with President Vigdís Finnbogadóttir of Iceland in 1996 .Liswood is now the Secretary General of the Council, which is composed of current and former women presidents, prime ministers, and heads of government. From 1992-1996, she served as director of the Harvard Women's Leadership Project. Her interviews and discussions with fifteen current and former women presidents and prime ministers are chronicled in her most recent book and video documentary, Women World Leaders.

T. Kumar (Washington, D.C.) T. Kumar is the Advocacy Director for Asia & Pacific for Amnesty International USA based in Washington DC. He has worked in several Asian and African countries and served as a human rights monitor in many Asian countries as well as in Bosnia, Haiti, Guatemala, and South Africa. Kumar frequently lectures at the Foreign Service Institute where U.S. diplomats are trained and he often testifies before the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, and has served as the United Nations Representative for Peace Brigades . Kumar was imprisoned for five years in Sri Lanka for his peaceful human rights activities.

Karen Fragala Smith (New York, NY): Karen Fragala Smith specializes in making the complex facts of international relations accessible to a wide audience. She is currently Associate Editor in the Foreign Department of Newsweek, where she has interviewed high profile women such as the late Benazir Bhutto and Madeleine Albright.  She holds a MS in journalism from Columbia University, and is fluent in English and Spanish.