The London Book Fair (LBF) has announced the inaugural Freedom to Publish seminar, curated with the International Publishers Association (IPA) Censor, Advocate, or Disruptor? The Role of Publishers in an Evolving Publishing & Media Landscape on Tuesday 10 April 2018, the first day of LBF.

The seminar will follow on from discussions that took place in New Delhi at the IPA’s 32nd International Publishers Congress. It will celebrate the core value of the IPA Prix Voltaire—the freedom to publish— and discuss international landscape of perceived political attacks on free expression.

Speakers will include Dr Razia Rahman Jolly, Angela Gui, Jacks Thomas, Director of LBF, Dr Michiel Kolman, Elsevier and President International Publishers Association, Jennifer Clement, Maureen Freely, Kristenn Einarsson, Azadeh Parsapour and Claire Armitstead, the Guardian, and International Human Rights Advocate Mark Stephens CBE.

It will include a panel discussion around the IPA Prix Voltaire focusing on the work of currently detained laureate, the publisher and bookseller Gui Minhai, who was awarded the IPA’s 32nd International Publishers Congress in New Delhi. It will also discuss the posthumous special award that went to Faisal Arefin Dipan, a publisher in Bangladesh who had collaborated with many prominent writers of Bengali literature, as well as eminent scholars and personalities. He was hacked to death inside his office at the hands of suspected religious extremists on October 31, 2015.

Gui Minhai’s daughter, Angela Gui, and Dr Razia Rahman Jolly, Faisal Arefin Dipan’s widow, who has taken on the running of Dipan’s publishing house since his death, will be speaking.

The seminar will take place at LBF, Club Room, Olympia Exhibition Centre, Tuesday 10 April from 10am – 12:15pm. This seminar is open to all LBF exhibitors and visitors.

 Programme: Censor, Advocate, or Disruptor? The Role of Publishers in an Evolving Publishing & Media Landscape

Tuesday 10 April 2018 Club Room, Olympia Exhibitiom Centre.

• Welcome from Jacks Thomas Director, The London Book Fair
• Dr Michiel Kolman Elsevier and President International Publishers Association
• International Human Rights Advocate Mark Stephens CBE
• Panel: Censorship and Self-Censorship. Adapting to the Modern Age of Disruption. Chair: Jennifer Clement. Speakers: Maureen Freely, Kristenn Einarsson, Azadeh Parsapour and International Human Rights Advocate Mark Stephens CBE.
• Fireside Chat:  Prix Voltaire Laureates. Angela Gui, in-conversation with Dr Razia Rahman Jolly, chaired by Claire Armitstead, the Guardian