Afghanistan’s Unheard Voices: Stories of Resilience

Christina Lamb is Chief Foreign Correspondent at The Sunday Times and one of Britain’s leading foreign journalists as well as a bestselling author. She has reported from most of the world’s hotspots starting with Afghanistan after an unexpected wedding invitation led her to Karachi in 1987 when she was just 21. She has since been awarded Foreign Correspondent of the Year six times as well as Europe’s top war reporting prize, the Prix Bayeux, and was recently given the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award by the Society of Editors. She is the best-selling author of ten books including Farewell Kabul, The Africa House, and The Sewing Circles of Herat and co-wrote the international bestseller I am Malala with Malala Yousafzai and The Girl from Aleppo with Nujeen Mustafa.

Rabia and her family fled from the Taliban in 1999. They claimed asylum in the UK after crossing the Channel in a refrigerated lorry. Rabia now plays a key role in the UK Covid-19 Inquiry as Head of Every Story Matters Research. Her last role was at the Department for Levelling Up, Housing, and Communities where she led a unit within the Afghan Resettlement Team. Outside of the Civil Service, Rabia has been closely engaged with the work of Afghanistan and Central Asian Association, a charity which was set up by her family. Her charity work led to her co-authoring a book titled Community Work with Migrant and Refugee Women, published by Emerald Points. Now she advocates for children refugees through her work as a trustee at the Separated Children Foundation. Rabia graduated from the University of Cambridge in 2021 with an MPhil in Sociology and from the LSE in 2016 with an MSc in Sociology.

Born in Kabul, Parwana Fayyaz was raised in Pakistan. After finishing high school in Kabul, she enrolled in an English language immersion program and subsequently began her undergraduate studies at the Asian University for Women in Chittagong, Bangladesh. She transferred to Stanford University and earned both her B.A. in 2015, with a major in Comparative Literature (with Honors) and a minor in Creative Writing (Poetry), and an M.A. in Religious Studies in 2016. She then moved to Cambridge University to pursue a PhD in Persian Studies at Trinity College and took up a Research Fellowship as the Carmen Blacker Fellow at Peterhouse, Cambridge University in October 2020. Her debut collection, Forty Names, was published in 2021 by Carcanet Press, and it was named A New Statesman Book of the Year and A White Review Book of the Year.