The sister of slain Lebanese intellectual Lokman Slim will accept a Swiss prize honouring publishers working in hostile environments in memory of her brother’s “fight for justice”.
The International Publishers' Association, in Geneva, announced on Monday that Dar Al Jadeed, the publishing house founded by Slim alongside his sister Rasha Al Ameer in 1990, had been selected to receive the 2021 IPA Prix Voltaire award from a shortlist of five nominees.
The prize will be awarded on November 30 at the Guadalajara International Book Fair in Mexico.
“I want to do it so that people keep talking about Lokman and for all the victims of Lebanon’s wars,” Al Ameer told The National. “We need justice.”.
Slim, 59, was found fatally shot in his rental car in the early hours of February 4 along a coastal motorway near the city of Saida, in South Lebanon.
Slim who, with his wife Monika Borgmann, ran an NGO which collated an archive of materials concerning Lebanon's social and political history, had remained in his family’s home in a stronghold of Lebanese militant group Hezbollah to the south of Beirut, despite receiving death threats for his outspoken criticism of the Iran-backed party.
In announcing the award, the International Publishers' Association, said nominees had been recognised for their "exemplary courage in upholding the freedom to publish and enabling others to exercise their right to freedom of expression".
"This year’s Prix Voltaire laureate paid the ultimate price standing up for freedom of expression as an enabler of tolerance and conflict resolution in Lebanon. His loss is a loss to the entire international publishing community,” IPA’s president Bodour Al Qasimi said.
The Prix Voltaire comes with a prize of 10,000 Swiss francs ($10,726) and is sponsored by Norwegian and Swedish publishing houses.
The investigation into Slim’s killing, which was widely viewed in Lebanon as a political assassination, has yielded no results to date. His family believes that Hezbollah is responsible for his death – a claim that the party denies.
The investigation was recently transferred from Saida to Beirut at the request of the public prosecutor. Such transfers take place when a judge believes that public safety is at risk.
Al Ameer said that Dar Al Jadeed had published “bold” texts in the past three decades.
“Our style was established very early,” she said, citing authors published by Dar Al Jadeed in the early 1990s such as Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish and Lebanese writer and activist Abdallah Al Alayli.
In addition to his work as an editor, Slim translated works of Lebanese authors including one titled Victim and Executioner written by Joseph Saadeh about losing his two sons in the civil war and tracking down their killers.
“It makes one think: who is the victim and who is the executioner?” said Al Ameer. “We are all victims and executioners at the same time when we are silent in the face of tragedy.”
For the first anniversary of Slim’s death, Dar Al Jadeed plans to publish a book by Lebanese journalist Iskandar Riachi, who was active from the 1920s to the 1950s, called Women of Beirut.
“Everyone has forgotten about him but Lokman loved his character, which was full of dark humour,” said Al Ameer. “We will continue working despite Lokman’s murder. We’ll continue on the path of justice, freedom and renaissance.”
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Day 3 stumps
New Zealand 153 & 249
Pakistan 227 & 37-0 (target 176)
Pakistan require another 139 runs with 10 wickets remaining
If you go
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It's up to you to go green
Nils El Accad, chief executive and owner of Organic Foods and Café, says going green is about “lifestyle and attitude” rather than a “money change”; people need to plan ahead to fill water bottles in advance and take their own bags to the supermarket, he says.
“People always want someone else to do the work; it doesn’t work like that,” he adds. “The first step: you have to consciously make that decision and change.”
When he gets a takeaway, says Mr El Accad, he takes his own glass jars instead of accepting disposable aluminium containers, paper napkins and plastic tubs, cutlery and bags from restaurants.
He also plants his own crops and herbs at home and at the Sheikh Zayed store, from basil and rosemary to beans, squashes and papayas. “If you’re going to water anything, better it be tomatoes and cucumbers, something edible, than grass,” he says.
“All this throwaway plastic - cups, bottles, forks - has to go first,” says Mr El Accad, who has banned all disposable straws, whether plastic or even paper, from the café chain.
One of the latest changes he has implemented at his stores is to offer refills of liquid laundry detergent, to save plastic. The two brands Organic Foods stocks, Organic Larder and Sonnett, are both “triple-certified - you could eat the product”.
The Organic Larder detergent will soon be delivered in 200-litre metal oil drums before being decanted into 20-litre containers in-store.
Customers can refill their bottles at least 30 times before they start to degrade, he says. Organic Larder costs Dh35.75 for one litre and Dh62 for 2.75 litres and refills will cost 15 to 20 per cent less, Mr El Accad says.
But while there are savings to be had, going green tends to come with upfront costs and extra work and planning. Are we ready to refill bottles rather than throw them away? “You have to change,” says Mr El Accad. “I can only make it available.”
Results
5pm: Reem Island – Conditions (PA) Dh80,000 (Turf) 1,600m; Winner: Farasah, Antonio Fresu (jockey), Musabah Al Muhairi
5.30pm: Sir Baniyas Island – Maiden (PA) Dh80,000 (T) 1,400m; Winner: SSR Ghazwan, Antonio Fresu, Ibrahim Al Hadhrami
6pm: Wathba Stallions Cup – Handicap (PA) Dh70,000 (T) 1,400m; Winner: Astral Del Sol, Sean Kirrane, Ibrahim Al Hadhrami
6.30pm: Al Maryah Island – Maiden (PA) Dh80,000 (T) 2,200m; Winner: Toumadher, Dane O’Neill, Jaber Bittar
7pm: Yas Island – Handicap (PA) Dh80,000 (T) 2,200m; Winner: AF Mukhrej, Tadhg O’Shea, Ernst Oertel
7.30pm: Saadiyat Island – Handicap (TB) Dh80,000 (T) 2,400m; Winner: Celestial Spheres, Gary Sanchez, Ismail Mohammed
The bio:
Favourite holiday destination: I really enjoyed Sri Lanka and Vietnam but my dream destination is the Maldives.
Favourite food: My mum’s Chinese cooking.
Favourite film: Robocop, followed by The Terminator.
Hobbies: Off-roading, scuba diving, playing squash and going to the gym.
Mohammed bin Zayed Majlis
