Sound Central’s: SAVE AFGHAN MUSICIANS

Product Description

Australia

SaveAfghanMusicians / Sound Central’s fiscal sponsor is Development Now Initiatives. DNI is a 501c3 Non-Profit registered with the New York Charities Commission. All donations are tax deductable. https://dniusa.org/save-afghan-musicians

Since the 15th of August we assisted more than 20+ Afghans musicians, festival staff and their families to get out of Afghanistan and arrive at following destinations: USA, France, Poland, UK and Germany. We also have several in processing camps in Bahrain and Kuwait.

And, we still have 110+ evacuees on our list in Afghanistan desperate to get out.

Sound Central, a grassroots organization founded in Afghanistan 2010, has today called on governments around the world to grant visas for Afghan musicians in the wake of the increasingly dire situation in Afghanistan.

The situation is equally concerning for young independent artists. The Kabul music scene of 2009-2014, despite being small, fostered numerous local bands across genres such as hip hop, rock and metal. These bands have performed in local venues, as well at the Sound Central Festival, the first music festival to be held in Afghanistan.

Using social media to promote their music has made these musicians readily identifiable, with a number of musicians have already received death threats. This is a real-time, now, on the ground in Kabul issue.

While tolerance has so far been promised, musicians across Afghanistan desperately fear that their lives are at risk. Already, threat letters have been received, instruments destroyed, and music-related institutions forcibly closed down.

“In Afghanistan, music is dying. We can’t play anymore. We have had to stop what we’ve always loved to do. But I believe that in a war between art and ignorance, art should be the winner,” said Metal Sam, a musician based in Kabul, who has used a pseudonym to protect their identity.

Several recent events provide a worrying insight into what may be to come. In Badarshan, armed men entered wedding parties, stopped the music, burned instruments, and prohibited musicians from performing again. Meanwhile in Kabul, the Afghan National Institute of Music (ANIM) – long targeted by extremists – has been shut down and has already suffered depredations. Students and teachers are fearful of reprisals for themselves and their families for being associated with the school.

The situation is equally concerning for young independent artists; local bands across genres such as hip hop, rock and metal. These bands have performed in local venues, as well as at the Sound Central Festival. They are extremely concerned for their lives and are all in hiding.

Between 2014 and 2019, Sound Central assisted 13 Afghan artists to successfully gain asylum. Since the change of power and rule in Afghanistan this month, the Sound Central team has reunited to help the musicians and festival employees who took a personal risk to deliver music and arts to the community.

So far we have assisted 20+ Afghans to safety. Sound Central continues to collect real-time data on who is still in Afghanistan; we still have 70+ evacuees on our list in Afghanistan desperate to get out.

100% of all monies raised will be used to assist Afghan musician refugees. We are not taking any funds for our work. We will use monies raised to pay for:

Timeframe: After the US completed their withdrawal, we have not stopped assisting to get Afghans out. If commercial flights resume and Afghans have visas, we will buy seats to the destination country. If for unforeseen reasons we can not utilise the airport, ALL funds will be used to Afghan nationals seeking other ways out of Afghanistan.

Greetings to all our loyal donors

I first want to apologise for not sending this update sooner. I just sent an update for the Lebanon campaign and I realised I have not done this campaign for quite some time.

So, we have good and bad news.

The bad news is that the Taliban appear to be reneging all their pledges on human rights [particularly towards women] and they keep presenting new restrictions: the most recent was the ban on women’s voices in public places. Denying them the right to speak out loud.

Although we at Sound Central focus on assisting musicians, we have many women in our cohort and we have a blanket objection to any restriction against women’s rights, as well as the total ban on music.

So, now some good news. As much as we have slowed down operations – pushing for immigration cases to be processed, we are now seeing the fruits of our labour [from