Our MENA Bitcoin Hub aims to educate activists, journalists and nonprofit executives experiencing issues with banking and free transfer of money, or with financial surveillance and repression, on how Bitcoin can be a solution to this; training them on how to use Bitcoin and Lightning securely and anonymously.
The Middle East and North Africa region is a rapidly-growing region of over 600 million people, with a predominantly young and educated population spread between 23 countries. It is also one of the most authoritarian regions in the world, experiencing extreme levels of repression. A wave of pro-freedom uprisings in 2011 were brutally repressed by a regional alliance of dictatorships, with mass human rights abuses ongoing.
The repression committed in the region corresponds with a campaign to silence and shut down human rights activism. Civil society organisations and activists are subjected to online and offline monitoring in almost every country in the region. Bank account closures and asset freezes have been normalised as a tool to silence activism.
The effect of these deliberate attacks on human rights activism alongside a hostile economic environment, has been severe. In most countries in the region, there is no ecosystem of professional human rights organisations, with activism limited to low-level, casual grassroots efforts - in places where it is able to exist at all. The human rights movement in the region is effectively unbanked, unable to coordinate financially at a scale or range beyond what cash allows. This means that activism cannot be conducted sustainably.
At Kawaakibi, we believe that by enabling NGOs and activists to transact freely, receive international donations and hold their money securely and privately, we can catalyse a significant increase in their capacity to operate, instituting a virtuous cycle which will lead to a growth of activism and subsequent increase in pressure on governments across the region, benefitting human rights needs in the medium- to long-term.
Are you interested in a training session with us? Contact us here.