The jury consisting of Maja Pan, Teona Strugar Mitevska and Boris Petkovič selected a winner from the five films competing for the Best Human Rights Documentary Award. All competition films are exceptionally strong in terms of addressing human rights, historicizing, raising awareness and bearing testament. Each of them constitutes an important voice that highlights both the violation of and struggle for human rights.
The 25th Documentary Film Festival Amnesty International Slovenia Best Human Rights Documentary Award goes to Be My Voice by Nahid Persson, a film dedicated to a prominent Iranian activist and journalist, Masih Alinejad.
Jury motivation
"With the combination of activism and documentarism, Nahid Persson creates a vast spectrum ranging from a precious, intimate portrait of Masih Alinejad, to an insight into the broadest public dimensions of her, in all respects influential, personal-political engagement. By going beyond the individuality of the portrait of an incredible activist, the documentary Be My Voice paints a portrait of the entire Iranian society.
It gives us an effective, emotionally clear-cut account of the Iranian dictatorship, in which women's human rights are one of the basic mechanisms abused to maintain the dictatorship. It is precisely because of its political and emotional charge, that the film Be My Voice evokes inspiration, understanding and solidarity with women around the world, as well as with today's fearless human rights defenders."
Special Jury Mention goes to Innocence by Guy Davidi.
Jury motivation
"Innocence is a masterful documentary product of ten years of research work and a strong aesthetic of the author, which manifests itself in the power of personal political expression, aimed at resistance against the militarization of children in Israel. In this way, director Guy Davidi clearly shows the nationalistic role of the state acting against society and family communities, which thus become increasingly powerless in opposing apartheid and the security dictatorship imposed on them by the state.
Innocence highlights the very tragic point at which the militaristic ideology, otherwise directed against the "Arab world", turns against itself and first breaks, followed by taking the lives of those in whose name, paradoxically, it justified its beliefs. With the ideology of militarism, the state violently breaks those feelings of children and young people, which seem to be the most precious; these are precisely those light, infallible, actually primal and innocent feelings for good, justice and peace."