Sehar Qazi is an independent multimedia journalist and documentary filmmaker based in Kashmir, India. Her work focuses on gender, conflict, refugee crises, human rights, environment, and minorities. She has extensive experience in the newspaper industry as well as online media platforms. Her work has been published in outlets including The Independent, The Wire, and Rukhmabai Initiatives. She has been selected for several fellowships and was a Google News Initiative and YouTube Creators Program grantee, trained along with forty-nine other independent journalists worldwide. She is currently building her own YouTube channel dedicated to telling powerful human interest stories from Kashmir and beyond.

My name is Mohammed Zonaid , a Rohingya freelance, award-winning journalist, photographer, and fixer based in the refugee camps of Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. I report on Rohingya refugee issues, human rights, displacement, education, community resilience, and youth and women’s empowerment in the Rohingya camps and Rakhine State. My work focuses on documenting underreported stories, amplifying marginalized voices, and connecting local realities with global audiences, mostly through in-depth features. Through articles, interviews, and multimedia reporting, I highlight the challenges faced by Rohingya communities while showcasing their strength, culture, and aspirations. My journalism aims to promote awareness, accountability, and informed international engagement on Rohingya issues, reporting as a Rohingya on the ground, from our perspective, while completing the higher education I was denied for years, and building an independent media for Rakhine State.

Born in Hong Kong, he completed a master’s degree in Bioinformatics at Imperial College London.

Inspired by the 2019 pro-democracy protests, he turned his passion for photography into a career in journalism. In 2020, he contributed on-the-ground updates from Belarus—amid its pro-democracy movement—to the now-defunct Hong Kong newspaper Apple Daily (closed in 2021), marking the beginning of his engagement with Eastern Europe.

As Hong Kong’s political situation deteriorated, he relocated to the United Kingdom in 2021. The following year, he traveled to Ukraine during the buildup of Russian forces, spending eight months documenting the war through photography.

Born in 2001 in Tokyo, Japan. Graduated from Kunitachi College of Music (Vocal Major). Began promoting the SDGs in high school and became aware of the climate crisis through training in Sweden.
Engaged in climate activism through youth-led movements such as Fridays For Future and the Climate Clock project. Since 2024, has produced the program “Artivist Mutsumi Kurobe” and worked in video editing at the citizen media platform 8bitNews. Also works freelance, participating in events and lectures. Held solo exhibitions in 2025 and 2026.

Born in Syria, 1973
Studied psychology in Beirut and filmmaking in London before coming to Japan in 1997 to pursue graduate studies in film theory at Nagoya University and the University of Tokyo.
Managing Risala Media Productions (www.risala.tv) in Tokyo, and reporting for foreign TV channels from Japan and Northeast Asia since 1998 (Dubai TV, France 24, etc.)
Fields of specialty: Japanese culture and society, reconstruction process of disaster-stricken areas in northeast Japan, public diplomacy projects between the Arab region and Northeast Asia.
Involved in documentary film production and in organizing cultural projects and film festivals. Writer and university lecturer.

Born in Hakodate, Japan, she began her career at Hokkaido Broadcasting Co (HBC) in 2015, covering disasters and producing documentaries on Japan’s former Eugenic Protection Law and the Technical Intern Training Program. After leaving HBC, she earned a master’s degree in journalism from Waseda University, receiving the Dean’s Award. She joined 8bitNews in 2024. Her work focuses on voices “between narratives,” with reporting from the West Bank and Greenland. She also serves as a part-time lecturer at Waseda University. She hosts the weekly video podcast Breaking Borders and writes for multiple media outlets, including Yahoo! News Japan and Dotworld.

Rohit Upadhyay is a creator journalist, documentary filmmaker, and video journalism trainer from India with over a decade of journalism experience. He reports on environmental corruption, minority rights, and geopolitical affairs. He has built an audience of around 2 million followers across platforms. His investigative work has been published with BBC, Outlook, The Wire and IndiaSpend. His work has been supported by Google, the International Center for Journalists, Journalismfund Europe, and the Earth Journalism Network.

Japanese journalist and CEO of 8bitNews, a civic media platform amplifying underreported voices. Joined NHK in 2001 after graduating from Rikkyo University, working on major news programs before launching 8bitNews in 2012. Former visiting scholar at UCLA. Currently active across TV, film, and digital media, producing global stories. Forbes Japan columnist, also leading initiatives that connect journalism, research, and social impact. Directed the film ”Stand with the Divided” and authored ”Disasters and Misinformation”.

A student at Tokyo University of Foreign Studies with a deep interest in Latin American music and society. Currently studying abroad in Colombia, where he has produced multiple documentaries exploring the intersection of art and social reality. His work focuses on the ways creative expression reflects and challenges the world around it — from street-level culture to structural inequality. In collaboration with Palestinian-Japanese rapper DANNY JIN, he pursues projects that blur the line between artistic practice and social commentary, building a body of work that asks not just what art looks like, but what it can do.