Azaz Elshami

Azaz Elshami (@3ozaz) is a Sudanese-American human rights advocate and independent consultant with more than 10 years of experience in public diplomacy, policy research and capacity building with U.S. government-supported entities and with international organizations. Her experience includes human rights, gender equality, peacebuilding, journalism, and conflict resolution. She advocated for Internet access rights and worked as an analyst to produce the Sudan Section for the 2015 and 2016 “Freedom on the Net” reports for Freedom House. She has engaged in policy advocacy addressing the European Union, the British Parliament, and the Arab League.

Azaz earned an MA in International Policy and Practice from George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs in Washington, DC (2014), where she was selected as an honorary fellow. During her program, she focused on the fields of social movements, nonviolent resistance, identity and conflicts, ethnic policy, and new trends in Islamist militancy in Sub-Saharan Africa.