The Alaska World Affairs Council Presents

Linda Biehl
Co-Founder & Director of the Amy Biehl Foundation
&
the Amy Biehl Foundation Trust

"Restorative Justice"

Friday, 18th September 2009 – Hilton Hotel
Doors open at 11:30 a.m. - Program begins at 12:00 p.m.
For Reservations
RSVP by Wednesday, 16th September to the Alaska World Affairs Council
by telephone 276-8038 or by email to AlaskaWorldAffairs.org .
Lunch Program $25 for Members - $30 for Non-Members - $10 for Coffee Only

Linda Biehl is the co-founder and director of the Amy Biehl Foundation in the U.S. and the Amy Biehl Foundation Trust in South Africa. Linda’s relationship to South Africa and the genesis of these Foundations is grounded in the life and death of her daughter Amy.

Amy Biehl was a dynamic, 26 year-old Stanford graduate who in 1993 was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to study the role of women and gender rights during South Africa’s transition from the racist and brutal apartheid regime to a free multiracial democracy. Amy was an esteemed human rights activist who worked tirelessly towards ensuring all South Africans regardless of race or gender assumed their rightful place in the emerging democratic nation. Just days before she was due home, Amy was killed in an act of political violence by a group of young black South Africans who were fighting to end apartheid and saw all whites as their oppressors.

Four young men were convicted for Amy’s death and in 1994; they were sentenced to 18 years in prison. In 1997, the four men applied for amnesty to South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Linda and her late husband Peter were strongly motivated by Amy’s belief in the TRC to achieve restorative justice for those who confessed to politically motivated crimes thus did not oppose their application for amnesty. In 1997, under the watchful eye of the world, Linda and Peter testified at the amnesty hearing of their daughters killers. Instead of opposing amnesty they offered their support and challenged the young men to link arms with them and together continue Amy’s work.

Justice is central to Linda Biehl’s message of peace and reconciliation. Following in the footsteps of Desmond Tutu, Linda Biehl and the Amy Biehl Foundation embrace restorative, rather than retributive justice. At a personal level Linda Biehl embraced restorative justice by building a relationship with two of the youth convicted for the death of her daughter. Today, those two young men have been tremendous social activists in their community working for the Amy Biehl Foundation Trust. At a professional level Linda works in communities in South Africa as she continues to spread “Amy’s magic”.

Linda Biehl and the Amy Biehl Foundation have worked to fulfill three important rights in the South African Constitution: the right to education, the right to equal employment, and the right to health.

For Linda Biehl justice is more than rights written into an official document; justice is converting those rights into reality.

OUTREACH OPPORTUNITIES/MEDIA

From her death in 1993, to South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission Hearings in 1997 and the current work of her Foundations, Amy’s story has been afforded significant media attention. Coverage includes: ABC’s “Turning Point” (4/94), CBS’s “60 Minutes” and “60 Minutes II” (1/99, 2/00), ABC’s Oprah Winfrey (5/99), IRIS Film’s Sundance Award winning “Long Night’s Journey Into Day” (1/00) and NBC’S “Today Show” (3/04) CNN’s Paula Zahn Show (2004), CNN’s Anderson Cooper (2005), NBC Nightly News (6/2007) and CNN’s Morning News (6/2007). In the upcoming future a major film will begin production.

Numerous invitations from primary schools to universities, churches, and other organizations have been extended to the Biehl family to share on a personal level about, Amy, her Foundations, and other related experiences. We welcome such opportunities and view them as a significant part of our work.

In 2008 Linda was awarded the highest honor given to a non-South African, the Companions of O R Tambo.

Linda was the first Greeley Scholar for Peace and UMASS Lowell in the spring of 2008.
To learn more about Chitose, Japan, please visit the Anchorage Sister Cities Commission’s website at http://www.muni.org/sister1/chitose.cfm .