WEF throws open Kailash Satyarthi, Karan Johar programmes for public

The World Economic Forum (WEF) Monday announced that some sessions of its high-profile annual meeting would be open for the public, including programmes of Indian Nobel laureate Kailash Satyarthi and celebrity filmmaker Karan Johar.

These sessions would form part of the Open Forum being held during the five-day annual congregation of the global elite beginning Monday in this ski resort town on the Swiss Alps.

Panellists at the Open Forum, which takes place outside the main session in Davos and can be attended by non-registered participants as well, also include Jane Goodall, the world's foremost expert on chimpanzees.

Other panellists would be Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim, President of the Association for Indigenous Women and Peoples of Chad, Denis Mukwege, a Congolese gynaecologist and human rights activist and Ricken Patel, founder and chief executive officer of Avaaz.org, a global civic organisation with the world's largest online activist community.

Topics include environmental questions, bridging science and society, violence against women and addressing loneliness.

These sessions would also be webcast for those not present in Davos.

The WEF said sessions on escaping extinction and tackling plastic pollution plus Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Kailash Satyarthi's special screening of the documentary 'The Price of Free', which portrays the rescue of 80,000 child factory workers in India, are among the events open to the public.

Karan Johar's programme would focus on violence against women.

Fareed Zakaria, host of CNN's Fareed Zakaria GPS, will be joined in conversation with Jane Goodall during which they will discuss her life's journey through the world's last forests and her work with great apes, humanity's closest relatives.

Extreme swimmer from Davos, Ernst Bromeis, will discuss his journeys across the waters of Europe and what it takes to protect our planet's most important resource.

There will also be a special performance and dialogue with a quartet of the Sphinx Virtuosi chamber orchestra, which comprises some of the most talented young African-American and Latino soloists in the US, highlighting how increasing diversity in classical music benefits everyone.

This is the 17th year of the Open Forum.