The Aljazeera International Documentary Film Festival has announced the formation of the jury for its ninth edition, taking place leadership of Aljazeera board chairman Sheikh Hamad bin Thamer al-Thani, from April 18-21 under the theme of ‘Windows’.
The jury panel is composed of 15 members, coming from different Arab and non-Arab countries. Ana Maria Leyaristi (Spain), Chao Gan (China), Dr Amal El Gamal (Egypt), Dr Kahlid Hroub (UK), Dr Marzook Bashir bin Marzook (Qatar), Giulia Amati (France), Gulbara Tolomushova (Kyrgyzstan), Dr Habib Nasry (Morocco), Hady Zaccak (Lebanon), Sergio Trefaut ( Portugal), Dr Yusuf Kaplan (Turkey) have been confirmed as part of the panel.
“The panel has been chosen very carefully and that all members are experts in the field of documentary films,” Festival managing director Abbas Arnaout said.  
The jury will view and judge 205 films during the festival; 23 ‘long’ films, 82 ‘medium’ films, 53 ‘short’ films, 36 ‘New Horizon’ films and 11 ‘Promising films’. The duration of short films is less than 30 minutes, medium ranging between 30 and 59 minutes, and long films of a duration exceeding an hour.
The festival awards grant the winning film in each category a cash prize shared by the director and the producer as follows: QR50,000 for long films, QR40,000 for medium length documentaries and QR30,000 for short presentations.
The ‘Jury award’ would be QR25,000 for long films, QR20,000 for medium films and QR15,000 for short films. The New Horizon award will earn QR15,000 for the winner and QR10,000 for the runner-up.
Regarding the special awards, Arnaout explained that “The Aljazeera Documentary Channel, the Public Liberties and Human Rights Section and the Aljazeera Children’s Channel will offer prizes to all categories; QR40,000 for the winning film in the long film category, QR30,000 for the winning film in the medium category and QR20,000 for the winning presentation in the short category.”