Chulie De Silva Email & Phone Number

Myislandlanka.Lk

Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka

Communications Consultant

Bangladesh

Manager, Communications, Drik Picture Agency & DrikNews at Drik Picture Library; the Project Manager for Drik-World Press Photo Press Freedom 2.0 project; head of the Chobi Mela VI and VII Secretariat.

Chobi Mela is the most demographically inclusive photo festival in the world. see also: chobimela.wordpress.com; www.chobimela.org

Sri Lanka

Responsible for the strategy and program development as the senior communications officer of the Colombo World Bank office’s External Affairs team which included the Public Information Centre. Among the many initiatives that commenced during my tenure was the publishing of World Bank books in Sri Lanka which included text summaries in the Sinhala and Tamil languages. Was responsible for building the Colombo office Photo library collection and extending the development story telling to include the use of visual media -- videos, blogs, podcasting, multi-media presentations and mobile exhibitions on Tuk-tuks.As the World Bank Grant’s Coordinator/focal point for the Civil Society Fund, from 2004 to 2009 and for the South Asia Development market Place for HIV/AIDS, World Bank Institute (WBI) Media Program and for Youth engagement worked as the principal civil society and media liaison person implementing many innovative creative communication programs. This included the training of mid career journalists with the Sri Lanka College of Journalism and WBI.

Virtual

As the President of the Lanka Academic network [LAcNet] and former Vice President, worked with a team of globally dispersed Sri Lankan academics linked in a virtual community on the web. The focus of our work was to make Internet facilities available to rural Sri Lanka. In a pioneering effort we set up a Computer Center at the Nivaththaka Chethiya School in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka in 2000. This project of LAcNet was featured in a background Paper for UNDP Human Development Report 2001 titled “People’s Initiatives to Use IT for Development” by Nadia Hijab. hdr.undp.org/docs/publications/ background_papers/hijab.doc

Colombo, Sri Lanka

During my tenure at the U.S. Embassy I served as the principal U.S. Mission authority on media matters, and was responsible for advising the Public Affairs Officer on the selection, targeting, and placement potential of U.S. State department material and executing a media strategy in keeping with the Country Plan objectives of the U.S. Mission in Sri Lanka. As the first point of contact at the U.S. Embassy for the media, I have been trained to diplomatically handle crisis communications and maintain good media contacts with local media as well as with the foreign press corps.