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Doc previously had world premiere at Berlinale.

Under The Sky Of Damascus by Talal Derki, Heba Khaled and Ali Wajeeh won the Golden Alexander prize in the international competition of the 25th Thessaloniki Documentary Festival, which closed on March 12.

The Denmark-Germany-us-Syrian co-production centres on a group of young Syrian women producing a play that lays bare the culture of misogyny and sexual abuse that has blighted their lives. The documentary had its world premiere in the Panorama section of this year Berlinale.

The Golden Alexander comes with a €12,000 and secures the place in the pre-selection shortlist for the Best Documentary Academy Award.

Egyptian director Alaa Dajani’s “The Native Dance,” a documentary that tells the story of Younis Abdallah and his comrades who were among the 300,000 peasants conscripted into the Egyptian Labor Corps in 1917, many of whom were dispatched to Europe to dig trenches for allied defense in World War I, took the top prize in the Pitching Forum of the Thessaloniki Intl. Documentary Festival’s Agora Docs industry program, which wrapped Wednesday.

The awards ceremony concluded a session that saw more than 400 professionals taking part both in-person and online in the Agora activities.

In “The Native Dance,” which is produced by Kesmat El Sayed and Laura Kloeckner (Seera Films), the jury found “a film that promises a compelling visual approach combining archive material and animation, telling the story about the British forcing peasants from Egypt to dig trenches in Europe during WWI,” read the jury’s statement.

The top prize in the Doc in Progress section,...

Stories of war and its devastating human toll, migration across borders, the struggle for human rights and the battle to save a rapidly warming planet are among the themes that take center stage on March 6 during the Thessaloniki Pitching Forum, the co-production and co-financing platform of the Thessaloniki Documentary Film Festival.

Fourteen projects representing filmmakers from 21 countries will be pitching before an audience of international industry guests including producers, broadcasters, funding bodies and festival programmers, as well as a jury comprised of Eleni Chandrinou, a consultant and producer from Cigale Films; Nevena Milašinović, a sales and acquisitions executive from Lightdox; and Sara Rüster, international distribution manager at the Swedish Film Institute.

Eleven more films that are nearing completion and looking for festival premieres and distribution will also be screened as part of the Agora Docs in Progress program.

Angeliki Vergou, who heads the Thessaloniki Documentary Festival’s Agora industry section,...