Ebadi, Shirin

Shirin Ebadi is a lawyer, human rights activist, and author. In 2003, she became the first Iranian as well as the first Muslim woman to receive the Nobel Peace Prize. Ebadi has received numerous awards for her humanitarian work with women's and children's rights, been bestowed with honorary doctoral degrees [Page 443]from colleges and universities, is an internationally known speaker, and has cofounded several nonprofit organizations to aid women and children in Iran.

Nobel Peace Prize award winner Shirin Ebadi in Paris at the nongovernmental organization, International Federation for Human Rights. Ebadi cofounded the Society for Protecting the Rights of the Child, and the Human Rights Defense Center

Born in Hamadan, Iran, on June 21, 1947, Ebadi and her family moved to Tehran in 1948. Upon graduation from school, she attended the University of Tehran in 1965, completed her law degree in 1969 and later obtained her master's degree in law in 1971. She became a judge, and was the first woman in Iran to head a legislative court. During the 1979 revolution, Iran's clerics deemed that the laws of Islam prohibited women from being judges, and demoted all female judges, including Ebadi, to clerks. The women protested this decision and later received a new classification, that of legal experts. Unhappy and frustrated with the situation, Ebadi resigned. She did not practice law again until 1993.

Ebadi spent many years working toward democracy in Iran and fighting for the rights of women and children. She has spent her life as a well-known and polarizing figure in Iran. She is celebrated for taking on legal cases of individuals and families that have fallen out of favor with the country's governing body due to their political convictions.

She has been an outspoken critic on the influence of the Western world, believing that Iran should become democratic without interference from outsiders. She brought a lawsuit against the United States Treasury Department for refusing to allow her to publish her memoir because of the United States's trade with Iran. United States trade laws prohibit writers from embargoed countries from being published here. Ebadi was successful in the lawuit, and her book was published in 2006.

In 2003, Ebadi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, becoming the 11th woman to receive that honor. She was criticized by conservatives in Iran for not covering her head when she received her award. Because [Page 444]Ebadi is an outspoken proponent of democracy in Iran, she has received numerous death threats. Her family has been imprisoned and harassed in an effort to silence her. In 2009, Ebadi claimed that the Iranian government had broken into her safe deposit box and stolen her Nobel Peace Prize medal. The government has denied all claims of wrongdoing. Ebadi fled to the United Kingdom in 2009 and lives in exile there, away from the increasing persecution of individuals critical of the ruling Iranian government.

Ebadi is the founder and/or cofounder of several groups, including the Society for Protecting the Rights of the Child, the Association for Support of Children's Rights and the Human Rights Defense Center. She continues to represent persecuted people and those who have been murdered for political beliefs against the Iranian government.

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