Shirin Ebadi, brief biography
An Iranian judge, lawyer and peace activist born on June 21, 1947. In 2003 she was the first Iranian and first Muslim woman to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Starting in 1965 she studied law at Tehran University and took the exams to become a magistrate. She started her career in the spring of 1969 and from 1975 to 1979 she was the chairman of a section of the court of Tehran. After the Islamic Revolution of 1979 she was forced, like all female judges, to abandon her role, and only after extensive protests did she recover the possibility of working with a court of law in the role of "legal expert." She considered this demotion intolerable, and for a few years her work activities were limited to publishing books and articles. Only in 1992 did she attain authorisation to work as a lawyer, opening her own professional practice. In 1994 she founded a non-governmental organisation, the Society for the Protection of Children’s Rights, of which she is still a manager. As a lawyer, she deals with cases of dissidents in conflict with the Iranian judicial system, which remains one of the bastions of the most conservative wing of the government, or in civil cases against members of the Iranian secret services. She is currently a lecturer at Tehran University and an active supporter of movements for women’s and children’s rights. She lives in Tehran with her husband and two daughters. Recently the threats to her life have, in her own words, "intensified."
The faces of the shift
