Mahnaz Afkhami was honored alongside Shirin Ebadi at the Royal United Services Institute in London for her lifelong work to promote women’s human rights. The event was hosted by Ambassador Melanne Verveer, Executive Director of the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace, and Security and featured a panel discussion on human rights in Iran. “Mahnaz Afkhami…
Tag: Women Leaders
PAAIA's 2019 Civic Engagement Forum: An Empowering and Successful First
Mahnaz Afkhami spoke at the inaugural Civic Engagement Forum, hosted by the Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans (PAAIA). The forum, which launched PAAIA’s new Civic Engagement Initiative, featured panels on a variety of topics including advocacy, political campaigns, and running for office as an Iranian-American woman. “We heard from inspiring leaders in and outside…
Women’s Learning Partnership’s Project on Family Law Reform to Challenge Gender-Based Violence
An international network of 20 autonomous nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) based primarily in transitioning and fragile states, Women’s Learning Partnership for Rights, Development, and Peace (WLP) is dedicated to enhancing universal human rights and gender equality, strengthening civil society, and empowering women to be active citizens and actors of change in their societies. Our mission is…
BBC: The History Hour: Women's Rights in Iran
Max Pearson’s The History Hour on the BBC World Service featured Mahnaz Afkhami on 17 Feb 2018. Afkhami was asked about her role as Iran’s first ever minister on Women’s Affairs: “It was a very interesting experience. There were 20 men and I was the only woman and I was very young….When I had meetings,…
Highlights from the 60th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women at the United Nations
The 60th Session of the Commission of the Status of Women (CSW60) took place in March, 2016, at the United Nations in New York. Mahnaz Afkhami spoke on a panel of CSW60 attendees to share highlights from the UN session.
Trespassing With Fatema
Fatema and I began our work together in 1984 as contributors to Robin Morgan’s Sisterhood Is Global: The International Women’s Movement Anthology. She wrote the Morocco chapter and I, Iran’s. We stayed in touch through the Sisterhood Is Global Institute that Robin founded with the seventy writers of the book, but we did not meet…
A Personal Remembrance of Fatema Mernissi
Fatema Mernissi, the Moroccan sociologist widely known as a pioneer in Middle Eastern Women’s studies, passed away this week. It is difficult for me to speak of her – a friend, ally, and colleague of over two decades – in the past tense. I first met Fatema at the Middle East Studies Association Conference in…
An Interview with Mahnaz Afkhami (In Persian)
Many women in Iran were not informed about their rights at the time of the 1979 Revolution, says Mahnaz Afkhami in an interview carried out by Tavaana. “In terms of women’s rights, Iran was one of the best among the developing countries – definitely much better than the rest of the region, and even comparable…