By Ayesha Husain
Shirin Ebadi, the first Muslim woman to be given the Nobel Peace Prize, has reported several recent death threats on her life. On April 5th, one such threat took the form of a missive sent to her office with the words, Shirin Ebadi, your death is near?.
While Ebadi has been at the receiving end of such warnings for some time, the threats have recently intensified and have begun to target members of Ebadi”s family as well.
Because she has such a prominent role against what she sees as the injustices of Iran”s government, and because she has taken on many controversial topics, Ebadi feels that these threats stem not from personal but ideological animosity,? according to Gulfnews.com.
In particular, one letter attacked her for recent work with the Bahai minority in Iran.
As a staunch human rights activist in her home country of Iran, Ms. Ebadi has taken on a number of causes over the years. Particularly, these include those concerning women and children, journalists, and by Rohit Chetty political dissidents.
Although she served as the first female judge in Iran, Ebadi was forced to abandon that post when the current government came to power. Still passionate about working within the legal world, Ebadi opened her own law practice and began taking on human rights cases in addition to writing books and lecturing both within and outside of her country.
Ebadi founded the Human Rights Defense Center and assisted in the creation of the Association for Support of Children”s Rights. This work earned her the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 and at the time the Nobel Committee declared her a courageous person? who has never heeded the threats to her own safety?.