Shirin Ebadi is an Iranian Nobel laureate, lawyer, writer, teacher and a former judge and founder of the Defenders of Human Rights Center in Iran. In 2003, Ebadi was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her pioneering efforts for democracy and women's, children's, and refugee rights. She was the first Muslim woman and the first Iranian to receive the award.
Nazanin Afshin-Jam is an Iranian-Canadian human rights activist, author, public speaker and beauty pageant titleholder who was crowned Miss World Canada 2003. She is also president and co-founder of Stop Child Executions, as well as the founder of The Nazanin Foundation. She emigrated to Canada with her family in 1981 and is married to Peter MacKay, former Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada.
Shirin R. Tahir-Kheli is an American political scientist who also served in the Department of State. In 2006, she was appointed as the first Ambassador for women's empowerment by the United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as well as Senior Advisor to the Secretary of State on United Nations Reform. She was sworn in as the First American Muslim Ambassador in July 1990. Dr. Tahir-Kheli was the Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Democracy, Human Rights and International Operations at the White House National Security Council, from 2003-2005. She has served three Republican presidential administrations since 1980.
Shirin Neshat is an Iranian photographer and visual artist who lives in New York City, known primarily for her work in film, video and photography. Her artwork centers on the contrasts between Islam and the West, femininity and masculinity, public life and private life, antiquity and modernity, and bridging the spaces between these subjects.
Gertrud Bäumer was a German politician who actively participated in the German civil rights feminist movement. She was also a writer, and contributed to Friedrich Naumann's paper Die Hilfe. From 1898, Bäumer lived and worked together with the German feminist and politician Helene Lange.
Charlotte Niese was a German writer, poet and teacher.
Nawal El Saadawi was an Egyptian feminist writer, activist and physician. She wrote numerous books on the subject of women in Islam, focusing on the practice of female genital mutilation in her society. She was described as "the Simone de Beauvoir of the Arab World", and as "Egypt's most radical woman".
Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury is a Bangladeshi politician who served as the first female speaker of the Bangladesh Jatiya Sangsad since April 2013 until August 2024. At 46, she became the youngest person to assume that office. She was also the chairperson of the executive committee of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association between 2014 and 2017. She previously served as the state minister of the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs of Bangladesh.
Vian Dakhil is a current member of the Iraqi parliament. She is the only Kurdish woman who's religion is Yazidism in the Iraqi Parliament.
Gulalai Ismail is a Pakistani human rights activist from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. She is the chairperson of Aware Girls, a global ambassador for Humanists International, and a leading member of the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM). She speaks on the subject of promoting peace and women's empowerment at conferences internationally, and is the recipient of the International Humanist of the Year Award, the Chirac Prize for Conflict Prevention, and the Anna Politkovskaya Award.
Carola Stern was the name under which Erika Assmus reinvented herself as a serious journalist and (subsequently) author and politically committed television presenter, after she was obliged to relocate at short notice from East Germany to West Germany in 1951.
The condition of human rights in the territory controlled by the Islamic State (IS) is considered to be among the worst in the world. The Islamic State's policies included acts of genocide, torture and slavery. The United Nations Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) stated in November 2014 that the Islamic State "seeks to subjugate civilians under its control and dominate every aspect of their lives through terror, indoctrination, and the provision of services to those who obey". Many Islamic State actions of extreme criminality, terror, recruitment and other activities have been documented in the Middle East.
The Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy is an annual human rights summit sponsored by a coalition of 20 non-governmental organizations. Each year, on the eve of the United Nations Human Rights Council's main annual session, activists from around the world meet to raise international awareness of human rights situations.
Nadia Murad Basee Taha is an Iraqi-born Yazidi human rights activist based in Germany. In 2014, during the Yazidi genocide by the Islamic State, she was abducted from her hometown of Kocho in Iraq. Much of her community was massacred. After losing most of her family, Murad was held as an Islamic State sex slave for three months, alongside thousands of other Yazidi women and girls.
Rosa María Payá Acevedo is a Cuban activist for freedom and human rights. The daughter of activist Oswaldo Payá, head of the Christian Liberation Movement, she took up much of his activist work after he was killed by Ángel Carromero on 22 July 2012; Carromero was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter,but a 2023 ruling by the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights (IACHR) holds the Cuban state responsible for the murder of Oswaldo Payá.
Farida Khalaf is the pen name of a Yazidi woman who was abducted by ISIS in 2014 and sold into slavery. She escaped to a refugee camp, and in 2016 published a book about her experience, The Girl Who Escaped ISIS.
Julienne Lusenge is a Congolese human rights activist recognized for advocating for survivors of wartime sexual violence. She is co-founder and President of Female Solidarity for Integrated Peace and Development (SOFEPADI) and director of the Congolese Women's Fund (FFC).
Daniela Alfinito is a German schlager singer from Hesse, Germany. She achieved first chart success with her 2015 album Ein bisschen sterben and reached number one in Germany with her 2019 and 2020 albums Du warst jede Träne wert and Liebes-Tattoo.
Ketty Nivyabandi is a Burundian poet and human rights activist living in exile in Canada.
Polina Nemirovskaia is a Russian human rights advocate specializing in prisoners' rights. She is a coordinator for Open Russia, a pro-democracy NGO in Moscow. Open Russia was designated as "undesirable" by the Russian government in 2017 and its offices raided by the police in February 2019 for hosting a videoconference with exiled Kremlin critic Mikhail Khodorkovsky.
Kurdistan Region 
Iraq, 
Germany 
