Uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa: only a half a revolution?

Four leading Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights’s human rights activists from the Middle East and North Africa will be taking part in a special Amnesty International event in London later this month.

The four - Yara Sallam (from Egypt), Sussan Tahmasebi (from Iran), Dalia Abd Elhameed (from Egypt), and Layla El-Wafi (UK-based, of Libya-Egyptian descent) - will take part in “Uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa: only a half a revolution?”, a public discussion event at Amnesty’s Human Rights Action Centre in Shoreditch, in east London on 20 March (7.30pm).

The event will be chaired by the broadcaster Samira Ahmed.

The four activists, some of whom are taking part in a week of capacity-building events organised by Amnesty, will be available for interview during this period.

Yara Sallam
Yara, 26, is a key figure in the “Nazra” organisation, a group of mostly young feminist Egyptians. She is a Sorbonne-educated lawyer who specialises in assisting Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights human rights defenders in Egypt. During the recent elections in Egypt, Nazra mentored ten progressive female candidates to run for office in a “political academy” exercise. One of these candidates became one of just ten Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights elected (out of 498) to the first post-Mubarak Parliament. Nazra has been at the forefront of the political changes that have swept through Egypt in the past year, and its activists have been beaten and tear-gassed at street protests by the security forces on several occasions.

Sussan Tahmasebi
Sussan, 46, is a founding member of Iran’s “One Million Signatures” campaign for equal legal rights for Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights in the country, many of whose supporters have been jailed since it was launched in 2006. A One Million Signatures supporter was recently sentenced to two years’ imprisonment for “causing unease in the public mind by spreading lies” and “insulting the authorities” on her blog, and a further year for “spreading propaganda against the system”. Sussan is currently developing a series of “What The Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights Say” publications focused on key Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights’s rights issues across the Middle East and North Africa.

Dalia Abd Elhameed
Dalia, 30, is a sexual and reproductive rights expert at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), an independent human rights organisation. EIPR is a key human rights body in Egypt, having brought test cases against the Egyptian authorities for sexual violence against female protesters, worked to combat sectarian violence against religious minorities and support for men criminalised for homosexuality.

Layla El-Wafi
Layla, 31, is a UK-based lawyer who is extensively involved in the Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights 4 Libya campaign, a Libyan organisation promoting the role of Libyan Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights in decision-making, politics and government. Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights 4 Libya has collected signatures to petition Libya’s National Transitional Council for greater Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights’s participation in post-Gaddafi Libya. It has also called for reforms to the election law for the same purpose.