GENEVA — Nobel peace
laureate Shirin Ebadi of Iran on Monday strongly defended Islam
as a religion of peace, while also saying Islam had been wrongly
used to justify the oppression of women.
“Islam is a religion that is against terrorism and violence,”
said Ebadi, at a press conference in Geneva at the International
Labor Organization where she was to take part in a panel discussion
to mark International Women’s Day, March 8.
“What happened in Bosnia, we did not say, ‘It was
Christians.’ All the things that happen in Palestine, we
do not put it at the door of Judaism,” said Ebadi, who asked
why Islam should be blamed for the violent actions of individuals
who followed that faith. “It is not the religion of Islam
that supports terrorism.”
Responding to a question about nuclear weapons, which Iran has
been accused of developing, Ebadi said that “no country”
needed such weapons.
“You cannot save humanity through nuclear weapons,”
she said. “What saves humanity is respect for human rights
and democracy.”
Ebadi was named the recipient of the Nobel peace prize in 2003
and she said the award had given her a “loudspeaker”
to be heard more clearly not only in Iran but also on the international
stage. “It is in that way that I can speak out about the
situation of women not only in Iran but in all Muslim countries,”
said Ebadi.
Defending Islam as a religion that believes in equality and human
rights, Ebadi said the position of women in Islamic countries
was due to the “patriarchal system” in those countries.
“With a correct understanding of Islam one can be for human
rights and the equality of women,” she said.
Still, the situation of women in her own country was not “perfect
or good,” she noted, and many discriminatory rules were
in place. She strongly criticized recent elections in Iran, in
which many reformers were forbidden from standing, and said the
will of the
people had been “nullified.”
Born in 1947, Ebadi was one of Iran’s first female judges
and served as president of the city court of Tehran from 1975
to 1979 but was forced to resign after the 1979 Islamic revolution
and now teaches at the University of Tehran. |
