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Secularism, Islam and Democracy

A public lecture by Akbar Ganji

Sunday, April 15, 2007
5:00 PM - 7:00 PM
Haines Hall 39
UCLA
Los Angeles, CA United States

Akbar Ganji is an Iranian journalist and writer. He was arrested on April 22, 2000 after he took part in a conference on political and social reform in Iran held in Berlin. He was imprisoned and charged collecting confidential information that harms national security and spreading propaganda against the Islamic system and for a series of articles he had written implicating leading Iranian political figures in the 1998 murders of several dissidents and intellectuals.  During his imprisonment he went on two hunger strikes, one lasting 80 days and garnering international attention and outcry.  He is author of several collections of his articles, including the best-selling The Dungeon of Ghosts, Prison-like Archipelago, and The Red Eminence, among others. 

Akbar Ganji is the recipient of many international awards, including: PEN America, Honorary member and Canadian Journalists for Free Expression, International Press Freedom Award in 2000; The Middle East Studies Association of North America, MESA Academic Freedom Prize and Press Freedom Award, Italy in 2005; World Association of Newspapers, Golden Pen of Freedom, Honorary citizen of the city of Florence, Italy, Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders, and National Press Club, John Aubuchon Freedom of the Press Award, all in 2006.

This lecture is part of the Center's Persian Lecture Series.

Cost: Free

Special Instructions

The lecture will be delivered in Persian.

For more information please contact

Peter Szanton, Center for Near Eastern Studies
Tel: (310) 825-1455
pszanton@international.ucla.edu
www.international.ucla.edu/cnes

Sponsor(s): Center for Near Eastern Studies