This undated image made available by Amnesty International in London, Thursday July 8, 2010, shows Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, a mother of two who is facing execution in Iran on charges of adultery.The Associated Press
Thousands of people around the world have signed a petition demanding the release of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, an Iranian woman who was sentenced to death after being charged with adultery. Among those who have signed the petition are panellists Irshad Manji and Marina Nemat, who were joined by journalist Azadeh Moaveni. Ms. Moaveni has covered Iran extensively for several publications including Time magazine.
Azadeh Moaveni is the author of Lipstick Jihad and co-author, with Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi, of Iran Awakening. She has lived and reported throughout the Middle East, and speaks both Farsi and Arabic fluently. Azadeh studied politics at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and received a Fulbright Fellowship to Egypt. As one of the few American correspondents allowed to work continuously in Iran since 1999, she has reported for Time, The New York Times Book Review, The Washington Post, and The Los Angeles Times. Currently a Time magazine contributing writer on Iran and the Middle East, she lives with her husband and son in London.
Marina Nemat was born in Tehran, Iran. After the Islamic Revolution of 1979, she was arrested at the age of 16 and spent more than two years in Evin, a political prison in Tehran, where she was tortured and came very close to execution. She came to Canada in 1991 and has called it home ever since. Her memoir of her life in Iran, Prisoner of Tehran , was published in April 2007, has been published in 28 other countries, and has been an international bestseller. On December 15, 2007, Marina received the inaugural Human Dignity Award from the European Parliament, and in October 2008, she received the prestigious Grinzane Prize in Italy. In 2008/2009, she was an Aurea Fellow at University of Toronto's Massey College, where she wrote her second book, After Tehran: A Life Reclaimed, which will be published by Penguin Canada in September 2010.
Irshad Manji was born in 1968 and came to Vancouver in 1972 with her family as a refugee from Idi Amin's Uganda. She is the internationally best-selling author of The Trouble with Islam Today: A Muslim's Call for Reform in Her Faith . Her book has been published in more than 30 countries, including Pakistan, India, Lebanon and Indonesia. Irshad is Director of the Moral Courage Project at New York University. As a scholar beyond NYU, Irshad is Senior Fellow with the European Foundation for Democracy. She has served as a Visiting Fellow at Yale University and Journalist-in-Residence at the University of Toronto, where she wrote The Trouble with Islam Today. As a journalist, Irshad's columns appear frequently in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Times of London, Al-Arabiya.net and other major news sources. She writes a regular feature for The Globe and Mail.
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