Dr Sima Samar

Chairperson, Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission and UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Sudan

Unfinished Business: Womens Rights in Afghanistan

Dr Samar is a well known women’s and human rights advocate in international forums. She was the first Hazara woman to obtain a degree in medicine in Afghanistan but fled to Pakistan with her son in 1984 following the arrest of her husband by the communist regime. Over the next decade, distressed by the lack of health care facilities for Afghan refugee women, she established the Shuhada Organization in Pakistan which is dedicated to providing health care and education for Afghan women and to training medical staff. In 2002 Dr. Samar returned to Afghanistan to serve as the first Deputy Chair and Minister of Women’s Affairs in the Interim Administration of Afghanistan. She was forced into resignation after she was threatened with death and harassed for questioning conservative Islamic laws.

Dr Samar is in Australia as a guest of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

Date: Monday, 1st October 2007
Time: 6.00 to 7.00 pm – Public Lecture; 7.00 to 7.30 pm – Light refreshments provided
Venue: Monash University Law Chambers, 472 Bourke St, Melbourne
RSVP: castan.centre@law.monash.edu.au or tel 03 9905 3327