Maryam Namazie is a human rights activist, commentator and broadcaster. Namazie has served as the executive director of the International Federation of Iranian Refugees.[1] She is spokesperson for the One Law for All Campaign[2] against Sharia Law in Britain. The campaign is opposed to faith based laws and promotes citizenship rights and one secular law for all. She is Spokesperson of the Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain[3] which aims to break the taboo that comes with renouncing Islam and to oppose apostasy laws and political Islam.[4] She hosts and produces a weekly TV International programme broadcast in the Middle East via New Channel TV.
Moreover, she is a National Secular Society Honorary Associate and the NSS' 2005 Secularist of the Year award winner;[5] spokesperson of Equal Rights Now - Organisation against Women's Discrimination in Iran; Distinguished Supporter of the British Humanist Association;[6] Central Committee member of the Worker-communist Party of Iran and co-editor of WPI Briefing. She is involved in the Third Camp against US militarism and Islamic terrorism among other things. Her blog has been rated one of the top 100 atheist blogs and she was selected one of the top 45 women of the year 2007 by Elle magazine Quebec.[2]
She has spoken at numerous conferences and written many articles on women's rights issues, violence against women, political Islam, and secularism - some of which have been translated into various languages.
Previously, Namazie was the elected Executive Director of the International Federation of Iranian Refugees, a refugee run organisation with 60 branches in 15 countries worldwide and founded the Committee for Humanitarian Assistance to Iranian Refugees (CHAIR).
Namazie was born in Tehran but left with her family during the 1980 Iranian revolution.[4][5] Presently, she lives in the United Kingdom.
After the Muhammad cartoons controversy, she, together with 11 other activists, published a declaration named MANIFESTO: Together facing the new totalitarianism. MANIFESTO portrayed the rise of Islamism as a new totalitarianism.
On 15 September 2010, Namazie, along with 54 other public figures, signed an open letter published in The Guardian, stating their opposition to Pope Benedict XVI's state visit to the UK.[7]