UCI welcomes Nobel Peace Prize recipient

Michael Miller

Shirin Ebadi, the only Iranian ever to win the Nobel Peace Prize,

planted a tree at Friday at UC Irvine to commemorate her receiving

the campus’s third UCI Citizen Peacebuilding Award.

At a small gathering in UCI’s Aldrich Park, Ebadi spoke to the

crowd in Persian about democracy and human rights in her native

country and abroad. After her speech, the laureate assisted in

planting a tiny redwood in the ground behind the Social Science

Tower.

UCI officials planted a second tree to represent the Dalai Lama,

who received the Citizen Peacebuilding Award on the campus last year.

John Graham, the director of the Citizen Peacebuilding Program, said

that along with representing the two recipients, the two trees stood

for social justice and democracy, the values that Ebadi trumpeted in

her speech.

“With the highest hope for lasting peace in Iran and the rest of

the world, I plant this tree, which is an everlasting symbol of

peace,” Ebadi said through her translator.

In her speech, the Iranian touched on human rights abuses --

particularly with regard to women’s rights -- in her home country and

in other parts of the world.

“Silence in a society run by a dictatorship is only graveyard

peace, which sooner or later will be disturbed,” Ebadi told the

crowd. “The government that has come to power through a democratic

election cannot govern in an arbitrary manner. It cannot repress half

of the society, who are the women.”

She added that a democratic state has to manage itself

responsibly, noting that a number of dictatorships came to power

through popular support.

“Only when we respect democracy and human rights simultaneously

can a society move toward true peace,” she said.

Ebadi was the third recipient of the Citizen Peacebuilding Award.

The Dalai Lama and former Soviet Union president Mikhail Gorbachev

both received the honor last year.

When the Dalai Lama came to UCI in 2004, a member of the Dalai

Lama Foundation in northern California brought in 100 redwood

saplings to set around the stage. Ebadi and UCI officials planted two

of those saplings -- now grown into tiny trees -- in the ground on

Friday.

“We had an idea of them being seeds of peace,” said Tony Hoeber, a

member of the foundation.

Ebadi, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003, was the first woman

judge in Iran and served as president of the Tehran City Court from

1975 to 1979. During the last 30 years, she has been an advocate for

women’s and children’s rights and for amnesty for political

prisoners. She currently practices law and teaches at the University

of Tehran.

Tonight, at the Westin South Coast Plaza Hotel, Ebadi will give an

additional public lecture on “The Challenges to Women, Children and

Human Rights Today.” A live Persian music performance by the Lian

Ensemble begins at 6 p.m., with Ebadi’s speech afterward.