Event Date: November 22, 2016 - 6:00pm to 7:30pm
Location: Faculty of Social Sciences 4004, 120 University Private , Ottawa
Presented by CIPS, OpenCanada.org and the Baha’i Community of Canada
Free. In English. Registration is not required. Seating is limited and available on a first come, first served basis.
The Trudeau government has recently lowered economic sanctions and announced plans to re-open diplomatic relations with Iran. However, as the recent case of Professor Homa Hoodfar illustrates, Iran arbitrarily continues to detain innocent people and its human rights record has not improved under reformist President Hassan Rouhani. How should Canada balance its strategic and business interests in re-engaging with its commitment to accountability, inclusion, and human rights? If re-engagement leads to more Canadian influence with Tehran, how should it be used?
This panel explores the challenges of diplomatic relations with Iran, trade, the role of the UN, and critical questions ahead for the Canadian government. Panellists include journalist Michael Petrou and human rights activist Maryam Nayeb Yazdi. Eva Salinas, managing editor of
OpenCanada.org, will moderate. (Michael Petrou’s feature story on the same theme can be read
here.)
About the panellists
Michael Petrou is a two-time National Magazine Award-winning journalist and author who has reported from across Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia. His latest book, Is This Your First War? Travels Through the Post-9/11 Islamic World, won the Ottawa Book Award for non-fiction. Petrou has a DPhil in Modern History from the University of Oxford. He is also a non-resident fellow at the Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights Studies.
Thomas Juneau teaches at the University of Ottawa’s Graduate School of Public and International Affairs. He is the author of Squandered Opportunity: Neoclassical realism and Iranian foreign policy (Stanford University Press, 2015), co-editor of Iranian Foreign Policy since 2001: Alone in the world (Routledge, 2013), and co-editor of Asie centrale et Caucase : Une sécurité mondialisée (Presses de l’Université Laval, 2004). He has also worked for the Department of National Defence as a strategic analyst on the Middle East.
Maryam Nayeb Yazdi is an activist, writer, and consultant/strategist working in the field of human rights and social change. She is the founder of Persian2English.com, an acclaimed translation blog that the Toronto Star has described as a “world-ranking resource for pundits, politicians, universities, media, human rights groups and the United Nations.” She has founded numerous campaigns calling for the release of political prisoners in Iran, including a global campaign for Canadian Permanent Resident Saeed Malekpour. In 2013, she delivered a speech at the Oslo Freedom Forum about the death penalty in Iran, the government’s “main weapon of choice … against Iranians.”
*Please note: Photos and/or video recordings of this event may be posted on the CIPS website, newsletter and/or social media accounts.