Contributor(s): Baroness Afshar | Prominent Muslim feminist and peer Haleh Afshar will speak on the situation facing Iranian women in their country today. The BRISMES Annual Lecture will be given at LSE by Professor the Baroness Haleh Afshar. The annual BRISMES Award for Services to Middle Eastern Studies will be presented to Baroness Afshar at this event. Haleh Afshar (BA York, PhD University of Cambridge) teaches Politics and Women's Studies at the University of York and serves as a Crossbench Peer in the House of Lords. In 2005 she was awarded an OBE for services to equal opportunities. She is also the Visiting Professor of Islamic Law at the Faculté Internationale de Droit Comparée at Strasbourg. She was born and raised in Iran where she worked as a journalist and a civil servant. She has served as the Chair for the British Association of Middle Eastern Studies and Chair of United Nation Association's International Services. Alistair Newton is President of the British Society for Middle Eastern Studies.