Lara Aharonian (born 1972) is a Lebanese Canadian Armenian rights activist. She is the Director of the Women's Resource Centre in

Yerevan Yerevan ( , , hy, Երևան , sometimes spelled Erevan) is the capital and largest city of Armenia and one of the world's List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest continuously inhabited cities. Situated along the Hrazdan River, Y ...

. She has been recognised as a "Woman of Courage" by the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and international security, security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be ...

Life

Aharonian was an Armenian who was born in

Beirut Beirut, french: Beyrouth is the capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, which makes it the third-largest city in the Levant region. The city is situated on a peninsula at the midpoint o ...

in 1972. The

Lebanese Civil War The Lebanese Civil War ( ar, الحرب الأهلية اللبنانية, translit=Al-Ḥarb al-Ahliyyah al-Libnāniyyah) was a multifaceted armed conflict that took place from 1975 to 1990. It resulted in an estimated 120,000 fatalities a ...

started in 1975 and in the 1990s she left to study in

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...

. She studied Psycho-education and Comparative feminist Literature. She went to live in Armenia, and in 2003 she, Shushan Avagyan and Gohar Shahnazaryan created the Women's Resource Center in

. Their feminist aim was to challenge the patriarchal Armenian society. In 2007 she started to act as an advocate for the women of Nagorno-Karabakh. In 2008 she founded a crisis centre as a refuge to women -survivors of sexual violence. She was one of the directors of a 2009 documentary film called ''Finding Zabel Yesayan'' about the life of the writer and dissident Zabel Yesayan. In 2013, threats against her organisation became so specific that they asked for the police to investigate. Aharonian lives in Armenia in with her husband and her four children. In 2014 she was honoured with a UN "Woman of Courage" award, presented by Kathy Leach who was the British Ambassador to Armenia.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Aharonian, Lara 1972 births Living people People from Beirut Lebanese people of Armenian descent