Name Kamal Qadir | Role Entrepreneur | |
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Education Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Oberlin College | ||
Dr. Kamal Sayid Qadir (also known as Kamal Berzenji) (b. 1958 in Arbil, Iraq) is a Kurdish human rights activist with Austrian citizenship. He immigrated to Austria in 1978 and studied law at the Vienna School of Law. He has taught at the University of Suleimani (1998-99) as well as Salahaddin University in Arbil (1999-2000) in Iraq. He had been arrested in October 2005. He was sentenced to 30 years imprisonment for defamation. The sentence was condemned by Amnesty International, Reporters without Borders and media.
He was released from custody on January 25, 2006, as a result of efforts by special envoy of the Austrian foreign ministry, Gudrun Harrer. The envoy intervened after the Austrian government deemed the sentence too harsh. Qadir was later retried and the sentenced changed to eighteen months. In April 2006 he was released.