Yasmeen Hassan became the Global Executive Director of Equality Now in 2011 after having served as Deputy Executive Director and Director of Programs for three years. Before joining the organization, Ms. Hassan was with the United Nations Division for the Advancement of Women where she worked on the implementation of CEDAW and the Secretary-General’s study on violence against women. She has been involved in women’s rights since very early in her career, authoring the first study of domestic violence in Pakistan, which ultimately became Pakistan’s submission to the Fourth World Conference on Women, Beijing 1995. Long before joining Equality Now, she was a supporter of the organization, serving as editor of its first report on discriminatory laws in 1999. She has written several papers and opinion editorials on the situation of women which have been published in the Washington Post and the International Herald Tribune. Ms. Hassan holds a J. D. from Harvard Law School where, among other subjects, she studied Islamic law and women’s rights. She practiced corporate law at Davis Polk & Wardwell from 1995 to 2003 and clerked on the D.C. Court of Appeals from 1994 to 1995.
