Belquis Al Lahabi is a pro-democracy activist and leader of a coalition of civil society organizations that organized anti-regime protests and sit-ins and played an important role in the 2011 revolution in Yemen. As the uprisings in Tunisia began, she stood in front of the Tunisian embassy in Yemen and called for the fall of President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s authoritarian regime. When Saleh was toppled, she was among the few women that were part of the National Dialogue Conference, a transitional dialogue process held in 2013 as a part of crisis reconciliation efforts in the country. Al Lahabi used this opportunity as a platform to advocate for women’s rights, focusing on issues such as child marriage, maternal mortality, and literacy. In April 2015, after her home was destroyed by an explosion, she fled to Jordan, where she has resided ever since.
