AT the age of 57, Shirin Ebadi resembles a lake, serene and selfpossessed, despite her lackluster French and English. She can only speak Parsi, her mother tongue. But those are not important attributes, as it turns out. We all know about this Iranian lady who won the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize, and that she was the keynote speaker at an international seminar on Islamic values in Jakarta last week.

"Islam is not a patriarchal religion. Peopl