Shirin Ebadi

Iranian Nobel Laureate Shirin Ebadi has issued a warning to the United States, saying any U.S. military attack on Iran would be an "utter disaster" for the cause of human rights in her country.

Ms. Ebadi's warning was published Tuesday in the New York Times.  It comes weeks after President Bush said he has not ruled out the use of military force, if diplomacy fails to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons.

In the essay, co-written with Hadi Ghaemi of Human Rights Watch, Ms. Ebadi said the human rights situation in her homeland is far from ideal.  But she said respect for human rights must be forged by the will of the Iranian people, and not by military threats from abroad.

She also said the threat of military intervention will provide what she calls a powerful excuse for Iran's hard-line rulers to crush the country's fledgling human rights movement.  Ms. Ebadi was the 2003 winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.