[7] Speakers included, among others, Massouda Jalal, former Afghan Minister of Women's Affairs;[8] exiled Uyghur leader Rebiya Kadeer;[8] Bob Boorstin, Google's policy director;[9] Caspian Makan, fiancé of slain Iranian icon Neda Agha Soltan;[9] Cuban dissident José Gabriel Ramón Castillo;[9] and Bo Kyi of Burma, a former political prisoner and secretary of the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners.
[15] Speakers included, among others, Pakistani women's rights activist Mukhtar Mai;[16] Moroccan writer and atheist Kacem El Ghazzali;[17] Tibetan politician Dicki Chhoyang;[18] Syrian politician Randa Kassis;[18] former Cuban political prisoner Régis Iglesias;[18] Iranian dissident Marina Nemat;[19] Pyotr Verzilov, husband of jailed Pussy Riot member Nadezhda Tolokonnikova;[19] and Kazakh journalist Lukpan Akhmedyarov.
[20] Speakers included, among others, Mauritanian anti-slavery activist Biram Dah Abeid;[21] Tibetan MP Tenzin Dhardon Sharling;[22] Chinese political dissident Yang Jianli;[22] Canadian MP and human rights lawyer Irwin Cotler;[23] North Korean human rights activist Ahn Myong Chul;[24] Naghmeh Abedini, wife of imprisoned Iranian-American pastor Saeed Abedini;[citation needed] and the aunt of imprisoned Venezuelan opposition leader Leopoldo López.
[25] Speakers included, among others, Yeonmi Park, a North Korean defector and human rights activist;[26] Lim Il, a North Korean defector and former slave laborer;[26] a Nigerian teenager, identified simply as "Saa", who escaped after being abducted by Boko Haram;[27][28] Hong Kong protest leaders Alex Chow and Lester Shum;[29] Pierre Torres, a French journalist who was held hostage by ISIS for ten months;[30] Turkish journalist Yavuz Baydar;[31] Moroccan politician Fouzia Elbayed;[32] and Tibetan politician Dicki Chhoyang.
[33] The summit's Courage Award was given to Raif Badawi, an imprisoned Saudi Arabian writer and activist,[34] and accepted on his behalf by Elham Manea, Professor at the University of Zurich.
[38] The 2017 Women's Rights Award was given to "Shirin", a Yazidi woman who escaped sexual slavery in the Islamic State, and author of I Remain a Daughter of the Light (Ich bleibe eine Tocher des Lichts), recently published in Germany.
Speakers included Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch; Luis Almagro, Uruguayan politician and Secretary General of the Organization of American States; Bolivian attorney and Human Rights Foundation associate Javier El-Hage; Turkish novelist Aslı Erdoğan; Cuban psychologist, journalist, and activist Guillermo Fariñas; Zimbabwean pastor and dissident Evan Mawarire; Effy Nguyen, son of Vietnamese activist and political prisoner Nguyen Trung Ton; Pakistani journalist Taha Siddiqui; Chinese dissident Yang Jianli; Hong Kong bookshop owner Lam Wing-kee; Tibetan monk and activist Golog Jigme; British journalist Jonny Gould; Farida Abbas Khalaf, Yazidi author of The Girl Who Beat ISIS; Ruth Dreifuss, first female president of Switzerland; Congolese human rights activist Julienne Lusenge; María-Alejandra Aristeguieta Álvarez, coordinator of Iniciativa Por Venezuela; Canadian former MP Irwin Cotler; Venezuelan politician and former political prisoner Antonio Ledezma; Luis Almagro, Secretary General of the Organization of American States; Ugandan LGBT rights activist Kasha Jacqueline; Iranian-Canadian activist Maryam Nayeb Yazdi; Iranian journalist and filmmaker Maziar Bahari; Maryam Malekpour, sister of Iranian political prisoner Saeed Malekpour; Fred and Cindy Warmbier, parents of the late Otto Warmbier, an American student who died after being tortured in North Korea; Korean-American missionary Kenneth Bae; Russian dissident Vladimir Vladimirovich Kara-Murza; Congolese women's rights advocate Julienne Lusenge and American attorney and diplomat Alfred H.