As the violence in the Eastern DRC continues, your support & your voice are critical. Hundreds of thousands of women and girls have been raped, and thousands more are at risk every day.
SHOW YOUR SUPPORT , let the women of the Congo hear you, speak out against this violence, send your message of hope, empowerment, change and victory.
CHANGING THE STORY
Join V-Day’s global campaign STOP RAPING OUR GREATEST RESOURCE: POWER TO THE WOMEN AND GIRLS OF DRC and bring much needed attention to the needs of Congolese women and girls.
The atrocities being perpetrated against women and girls in the Democratic Republic of Congo are nothing less than a femicide.
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25 April 2009
V-Moment
http://newsite.vday.org/vmoment/alam
AYESHAH ALAM: “This is not what we want for Pakistan…”Renowned social activist Ayeshah Alam speaks out against the recent flogging of a teenage girl by Taliban fighters. The violence was captured on a mobile phone and spread throughout the internet, highlighting militant brutality in the once-peaceful district, a sign of Taliban influence spreading deeper into the country of Pakistan.
When Samar Minallah first forwarded me the video of a young 17-year-old girl being flogged in public I was stunned. These were images that one had gotten used to seeing come out of Afghanistan but not my country. For years on my morning radio show and then later on my morning television show. I had been saying, “we are ignoring what's really happening in our tribal areas.” Hushed stories had been filtered through and my pathan friends kept going on about how the government was ignoring the gradual growing strength of extremist elements. We failed. As a society. When we could see the warning signs, they weren't in our faces and perhaps that's why it was easier to brush them aside...but we failed and today the flogging of our 17 year old sister...daughter is because we kept quiet then and didn't make a loud enough noise to say NO.... this is not what we want for Pakistan.
Today I am proud to see so many men and women stand up for the little girl and tell the people who did this...YOU WILL NOT DO THIS ANYMORE. I was even more pleasantly surprised to see clergymen, different political parties, all come together with one voice and say NO. Yet there are still the men in those areas, which are not under the write of the government who continue to have their beliefs and are making the women of that territory miserable. Some were cynical and said it was fake. Clearly Chaand Bibi's screams for help and mercy were not enough proof for them. Today we don't know where Chaand Bibi is. We don't know if she is still alive. The courts have asked for the victim to be produced but the family will never come forward as it "dishonors" the family name. That today in the year 2009, these events and ideas are still alive is a shameful thing. Yes governments have their role to play, but even as individuals, we can all contribute in making a change of opinions and ideas and ways of living and thinking, if only in the slightest way. We have a saying in Urdu that says "katray katray say durya bunta hai" which means “ a river can be created drop by drop,” or, as Margaret Mead liked to say "Never doubt a small group of people can change the world... it never happened any other way."
Thank you for your work in challenging accepted norms... lets keep challenging and changing so the Chaand Bibis' of the world don't have to scream helplessly anymore.
-Ayeshah
Ayeshah Alam is a blogger, filmmaker and radio host based in Pakistan.
http://www.ayeshahalam.wordpress.com
AYESHAH ALAM: “This is not what we want for Pakistan…”Renowned social activist Ayeshah Alam speaks out against the recent flogging of a teenage girl by Taliban fighters. The violence was captured on a mobile phone and spread throughout the internet, highlighting militant brutality in the once-peaceful district, a sign of Taliban influence spreading deeper into the country of Pakistan.
When Samar Minallah first forwarded me the video of a young 17-year-old girl being flogged in public I was stunned. These were images that one had gotten used to seeing come out of Afghanistan but not my country. For years on my morning radio show and then later on my morning television show. I had been saying, “we are ignoring what's really happening in our tribal areas.” Hushed stories had been filtered through and my pathan friends kept going on about how the government was ignoring the gradual growing strength of extremist elements. We failed. As a society. When we could see the warning signs, they weren't in our faces and perhaps that's why it was easier to brush them aside...but we failed and today the flogging of our 17 year old sister...daughter is because we kept quiet then and didn't make a loud enough noise to say NO.... this is not what we want for Pakistan.
Today I am proud to see so many men and women stand up for the little girl and tell the people who did this...YOU WILL NOT DO THIS ANYMORE. I was even more pleasantly surprised to see clergymen, different political parties, all come together with one voice and say NO. Yet there are still the men in those areas, which are not under the write of the government who continue to have their beliefs and are making the women of that territory miserable. Some were cynical and said it was fake. Clearly Chaand Bibi's screams for help and mercy were not enough proof for them. Today we don't know where Chaand Bibi is. We don't know if she is still alive. The courts have asked for the victim to be produced but the family will never come forward as it "dishonors" the family name. That today in the year 2009, these events and ideas are still alive is a shameful thing. Yes governments have their role to play, but even as individuals, we can all contribute in making a change of opinions and ideas and ways of living and thinking, if only in the slightest way. We have a saying in Urdu that says "katray katray say durya bunta hai" which means “ a river can be created drop by drop,” or, as Margaret Mead liked to say "Never doubt a small group of people can change the world... it never happened any other way."
Thank you for your work in challenging accepted norms... lets keep challenging and changing so the Chaand Bibis' of the world don't have to scream helplessly anymore.
-Ayeshah
Ayeshah Alam is a blogger, filmmaker and radio host based in Pakistan.
http://www.ayeshahalam.wordpress.com
24 April 2009
Action Alert: Journalist Jailed in Iran
Please join feminists and human rights activist worldwide in urging the Iranian government to commute the sentence of journalist Roxana Saberi.
Saberi was initially arrested in February, purportedly for working without press credentials. In March, she was charged with espionage and being an American spy. She was sentenced to 8 years in prison after a one day, closed-door trial.
Iran's Nobel Laureate Dr. Shirin Ebadi will defend Roxana Saberi during her appeal. We must stand behind Dr. Ebadi and Saberi at this critical time!
No evidence against Saberi has been released by the Iranian government. It is increasingly evident that the charges against her are baseless and reports indicate that she may have been forced to make incriminating statements while imprisoned.
Write to urge Iran's reversal of Saberi's sentence and her immediate release from prison.
We have asked for your help before to seek the release by the Iranian government of Dr. Shirin Ebadi's secretary, Jinus Sobhani. Your messages made a difference and Sobhani was released. We are asking you to help again.
Urge Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad; Iran's Head of the Judiciary, Mahmoud Hashemi Shahrudi; the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay; and the U.N. and Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon to intervene immediately to free Roxana Saberi from prison and commute her unjust sentence.
Saberi was initially arrested in February, purportedly for working without press credentials. In March, she was charged with espionage and being an American spy. She was sentenced to 8 years in prison after a one day, closed-door trial.
Iran's Nobel Laureate Dr. Shirin Ebadi will defend Roxana Saberi during her appeal. We must stand behind Dr. Ebadi and Saberi at this critical time!
No evidence against Saberi has been released by the Iranian government. It is increasingly evident that the charges against her are baseless and reports indicate that she may have been forced to make incriminating statements while imprisoned.
Write to urge Iran's reversal of Saberi's sentence and her immediate release from prison.
We have asked for your help before to seek the release by the Iranian government of Dr. Shirin Ebadi's secretary, Jinus Sobhani. Your messages made a difference and Sobhani was released. We are asking you to help again.
Urge Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad; Iran's Head of the Judiciary, Mahmoud Hashemi Shahrudi; the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay; and the U.N. and Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon to intervene immediately to free Roxana Saberi from prison and commute her unjust sentence.
23 April 2009
Action Alert: Bush's Torture
On Thursday, President Obama released memos that describe, in horrific detail, the torture techniques authorized by the Bush administration. The memos make clear that top Bush officials didn't just condone torture—they encouraged it.
So far there's been no accountability for the architects of Bush's torture program—the top officials who justified keeping detainees awake for 11 days straight, waterboarding them repeatedly, and forcing prisoners into coffin-like boxes with insects.1
We need real consequences for those responsible—it's the only way to keep this from happening again. Attorney General Holder can open an investigation into the torture program—but he most likely won't unless people everywhere speak up and demand it.
Can you sign our petition to Attorney General Eric Holder asking him to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the torture program? If we can reach 200,000 signatures, we'll deliver the petition to Holder by the end of the week. Clicking here will sign your name:
http://pol.moveon.org/torture/o.pl?id=15951-9461854-PFHFSDx&t=3The petition
says: "No one is above the law. It's time to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate and prosecute the architects of the Bush-era torture program."
Calls for action, from the United Nations, the ACLU, Amnesty International,2 Senators Leahy and Feingold, and others, are gathering steam. The New York Times made the case for accountability in an editorial:3
"...[Obama] has an obligation to pursue what is clear evidence of a government policy sanctioning the torture and abuse of prisoners—in violation of international law and the Constitution. "
This isn't about retribution or politics. It's about accountability. If hundreds of thousands of us speak up, we can make sure Holder hears this loud and clear. http://pol.moveon.org/torture/o.pl?id=15951-9461854-PFHFSDx&t=4Thanks for all you do.
P.S. You can see all the Bush administration memos here.
Sources:
1. "Interrogation Memos Detail Harsh Tactics by the C.I.A.," The New York Times, April 17, 2009.
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51338&id=15951-9461854-PFHFSDx&t=5
2. "Opposition Grows To Obama's Decision Not To Prosecute CIA Agents," The Huffington Post, April 19, 2009.
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51336&id=15951-9461854-PFHFSDx&t=6
3. "A Torturers' Manifesto," The New York Times, April 19, 2009.
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51334&id=15951-9461854-PFHFSDx&t=7
So far there's been no accountability for the architects of Bush's torture program—the top officials who justified keeping detainees awake for 11 days straight, waterboarding them repeatedly, and forcing prisoners into coffin-like boxes with insects.1
We need real consequences for those responsible—it's the only way to keep this from happening again. Attorney General Holder can open an investigation into the torture program—but he most likely won't unless people everywhere speak up and demand it.
Can you sign our petition to Attorney General Eric Holder asking him to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the torture program? If we can reach 200,000 signatures, we'll deliver the petition to Holder by the end of the week. Clicking here will sign your name:
http://pol.moveon.org/torture/o.pl?id=15951-9461854-PFHFSDx&t=3The petition
says: "No one is above the law. It's time to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate and prosecute the architects of the Bush-era torture program."
Calls for action, from the United Nations, the ACLU, Amnesty International,2 Senators Leahy and Feingold, and others, are gathering steam. The New York Times made the case for accountability in an editorial:3
"...[Obama] has an obligation to pursue what is clear evidence of a government policy sanctioning the torture and abuse of prisoners—in violation of international law and the Constitution. "
This isn't about retribution or politics. It's about accountability. If hundreds of thousands of us speak up, we can make sure Holder hears this loud and clear. http://pol.moveon.org/torture/o.pl?id=15951-9461854-PFHFSDx&t=4Thanks for all you do.
P.S. You can see all the Bush administration memos here.
Sources:
1. "Interrogation Memos Detail Harsh Tactics by the C.I.A.," The New York Times, April 17, 2009.
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51338&id=15951-9461854-PFHFSDx&t=5
2. "Opposition Grows To Obama's Decision Not To Prosecute CIA Agents," The Huffington Post, April 19, 2009.
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51336&id=15951-9461854-PFHFSDx&t=6
3. "A Torturers' Manifesto," The New York Times, April 19, 2009.
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=51334&id=15951-9461854-PFHFSDx&t=7
WHAT’S THE CONNECTION BETWEEN WOMEN AND WATER?
Throughout the world, women are intrinsically linked to water resources because of their roles and responsibilities in using and managing water.Since women and girls often cook, clean, farm,and provide health care and hygiene for their households, they are on the front lines of their communities’ and countries’ water
issues.Global challenges like over-consumption,population growth, privatization and climate change all affect the quality and accessibility of water, and put a strain on limited freshwater systems. Water scarcity and contamination disproportionately impact low-income women and girls. For many girls who must walk miles to
access clean water, school is not a reality.Without a basic education or the ability to get a formal wage-earning job, many women become locked into a vicious cycle of poverty. This has a ripple effect that impacts communities and countries socially, economically and environmentally.
TAKE ACTION!
As consumers and as global citizens, we must all do our part to break the cycle of poverty and inequity that impacts women and water resources worldwide.Women around the world must have the means and the power to protect water resources critical for their and their children’s survival.
• Encourage your decision-makers to support sustainable
development initiatives that help to achieve the
Millennium Development Goals. http://endpoverty2015.org
• Get involved with Sierra Club’s Global Population and
Environment Program. Find out how at
www.sierraclub.org/population
• Get involved with Feminist Campus. Find out how at
www.feministcampus.org
• Find out more about WEDO's publications, factsheets and
case studies on women and water at www.wedo.org
• Join Sierra Club’s Population Justice Environmental
Challenge campaign at www.sierraclub.org/popjustice
• Take action in your community by using WEDO's online
action kit to educate and advocate for gender and climate
change! www.wedo.org/category/act
• Join WEDO's Women Demand U.S.Action on
Climate Change campaign listserve by visiting
http://groups.google.com/group/wdaccus?hl=en
• Join the Think Outside the Bottle Campaign to support
strong public water systems over bottled water profits
www.thinkoutsidethebottle.org
• Find out about your region’s local water worries and spread
the word on your community and campus. Host a panel or
film-screening connecting the dots between women and
water, and generate media to educate your peers!
issues.Global challenges like over-consumption,population growth, privatization and climate change all affect the quality and accessibility of water, and put a strain on limited freshwater systems. Water scarcity and contamination disproportionately impact low-income women and girls. For many girls who must walk miles to
access clean water, school is not a reality.Without a basic education or the ability to get a formal wage-earning job, many women become locked into a vicious cycle of poverty. This has a ripple effect that impacts communities and countries socially, economically and environmentally.
TAKE ACTION!
As consumers and as global citizens, we must all do our part to break the cycle of poverty and inequity that impacts women and water resources worldwide.Women around the world must have the means and the power to protect water resources critical for their and their children’s survival.
• Encourage your decision-makers to support sustainable
development initiatives that help to achieve the
Millennium Development Goals. http://endpoverty2015.org
• Get involved with Sierra Club’s Global Population and
Environment Program. Find out how at
www.sierraclub.org/population
• Get involved with Feminist Campus. Find out how at
www.feministcampus.org
• Find out more about WEDO's publications, factsheets and
case studies on women and water at www.wedo.org
• Join Sierra Club’s Population Justice Environmental
Challenge campaign at www.sierraclub.org/popjustice
• Take action in your community by using WEDO's online
action kit to educate and advocate for gender and climate
change! www.wedo.org/category/act
• Join WEDO's Women Demand U.S.Action on
Climate Change campaign listserve by visiting
http://groups.google.com/group/wdaccus?hl=en
• Join the Think Outside the Bottle Campaign to support
strong public water systems over bottled water profits
www.thinkoutsidethebottle.org
• Find out about your region’s local water worries and spread
the word on your community and campus. Host a panel or
film-screening connecting the dots between women and
water, and generate media to educate your peers!
Action Alert: Support Clemency for Troy Davis
It's not the end of the road for Troy Davis, but the news is not good.
Yesterday, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Troy Davis' bid for a new trial. In a 2-1 vote, the court cited technical reasons to reject Davis' petition for a hearing.
But all hope is not lost. Troy has 30 days to file another petition with the US Supreme Court.
Troy and his lawyers are doing everything they can to fight this decision from the inside. It is up to us to turn up the pressure on the outside. Even if you've taken action before, keep flooding Governor Perdue's office with emails demanding justice for Troy. And pass the action on to everyone you know. There is power in numbers and when you stand behind Troy Davis, you make the fight for justice even stronger!
P.S. Save the date — National Day of Solidarity for Troy Davis coming in May. We'll be in touch soon to let you know how you can support Troy in your own community!
Action Alert: Two Women Jailed in Zimbabwe
Jenni Williams and Magodonga ("Magi") Mahlangu have done nothing illegal. But if convicted, the two women could face up to 5 years in prison.
The women, leaders of the organization Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA), were arbitrarily arrested last October during a protest that called on the government to equally distribute scarce food aid among Zimbabweans.
Zimbabwe is a country in turmoil. But a power-sharing agreement struck between two rival political parties could mean a new chance for a country to right itself. Yet, this unity government, as it's called, has failed to prioritize human rights as a necessity in achieving stability.
Jenni and Magi's court date on April 30th is an opportune time for Zimbabwe's leaders to step into a new era and show the world that it respects the rights of all individuals. Tell Zimbabwe's leaders to drop all charges against Jenni and Magi and to protect the country's human rights defenders.
Zimbabwe's Finance Minister is in the U.S. this week to push for restoration of humanitarian aid to help pull his country from the brink of utter collapse. But the U.S. and the rest of the international community are looking for evidence that Zimbabwe is ready to leave its deep path of violence and intolerance behind before they will agree to restore any aid.
Just this week, authorities in Zimbabwe conditionally freed three political prisoners who had been detained since December. This is a welcome development, but the government must go further. It must stop harassing, torturing and jailing activists who only seek a better tomorrow for Zimbabwe – activists like Jenni Williams and Magi Mahlangu.
Email Zimbabwe's officials and urge them to drop all charges against Jenni and Magi.
The power-sharing agreement in Zimbabwe is, in itself, a monumental step forward. And it's going to take more monumental steps forward to bring about real change in Zimbabwe.
On April 30th the government of Zimbabwe can prove to the world that it's ready to restore human rights. Let's help them make the right decision.
The women, leaders of the organization Women of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA), were arbitrarily arrested last October during a protest that called on the government to equally distribute scarce food aid among Zimbabweans.
Zimbabwe is a country in turmoil. But a power-sharing agreement struck between two rival political parties could mean a new chance for a country to right itself. Yet, this unity government, as it's called, has failed to prioritize human rights as a necessity in achieving stability.
Jenni and Magi's court date on April 30th is an opportune time for Zimbabwe's leaders to step into a new era and show the world that it respects the rights of all individuals. Tell Zimbabwe's leaders to drop all charges against Jenni and Magi and to protect the country's human rights defenders.
Zimbabwe's Finance Minister is in the U.S. this week to push for restoration of humanitarian aid to help pull his country from the brink of utter collapse. But the U.S. and the rest of the international community are looking for evidence that Zimbabwe is ready to leave its deep path of violence and intolerance behind before they will agree to restore any aid.
Just this week, authorities in Zimbabwe conditionally freed three political prisoners who had been detained since December. This is a welcome development, but the government must go further. It must stop harassing, torturing and jailing activists who only seek a better tomorrow for Zimbabwe – activists like Jenni Williams and Magi Mahlangu.
Email Zimbabwe's officials and urge them to drop all charges against Jenni and Magi.
The power-sharing agreement in Zimbabwe is, in itself, a monumental step forward. And it's going to take more monumental steps forward to bring about real change in Zimbabwe.
On April 30th the government of Zimbabwe can prove to the world that it's ready to restore human rights. Let's help them make the right decision.
21 April 2009
Why Should We Pay Attention to Girls?
Little research has been done to understand how investments in girls impact economic growth and the health and well-being of communities. This lack of data reveals how pervasively girls have been overlooked. For millions of girls across the developing world, there are no systems to record their birth, their citizenship, or even their identity. However, the existing research suggests their impact can reach much farther than expected.
The Ripple Effect
• When a girl in the developing world receives seven or more years of education, she marries four years later and has 2.2 fewer children.
(United Nations Population Fund, State of World Population 1990.)
• An extra year of primary school boosts girls’ eventual wages by 10 to 20 percent. An extra year of secondary school: 15 to 25 percent.
(George Psacharopoulos and Harry Anthony Patrinos, “Returns to Investment in Education: A Further Update,” Policy Research Working Paper 2881
[Washington, D.C.: World Bank, 2002].)
• Research in developing countries has shown a consistent relationship between better infant and child health and higher levels of schooling among mothers.
(George T. Bicego and J. Ties Boerma, “Maternal Education and Child Survival: A Comparative Study of Survey Data from 17 Countries,” Social Science
and Medicine 36 (9) [May 1993]: 1207–27.)
• When women and girls earn income, they reinvest 90 percent of it into their families, as compared to only 30 to 40 percent for a man.
(Phil Borges, with foreword by Madeleine Albright, Women Empowered: Inspiring Change in the Emerging World [New York: Rizzoli, 2007], 13.)
Population Trends
• Today, more than 600 million girls live in the developing world.
Girls Count, 14
(Population Reference Bureau, DataFinder database, http://www.prb.org/datafinder.aspx [accessed December 20, 2007].)
• More than one-quarter of the population in Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean, and sub-Saharan Africa are girls and young women ages 10 to 24.
Girls Count, 15
(United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, “World Population Prospects: The 2006 Revision,” http://esa.un.org/unpp, and “World
Urbanization Prospects: The 2005 Revision,” www.un.org/esa/population/publications/WUP2005/2005WUP_DataTables1.pdf.)
• The total global population of girls ages 10 to 24—already the largest in history—is expected to peak in the next decade.
Girls Count, 14
(Ruth Levine et al., Girls Count: A Global Investment & Action Agenda [Washington, D.C.: Center for Global Development, 2008].)
Educational Gaps
• Approximately one-quarter of girls in developing countries are not in school.
(Cynthia B. Lloyd, ed., Growing Up Global: The Changing Transitions to Adulthood in Developing Countries [Washington, D.C.: National Academies Press, 2005].)
• Out of the world’s 130 million out-of-school youth, 70 percent are girls.
(Human Rights Watch, “Promises Broken: An Assessment of Children’s Rights on the 10th Anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child,”
http://www.hrw.org/campaigns/crp/promises/education.html [December 1999].)
Child Marriage and Early Childbirth
• One girl in seven in developing countries marries before age 15.
Girls Count, 41
(Population Council, “Transitions to Adulthood: Child Marriage/Married Adolescents,” http://www.popcouncil.org/ta/mar.html [updated May 13, 2008].)
• 38 percent marry before age 18.
Girls Count, 41
(Cynthia B. Lloyd, ed., Growing Up Global: The Changing Transitions to Adulthood in Developing Countries [Washington, D.C.: National Academies Press, 2005].)
• One-quarter to one-half of girls in developing countries become mothers before age 18; 14 million girls aged 15 to 19 give birth in developing countries each year.
Girls Count, 3
(United Nations Population Fund, State of World Population 2005, http://www.unfpa.org/swp/2005.)
• In Nicaragua, 45 percent of girls with no schooling are married before age 18 versus only 16 percent of their educated counterparts. In Mozambique, the figures are 60 percent versus 10; in Senegal, 41 percent versus 6.
Girls Count, 44
(International Center for Research on Women, Too Young to Wed: Education & Action Toward Ending Child Marriage,
http://www.icrw.org/docs/2006_cmtoolkit/cm_all.pdf [2007].)
• A survey in India found that girls who married before age 18 were twice as likely to report being beaten, slapped, or threatened by their husbands as were girls who married later.
(International Center for Research on Women, Development Initiative on Supporting Healthy Adolescents [2005], analysis of quantitative baseline survey
data collected in select sites in the states of Bihar and Jharkhand, India [survey conducted in 2004].)
Health
• Medical complications from pregnancy are the leading cause of death among girls ages 15 to 19 worldwide. Compared with women ages 20 to 24, girls ages 10 to 14 are five times more likely to die from childbirth, and girls 15 to 19 are up to twice as
likely, worldwide.
(United Nations Children’s Fund, Equality, Development and Peace, http://www.unicef.org/publications/files/pub_equality_en.pdf [New York:
UNICEF, 2000], 19.)
• 75 percent of 15- to 24-year-olds living with HIV in Africa are female, up from 62 percent in 2001.
Girls Count, 48
(Global Coalition on Women and AIDS, Keeping the Promise: An Agenda for Action on Women and AIDS,
http://data.unaids.org/pub/Booklet/2006/20060530_FS_Keeping_Promise_en.pdf[2006a].)
girleffect.org
For More on this topic check out Girls Count: A Global Investment & Action Agenda published by The Center for Global Development in Washington, D.C.
The Ripple Effect
• When a girl in the developing world receives seven or more years of education, she marries four years later and has 2.2 fewer children.
(United Nations Population Fund, State of World Population 1990.)
• An extra year of primary school boosts girls’ eventual wages by 10 to 20 percent. An extra year of secondary school: 15 to 25 percent.
(George Psacharopoulos and Harry Anthony Patrinos, “Returns to Investment in Education: A Further Update,” Policy Research Working Paper 2881
[Washington, D.C.: World Bank, 2002].)
• Research in developing countries has shown a consistent relationship between better infant and child health and higher levels of schooling among mothers.
(George T. Bicego and J. Ties Boerma, “Maternal Education and Child Survival: A Comparative Study of Survey Data from 17 Countries,” Social Science
and Medicine 36 (9) [May 1993]: 1207–27.)
• When women and girls earn income, they reinvest 90 percent of it into their families, as compared to only 30 to 40 percent for a man.
(Phil Borges, with foreword by Madeleine Albright, Women Empowered: Inspiring Change in the Emerging World [New York: Rizzoli, 2007], 13.)
Population Trends
• Today, more than 600 million girls live in the developing world.
Girls Count, 14
(Population Reference Bureau, DataFinder database, http://www.prb.org/datafinder.aspx [accessed December 20, 2007].)
• More than one-quarter of the population in Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean, and sub-Saharan Africa are girls and young women ages 10 to 24.
Girls Count, 15
(United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, “World Population Prospects: The 2006 Revision,” http://esa.un.org/unpp, and “World
Urbanization Prospects: The 2005 Revision,” www.un.org/esa/population/publications/WUP2005/2005WUP_DataTables1.pdf.)
• The total global population of girls ages 10 to 24—already the largest in history—is expected to peak in the next decade.
Girls Count, 14
(Ruth Levine et al., Girls Count: A Global Investment & Action Agenda [Washington, D.C.: Center for Global Development, 2008].)
Educational Gaps
• Approximately one-quarter of girls in developing countries are not in school.
(Cynthia B. Lloyd, ed., Growing Up Global: The Changing Transitions to Adulthood in Developing Countries [Washington, D.C.: National Academies Press, 2005].)
• Out of the world’s 130 million out-of-school youth, 70 percent are girls.
(Human Rights Watch, “Promises Broken: An Assessment of Children’s Rights on the 10th Anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child,”
http://www.hrw.org/campaigns/crp/promises/education.html [December 1999].)
Child Marriage and Early Childbirth
• One girl in seven in developing countries marries before age 15.
Girls Count, 41
(Population Council, “Transitions to Adulthood: Child Marriage/Married Adolescents,” http://www.popcouncil.org/ta/mar.html [updated May 13, 2008].)
• 38 percent marry before age 18.
Girls Count, 41
(Cynthia B. Lloyd, ed., Growing Up Global: The Changing Transitions to Adulthood in Developing Countries [Washington, D.C.: National Academies Press, 2005].)
• One-quarter to one-half of girls in developing countries become mothers before age 18; 14 million girls aged 15 to 19 give birth in developing countries each year.
Girls Count, 3
(United Nations Population Fund, State of World Population 2005, http://www.unfpa.org/swp/2005.)
• In Nicaragua, 45 percent of girls with no schooling are married before age 18 versus only 16 percent of their educated counterparts. In Mozambique, the figures are 60 percent versus 10; in Senegal, 41 percent versus 6.
Girls Count, 44
(International Center for Research on Women, Too Young to Wed: Education & Action Toward Ending Child Marriage,
http://www.icrw.org/docs/2006_cmtoolkit/cm_all.pdf [2007].)
• A survey in India found that girls who married before age 18 were twice as likely to report being beaten, slapped, or threatened by their husbands as were girls who married later.
(International Center for Research on Women, Development Initiative on Supporting Healthy Adolescents [2005], analysis of quantitative baseline survey
data collected in select sites in the states of Bihar and Jharkhand, India [survey conducted in 2004].)
Health
• Medical complications from pregnancy are the leading cause of death among girls ages 15 to 19 worldwide. Compared with women ages 20 to 24, girls ages 10 to 14 are five times more likely to die from childbirth, and girls 15 to 19 are up to twice as
likely, worldwide.
(United Nations Children’s Fund, Equality, Development and Peace, http://www.unicef.org/publications/files/pub_equality_en.pdf [New York:
UNICEF, 2000], 19.)
• 75 percent of 15- to 24-year-olds living with HIV in Africa are female, up from 62 percent in 2001.
Girls Count, 48
(Global Coalition on Women and AIDS, Keeping the Promise: An Agenda for Action on Women and AIDS,
http://data.unaids.org/pub/Booklet/2006/20060530_FS_Keeping_Promise_en.pdf[2006a].)
girleffect.org
For More on this topic check out Girls Count: A Global Investment & Action Agenda published by The Center for Global Development in Washington, D.C.
19 April 2009
Research on Lesser-Known Nazi Sites Is Now Public
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/20/world/middleeast/20holocaust.html
By ETHAN BRONNER
Published: April 19, 2009
JERUSALEM — In the Ukrainian town of Berdichev, Jewish women were forced to swim across a wide river until they drowned. In Telsiai, Lithuania, children were thrown alive into pits filled with their murdered parents. In Liozno, Belarus, Jews were herded into a locked barn where many froze to death.
Holocaust deniers aside, the world is not ignorant of the systematic Nazi slaughter of some six million Jews in World War II. People know of the gas chambers in Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen; many have heard of the tens of thousands shot dead in the Ukrainian ravine of Babi Yar. But little has been known about the hundreds — perhaps thousands — of smaller killing fields across the former Soviet Union where some 1.5 million Jews met their deaths.
That is now changing. Over the past few years, the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum and research center in Israel has been investigating those sites, comparing Soviet, German, local and Jewish accounts, cross-checking numbers and methods. The work, gathered under the title “The Untold Stories,” is far from over. But to honor Holocaust Remembrance Day, which starts Monday evening, the research is being made public on the institution’s Web site.
“These are places that have been mostly neglected because they involved smaller towns and villages,” said David Bankier, head of the International Institute for Holocaust Research at Yad Vashem. “In many cases, locals played a key role in the murders, probably by a ratio of 10 locals to every one German. We are trying to understand the man who played soccer with his Jewish neighbor one day and turned to kill him the next. This provides material for research on genocide elsewhere, like in Africa.”
For the purposes of this project, a killing field entailed at least 50 people, Lea Prais, the project director, said. The murdering began in June 1941 with the German invasion of the Soviet Union. From the Baltic Republics in the north to the Caucuses in the south, Nazi death squads combed the areas.
The first evidence for what took place was gathered right after the war by Soviet investigating committees largely focused on finding anti-Soviet collaborators.
The new research checks those versions against German records, diaries and letters of soldiers, and accounts by witnesses and the few surviving Jews, some of whom climbed out of pits of corpses. Sometimes, the researchers said, the Soviets seemed to have exaggerated, and that is noted on the Web site. One goal of the project is to gain greater specificity of the numbers killed.
One little-known case comes from a German sailor who filmed actual killings in Liepaja, Latvia. The film has been on view for some years at the Yad Vashem museum. But the new Web site has a forgotten video of a 1981 interview with the sailor, Reinhard Wiener, who claimed to have been a bystander with a movie camera.
According to part of his account, “After the civilian guards with the yellow armbands shouted once again, I was able to identify them as Latvian home guardsmen. The Jews, whom I was able to recognize by now, were forced to jump over the sides of the truck onto the ground. Among them were crippled and weak people, who were caught by the others.
At first, they had to line up in a row, before they were chased toward the trench. This was done by SS and Latvian home guardsmen. Then the Jews were forced to jump into the trench and to run along inside it until the end. They had to stand with their back to the firing squad. At that time, the moment they saw the trench, they probably knew what would happen to them. They must have felt it, because underneath there was already a layer of corpses, over which was spread a thin layer of sand.”
Ms. Prais, the project director, said one of the discoveries that most surprised her is the way in which Soviet Jews who survived the war made an effort to commemorate those who perished. In distant fields and village squares they often placed a Star of David or some other memorial despite fears of overt Jewish expression in the Soviet era.
“The silent Jews of the Soviet Union were not so silent,” she said.
The slaughter that some of them had escaped defies the imagination. One case Ms. Prais and her colleagues have cross-referenced involves what happened in the town of Krupki in Belarus, where the entire Jewish community of at least 1,000 was eliminated on Sept. 18, 1941.
A German soldier who took part in the mass murder kept a diary that was found on his body by the Allies, she said. In it, he wrote of having volunteered as one of “15 men with strong nerves” asked to eliminate the Jews of Krupki. “All these had to be shot today,” he wrote. The weather was gray and rainy, he observed.
The Jews had been told they were to be deported to work in Germany but as they were forced into a ditch, the reality of their fate became evident. Panic ensued. The soldier wrote that the guards had a hard time controlling the crowd.
“Ten shots rang out, ten Jews popped off,” he wrote. “This continued until all were dispatched. Only a few of them kept their countenances. The children clung to their mothers, wives to their husbands. I won’t forget this spectacle in a hurry....”
By ETHAN BRONNER
Published: April 19, 2009
JERUSALEM — In the Ukrainian town of Berdichev, Jewish women were forced to swim across a wide river until they drowned. In Telsiai, Lithuania, children were thrown alive into pits filled with their murdered parents. In Liozno, Belarus, Jews were herded into a locked barn where many froze to death.
Holocaust deniers aside, the world is not ignorant of the systematic Nazi slaughter of some six million Jews in World War II. People know of the gas chambers in Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen; many have heard of the tens of thousands shot dead in the Ukrainian ravine of Babi Yar. But little has been known about the hundreds — perhaps thousands — of smaller killing fields across the former Soviet Union where some 1.5 million Jews met their deaths.
That is now changing. Over the past few years, the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum and research center in Israel has been investigating those sites, comparing Soviet, German, local and Jewish accounts, cross-checking numbers and methods. The work, gathered under the title “The Untold Stories,” is far from over. But to honor Holocaust Remembrance Day, which starts Monday evening, the research is being made public on the institution’s Web site.
“These are places that have been mostly neglected because they involved smaller towns and villages,” said David Bankier, head of the International Institute for Holocaust Research at Yad Vashem. “In many cases, locals played a key role in the murders, probably by a ratio of 10 locals to every one German. We are trying to understand the man who played soccer with his Jewish neighbor one day and turned to kill him the next. This provides material for research on genocide elsewhere, like in Africa.”
For the purposes of this project, a killing field entailed at least 50 people, Lea Prais, the project director, said. The murdering began in June 1941 with the German invasion of the Soviet Union. From the Baltic Republics in the north to the Caucuses in the south, Nazi death squads combed the areas.
The first evidence for what took place was gathered right after the war by Soviet investigating committees largely focused on finding anti-Soviet collaborators.
The new research checks those versions against German records, diaries and letters of soldiers, and accounts by witnesses and the few surviving Jews, some of whom climbed out of pits of corpses. Sometimes, the researchers said, the Soviets seemed to have exaggerated, and that is noted on the Web site. One goal of the project is to gain greater specificity of the numbers killed.
One little-known case comes from a German sailor who filmed actual killings in Liepaja, Latvia. The film has been on view for some years at the Yad Vashem museum. But the new Web site has a forgotten video of a 1981 interview with the sailor, Reinhard Wiener, who claimed to have been a bystander with a movie camera.
According to part of his account, “After the civilian guards with the yellow armbands shouted once again, I was able to identify them as Latvian home guardsmen. The Jews, whom I was able to recognize by now, were forced to jump over the sides of the truck onto the ground. Among them were crippled and weak people, who were caught by the others.
At first, they had to line up in a row, before they were chased toward the trench. This was done by SS and Latvian home guardsmen. Then the Jews were forced to jump into the trench and to run along inside it until the end. They had to stand with their back to the firing squad. At that time, the moment they saw the trench, they probably knew what would happen to them. They must have felt it, because underneath there was already a layer of corpses, over which was spread a thin layer of sand.”
Ms. Prais, the project director, said one of the discoveries that most surprised her is the way in which Soviet Jews who survived the war made an effort to commemorate those who perished. In distant fields and village squares they often placed a Star of David or some other memorial despite fears of overt Jewish expression in the Soviet era.
“The silent Jews of the Soviet Union were not so silent,” she said.
The slaughter that some of them had escaped defies the imagination. One case Ms. Prais and her colleagues have cross-referenced involves what happened in the town of Krupki in Belarus, where the entire Jewish community of at least 1,000 was eliminated on Sept. 18, 1941.
A German soldier who took part in the mass murder kept a diary that was found on his body by the Allies, she said. In it, he wrote of having volunteered as one of “15 men with strong nerves” asked to eliminate the Jews of Krupki. “All these had to be shot today,” he wrote. The weather was gray and rainy, he observed.
The Jews had been told they were to be deported to work in Germany but as they were forced into a ditch, the reality of their fate became evident. Panic ensued. The soldier wrote that the guards had a hard time controlling the crowd.
“Ten shots rang out, ten Jews popped off,” he wrote. “This continued until all were dispatched. Only a few of them kept their countenances. The children clung to their mothers, wives to their husbands. I won’t forget this spectacle in a hurry....”
15 April 2009
Action Alert: Help Support Fathi el-Jahmi.
Health records show that Fathi el-Jahmi will likely die in prison of heart failure and complications from diabetes if he does not receive critical medical treatment. However, the prognosis leaves out the fact that Libya's poor prison system is to blame for years of neglectful treatment given to a man who was unlawfully detained in the first place.
This is the second time Fathi has been wrongfully imprisoned for publicly calling for greater political freedom in Libya. His health condition is severe and the Libyan government knows it.
We've got two strong allies in Congress willing to speak out against Libya's injustice. Representatives Wolf (R-VA) and Kirk (R-IL) are sponsoring our letter calling on Libya’s authorities to free Fathi el-Jahmi from detention and allow him to seek proper medical care. But they'll need our help to convince other members of Congress to join this effort to keep Fathi alive.
Urge your members of Congress to add their name to a letter of support for Fathi el-Jahmi.
Fathi was briefly released from detention in 2004 because the emotion stirred by former Senator Joe Biden and other members of Congress calling for his release. Biden called Fathi "a courageous Libyan democracy advocate with serious health problems whose only crime was to speak truth to power."
It was the leadership shown then by Congress that helped lead to Fathi's release. Now, we need our representatives to stand in solidarity once again for Fathi, but this time to save his life.
Muammar al-Gaddafi, Libya's head of state, and other Libyan authorities will continue to let Fathi's life hang in the balance unless we expose this foul act for what it really is – a sad attempt to silence political opposition at all costs. We cannot just stand by while a bright flame of the human rights movement is extinguished.
Libya is seeking to improve its ties with the United States. And if we get enough members of Congress to sign the letter on Fathi's behalf, then Libya has a stronger incentive to heed our calls for justice. Email your Representatives and ask for them to stand in support of Fathi el-Jahmi.
Amnesty activists have a history of standing in Fathi's corner. His case garnered an outpouring of support and thousands of letters sent on his behalf during this past year's Global Write-a-thon.
In the following weeks, supporters will gather in front of the US mission to the United Nations and hold peaceful vigils as an act of solidarity for Fathi.
Add your voice to theirs. Tell your Representatives the story of Fathi el-Jahmi. Tell them that if we don't take a stand against Libya's gross misconduct, then we will lose a great human rights defender – and his health won't be to blame.
But for Fathi to have any chance at a future, we have got to make the present count.
This is the second time Fathi has been wrongfully imprisoned for publicly calling for greater political freedom in Libya. His health condition is severe and the Libyan government knows it.
We've got two strong allies in Congress willing to speak out against Libya's injustice. Representatives Wolf (R-VA) and Kirk (R-IL) are sponsoring our letter calling on Libya’s authorities to free Fathi el-Jahmi from detention and allow him to seek proper medical care. But they'll need our help to convince other members of Congress to join this effort to keep Fathi alive.
Urge your members of Congress to add their name to a letter of support for Fathi el-Jahmi.
Fathi was briefly released from detention in 2004 because the emotion stirred by former Senator Joe Biden and other members of Congress calling for his release. Biden called Fathi "a courageous Libyan democracy advocate with serious health problems whose only crime was to speak truth to power."
It was the leadership shown then by Congress that helped lead to Fathi's release. Now, we need our representatives to stand in solidarity once again for Fathi, but this time to save his life.
Muammar al-Gaddafi, Libya's head of state, and other Libyan authorities will continue to let Fathi's life hang in the balance unless we expose this foul act for what it really is – a sad attempt to silence political opposition at all costs. We cannot just stand by while a bright flame of the human rights movement is extinguished.
Libya is seeking to improve its ties with the United States. And if we get enough members of Congress to sign the letter on Fathi's behalf, then Libya has a stronger incentive to heed our calls for justice. Email your Representatives and ask for them to stand in support of Fathi el-Jahmi.
Amnesty activists have a history of standing in Fathi's corner. His case garnered an outpouring of support and thousands of letters sent on his behalf during this past year's Global Write-a-thon.
In the following weeks, supporters will gather in front of the US mission to the United Nations and hold peaceful vigils as an act of solidarity for Fathi.
Add your voice to theirs. Tell your Representatives the story of Fathi el-Jahmi. Tell them that if we don't take a stand against Libya's gross misconduct, then we will lose a great human rights defender – and his health won't be to blame.
But for Fathi to have any chance at a future, we have got to make the present count.
11 April 2009
V-Moment
V-Day has started a new part of their website that celebrates courageous women around the globe. Below is the first installment. To check it out in the future click here.
Since 1996, the V-Day movement has continued to grow, from one event in New York City, to over 4000 events annually in over 120 countries and all 50 of the United States. As V-Day grows we want to ensure that those in the movement to end violence against women and girls remain connected and in touch with issues facing women all over the world.
V-Day is pleased to welcome you to our newest expanded V-Moment. Here, Vagina Warriors from all over the world will speak out about issues affecting women in their countries. Eve will continue to post as well.
Check back often and tell your friends! The V-Moment will be updated frequently and we will soon have the ability for users to leave comments!
ZOYA: “This is just the tip of the iceburg…”
Upon hearing of the recent change in Shiite law in Afghanistan, one that stipulates that a wife "is bound to preen for her husband as and when he desires," V-Day reached out to long time V-Day activist and representative of the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, (RAWA) Zoya for her comments on behalf of RAWA and the women of her country.
In RAWA’s opinion, the anti-women law recently signed by Karzai is a torturous nail hammered in the coffin of women’s rights is not something new or astounding because such shameful acts are the dark outcomes of Afghanistan being ruled by US-backed Islamic criminals in the past seven years. The world needs to know that many more treasons, much harsher and more painful than the last one have been committed against our people and the fate of democracy and freedom in our crying nation. This is just an example but there are much greater and terrible treasons waiting for Afghan men and women, especially when based on the new policies of Obama administration, the so-called “moderate” Taliban and Gulbuddin Party is also officially added in the collection of criminals now ruling Afghanistan.
Maybe the mother of all these treacheries is the disgraceful bill of ‘National Reconciliation’ passed in which all criminals forgave themselves from their brutal war crimes in the last three decades and built a safe haven from prosecution and trial. And this happened in the presence of tens of thousands of foreign troops headed by US, but what salts the wounds of our people especially women, is the silence of the world which watched such treason and malevolence but did not take any concrete footstep against it.
In the present situation, we do not think that this shocking law specifically targeting women would receive effective reactions from any government. Naturally, the people, mostly women, RAWA and all the justice-seekers around the world would raise their voice and strive for exposing the corrupt Jehadi and mafia government of Karzai.
It would be attention-grabbing for the people around the globe to know that this semi-secret law was signed by Karzai at a time when the governmental media itself reports 600 suicides in the first two months of 2009, consisting of mostly women. There are much more bitter and heart-wrenching truths and this is just the tip of the iceberg. The sky-rocketing rapes, self-immolations, violence and thousands of other oppression on Afghan women expands on much broader horizons but since Afghanistan is under the fundamentalists’ grip and media clings with them, such horrible atrocities fail to reflect in the media.
It is a wide notion that Karzai passed this law to attract Shia (one of the two sects of Islam) voters but this is a little corner of the much bigger and hateful reality; by signing such a misogynist law, he has empowered and stabilized the presence of both Shia and Sunni fundamentalists. It merits a mention that the content of this document is more satisfying and interesting for the Sunnis than the Shias, who were the first ones to enforce such laws during their bloody 1992-96 rule.
The women MPs like Humaira Namati and others smell of hypocrisy when condemning this law because when they see such a bright and scandalous perfidy against women with their naked eyes, why don’t they resign or resolutely raise their voice the way Malalai Joya did? Expressing disapproval is more of a posing for the foreign media and it is obvious that they are collaborating with the government.
The so-called presidential elections are in four months but everyone knows that the new president would be someone that US desires. How is it possible that despite the invasion of US and its allies in Afghanistan, the president would be freely elected, against the presence of troops and Jehadi and Taliban fundamentalists and dream of a democratic Afghanistan? Even if US are fed up of Karzai, another Karzai would come with a different name and face. It is like the famous Afghani proverb, ‘the old donkey but with a new saddle!’ the policies of US has resulted in not only the power of Jehadi warlords but Hezb-e-Islami and pro-Taliban candidates are also pouring in.
In the West, propaganda for these elections is in full swing whereas as we said before, this is not going to bring any positive change for our people.
With the new president chosen by US, the parliament would be chosen by the new government. In these parliamentary elections, even if a handful of true people’s representatives find way, it would serve as a façade for US and government to show democracy that even opposing voices are being tolerated.
In attention to the previous dishonesty of Karzai’s criminal government and the policies of US, it is quite predictable that the new president and new parliament would be more odious than the present one.
The new strategy of Mr. Obama is possible to be of any use except for mitigating the soaring and burning pains of our people but have totally stampede the rights of our people especially women. This strategy does not remove the Jehadi, Parchami, Khalqi or Taliban from the political scenery but on contrary, US is reconciling all of these terrorist bands to create a US-supportive government and establish a stable path to the gas pipes of Central Asia. The American troops are not here for security but for strengthening the Jihadis and backing their dirty policies.
RAWA calls for all the people around the world especially the kind-hearted people of America, both the supporters and opponents of Mr. Obama to join hands if they truly do not want this treacherous policy to continue. They should be against conspiracy of a government installed of criminals fiercely against democracy, women’s rights and independence and to avoid such acts under the cover of new strategy.
RAWA’s eyes have always been waiting for the people around the world particularly great American people to condemn the wrong foreign policies of their governments for supporting and protecting misogynist fundamentalists groups and ignoring and isolating pro-human rights, women’s rights and democratic forces.
- Zoya
Zoya is a representative of RAWA, the Revolutionary Association of the Women Of Afghanistan, an independent political/social organization of Afghan women fighting for human rights and for social justice in Afghanistan www.rawa.org
Since 1996, the V-Day movement has continued to grow, from one event in New York City, to over 4000 events annually in over 120 countries and all 50 of the United States. As V-Day grows we want to ensure that those in the movement to end violence against women and girls remain connected and in touch with issues facing women all over the world.
V-Day is pleased to welcome you to our newest expanded V-Moment. Here, Vagina Warriors from all over the world will speak out about issues affecting women in their countries. Eve will continue to post as well.
Check back often and tell your friends! The V-Moment will be updated frequently and we will soon have the ability for users to leave comments!
ZOYA: “This is just the tip of the iceburg…”
Upon hearing of the recent change in Shiite law in Afghanistan, one that stipulates that a wife "is bound to preen for her husband as and when he desires," V-Day reached out to long time V-Day activist and representative of the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, (RAWA) Zoya for her comments on behalf of RAWA and the women of her country.
In RAWA’s opinion, the anti-women law recently signed by Karzai is a torturous nail hammered in the coffin of women’s rights is not something new or astounding because such shameful acts are the dark outcomes of Afghanistan being ruled by US-backed Islamic criminals in the past seven years. The world needs to know that many more treasons, much harsher and more painful than the last one have been committed against our people and the fate of democracy and freedom in our crying nation. This is just an example but there are much greater and terrible treasons waiting for Afghan men and women, especially when based on the new policies of Obama administration, the so-called “moderate” Taliban and Gulbuddin Party is also officially added in the collection of criminals now ruling Afghanistan.
Maybe the mother of all these treacheries is the disgraceful bill of ‘National Reconciliation’ passed in which all criminals forgave themselves from their brutal war crimes in the last three decades and built a safe haven from prosecution and trial. And this happened in the presence of tens of thousands of foreign troops headed by US, but what salts the wounds of our people especially women, is the silence of the world which watched such treason and malevolence but did not take any concrete footstep against it.
In the present situation, we do not think that this shocking law specifically targeting women would receive effective reactions from any government. Naturally, the people, mostly women, RAWA and all the justice-seekers around the world would raise their voice and strive for exposing the corrupt Jehadi and mafia government of Karzai.
It would be attention-grabbing for the people around the globe to know that this semi-secret law was signed by Karzai at a time when the governmental media itself reports 600 suicides in the first two months of 2009, consisting of mostly women. There are much more bitter and heart-wrenching truths and this is just the tip of the iceberg. The sky-rocketing rapes, self-immolations, violence and thousands of other oppression on Afghan women expands on much broader horizons but since Afghanistan is under the fundamentalists’ grip and media clings with them, such horrible atrocities fail to reflect in the media.
It is a wide notion that Karzai passed this law to attract Shia (one of the two sects of Islam) voters but this is a little corner of the much bigger and hateful reality; by signing such a misogynist law, he has empowered and stabilized the presence of both Shia and Sunni fundamentalists. It merits a mention that the content of this document is more satisfying and interesting for the Sunnis than the Shias, who were the first ones to enforce such laws during their bloody 1992-96 rule.
The women MPs like Humaira Namati and others smell of hypocrisy when condemning this law because when they see such a bright and scandalous perfidy against women with their naked eyes, why don’t they resign or resolutely raise their voice the way Malalai Joya did? Expressing disapproval is more of a posing for the foreign media and it is obvious that they are collaborating with the government.
The so-called presidential elections are in four months but everyone knows that the new president would be someone that US desires. How is it possible that despite the invasion of US and its allies in Afghanistan, the president would be freely elected, against the presence of troops and Jehadi and Taliban fundamentalists and dream of a democratic Afghanistan? Even if US are fed up of Karzai, another Karzai would come with a different name and face. It is like the famous Afghani proverb, ‘the old donkey but with a new saddle!’ the policies of US has resulted in not only the power of Jehadi warlords but Hezb-e-Islami and pro-Taliban candidates are also pouring in.
In the West, propaganda for these elections is in full swing whereas as we said before, this is not going to bring any positive change for our people.
With the new president chosen by US, the parliament would be chosen by the new government. In these parliamentary elections, even if a handful of true people’s representatives find way, it would serve as a façade for US and government to show democracy that even opposing voices are being tolerated.
In attention to the previous dishonesty of Karzai’s criminal government and the policies of US, it is quite predictable that the new president and new parliament would be more odious than the present one.
The new strategy of Mr. Obama is possible to be of any use except for mitigating the soaring and burning pains of our people but have totally stampede the rights of our people especially women. This strategy does not remove the Jehadi, Parchami, Khalqi or Taliban from the political scenery but on contrary, US is reconciling all of these terrorist bands to create a US-supportive government and establish a stable path to the gas pipes of Central Asia. The American troops are not here for security but for strengthening the Jihadis and backing their dirty policies.
RAWA calls for all the people around the world especially the kind-hearted people of America, both the supporters and opponents of Mr. Obama to join hands if they truly do not want this treacherous policy to continue. They should be against conspiracy of a government installed of criminals fiercely against democracy, women’s rights and independence and to avoid such acts under the cover of new strategy.
RAWA’s eyes have always been waiting for the people around the world particularly great American people to condemn the wrong foreign policies of their governments for supporting and protecting misogynist fundamentalists groups and ignoring and isolating pro-human rights, women’s rights and democratic forces.
- Zoya
Zoya is a representative of RAWA, the Revolutionary Association of the Women Of Afghanistan, an independent political/social organization of Afghan women fighting for human rights and for social justice in Afghanistan www.rawa.org
09 April 2009
URGENT ACTION APPEAL: Death Penalty in Saudi Arabia
To read the current Urgent Action newsletter, go to
http://www.amnestyusa.org/urgent/newslett.html
----------------------------------
For a print-friendly version of this Urgent Action (PDF):
http://www.amnestyusa.org/actioncenter/actions/uaa11607.pdf
Note: Please write on behalf of these persons even though you may not have received the original UA when issued on May 17 2007. Thanks!
8 April 2009
Further Information on 116/07 (17 May 2007) and follow-ups (2 August 2007; 31 March 2008; 8 April 2008; 14 August 2008; 27 November 2008) - Death Penalty/Fear of imminent execution
SAUDI ARABIA
Mohamed Kohail (m), aged 23, Canadian national
Mehanna Sa'd (m), aged 22, Jordanian national
Sultan Kohail (m), aged 17, Canadian national
The Jeddah General Court upheld the death sentences imposed on Canadian national Mohamed Kohail and Jordanian national Mehanna Sa’d on 4 April 2009. Their cases have now been referred back to the Supreme Judicial Council. If the Council approves the death sentences, the two men could be executed at any time.
Sultan Kohail, meanwhile, is still awaiting retrial before a General Court, and therefore remains at risk of being sentenced to death if convicted, despite the fact that he is 17 years old.
Saudi Arabia is a state party to the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), which prohibits the execution of those under 18 at the time of the crime; in the past, however, the Saudi Arabian authorities have executed juvenile offenders who were under 18 at the time of the crime of which they were convicted.
In November 2008, the Court of Cassation confirmed the death sentences against Mohamed Kohail and Mehanna Sa'd and then referred the sentences to the Supreme Judicial Council for approval. In February 2009, the Supreme Judicial Council sent the case back to the original trial court, the Jeddah General Court, for review. This Court has now again upheld their death sentences and referred the death sentences to the Supreme Judicial Council for approval.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
At least 158 people, including 76 foreign nationals, were executed by the Saudi Arabian authorities in 2007, and at least 102 people, including almost 40 foreign nationals were executed in 2008. Since the beginning of 2009, a further 24 people are known to have been executed.
Saudi Arabia applies the death penalty for a wide range of offenses. Court proceedings fall far short of international standards for fair trial. Defendants are rarely allowed formal representation by a lawyer, and in many cases are not informed of the progress of legal proceedings against them. Prisoners under sentence of death may not be informed of the date of execution until the morning when they are taken out and beheaded. They may be convicted solely on the basis of confessions obtained under duress or deception.
In a recent report on the use of the death penalty in Saudi Arabia, Amnesty International highlighted the extensive use of the death penalty as well as the disproportionately high number of executions of foreign nationals from developing countries. For further information please see Saudi Arabia: Affront to Justice: Death Penalty in Saudi Arabia, issued on 14 October 2008: http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-updates/report/saudi-arabia-executions-target-foreign-nationals-20081014
RECOMMENDED ACTION: Please send appeals to arrive as quickly as possible:
- urging the King as the head of the Supreme Judicial Council not to ratify the death sentences against Mohamed Kohail and Mehanna Sa'd and to commute their death sentences;
- reminding the authorities that they are bound by international standards for fair trial in capital cases, in particular the UN Safeguards Guaranteeing the Protection of the Rights of Those Facing the Death Penalty, which guarantee adequate opportunity for defense and appeal, and prohibits the imposition of the death penalty when there is room for alternative interpretation of the evidence;
- highlighting that the execution of child offenders is expressly prohibited by the Convention on the Rights of the Child, to which Saudi Arabia is a state party;
- expressing concern that 17-year-old Sultan Kohail may still be at risk of being sentenced to death and asking the authorities to guarantee that this will not happen, as Saudi Arabia is a state party to the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
APPEALS TO:
His Majesty King 'Abdullah Bin 'Abdul 'Aziz Al-Saud
The Custodian of the two Holy Mosques
Office of His Majesty the King
Royal Court
Riyadh
KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA
Fax: (via Ministry of the Interior) 011 966 1 403 1185 (please keep trying)
Salutation: Your Majesty
His Royal Highness Prince Naif bin 'Abdul 'Aziz Al-Saud
Minister of the Interior
Ministry of the Interior
P.O. Box 2933, Airport Road
Riyadh 11134
KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA
Fax: 011 966 1 403 1185 (please keep trying)
Salutation: Your Royal Highness
His Royal Highness Prince Saud al-Faisal bin 'Abdul 'Aziz Al-Saud
Minister of Foreign Affairs
Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Nasseriya Street
Riyadh 11124
KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA
Fax: 011 966 1 403 0645
Salutation: Your Royal Highness
COPIES TO:
Mr. Bandar Mohammed Abdullah Al Aiban
President
Human Rights Commission
P.O. Box 58889, King Fahad Road, Building No. 373
Riyadh 11515
KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA
Fax: 011 966 1 4612061
Ambassador Adel A. Al-Jubeir
Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia
601 New Hampshire Ave. NW
Washington DC 20037
Fax: 1 202 944 5983
Email: info@saudiembassy.net
PLEASE SEND APPEALS IMMEDIATELY.
Check with the AIUSA Urgent Action office if sending appeals after 20 May 2009.
----------------------------------
Tip of the Month:
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Amnesty International is a worldwide grassroots movement that promotes and defends human rights.
This Urgent Action may be reposted if kept intact, including contact information and stop action date (if applicable). Thank you for your help with this appeal.
Urgent Action Network
Amnesty International USA
600 Pennsylvania Ave SE 5th fl
Washington DC 20003
Email: uan@aiusa.org
http://www.amnestyusa.org/urgent/
Phone: 202.544.0200
Fax: 202.675.8566
http://www.amnestyusa.org/urgent/newslett.html
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For a print-friendly version of this Urgent Action (PDF):
http://www.amnestyusa.org/actioncenter/actions/uaa11607.pdf
Note: Please write on behalf of these persons even though you may not have received the original UA when issued on May 17 2007. Thanks!
8 April 2009
Further Information on 116/07 (17 May 2007) and follow-ups (2 August 2007; 31 March 2008; 8 April 2008; 14 August 2008; 27 November 2008) - Death Penalty/Fear of imminent execution
SAUDI ARABIA
Mohamed Kohail (m), aged 23, Canadian national
Mehanna Sa'd (m), aged 22, Jordanian national
Sultan Kohail (m), aged 17, Canadian national
The Jeddah General Court upheld the death sentences imposed on Canadian national Mohamed Kohail and Jordanian national Mehanna Sa’d on 4 April 2009. Their cases have now been referred back to the Supreme Judicial Council. If the Council approves the death sentences, the two men could be executed at any time.
Sultan Kohail, meanwhile, is still awaiting retrial before a General Court, and therefore remains at risk of being sentenced to death if convicted, despite the fact that he is 17 years old.
Saudi Arabia is a state party to the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), which prohibits the execution of those under 18 at the time of the crime; in the past, however, the Saudi Arabian authorities have executed juvenile offenders who were under 18 at the time of the crime of which they were convicted.
In November 2008, the Court of Cassation confirmed the death sentences against Mohamed Kohail and Mehanna Sa'd and then referred the sentences to the Supreme Judicial Council for approval. In February 2009, the Supreme Judicial Council sent the case back to the original trial court, the Jeddah General Court, for review. This Court has now again upheld their death sentences and referred the death sentences to the Supreme Judicial Council for approval.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
At least 158 people, including 76 foreign nationals, were executed by the Saudi Arabian authorities in 2007, and at least 102 people, including almost 40 foreign nationals were executed in 2008. Since the beginning of 2009, a further 24 people are known to have been executed.
Saudi Arabia applies the death penalty for a wide range of offenses. Court proceedings fall far short of international standards for fair trial. Defendants are rarely allowed formal representation by a lawyer, and in many cases are not informed of the progress of legal proceedings against them. Prisoners under sentence of death may not be informed of the date of execution until the morning when they are taken out and beheaded. They may be convicted solely on the basis of confessions obtained under duress or deception.
In a recent report on the use of the death penalty in Saudi Arabia, Amnesty International highlighted the extensive use of the death penalty as well as the disproportionately high number of executions of foreign nationals from developing countries. For further information please see Saudi Arabia: Affront to Justice: Death Penalty in Saudi Arabia, issued on 14 October 2008: http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-updates/report/saudi-arabia-executions-target-foreign-nationals-20081014
RECOMMENDED ACTION: Please send appeals to arrive as quickly as possible:
- urging the King as the head of the Supreme Judicial Council not to ratify the death sentences against Mohamed Kohail and Mehanna Sa'd and to commute their death sentences;
- reminding the authorities that they are bound by international standards for fair trial in capital cases, in particular the UN Safeguards Guaranteeing the Protection of the Rights of Those Facing the Death Penalty, which guarantee adequate opportunity for defense and appeal, and prohibits the imposition of the death penalty when there is room for alternative interpretation of the evidence;
- highlighting that the execution of child offenders is expressly prohibited by the Convention on the Rights of the Child, to which Saudi Arabia is a state party;
- expressing concern that 17-year-old Sultan Kohail may still be at risk of being sentenced to death and asking the authorities to guarantee that this will not happen, as Saudi Arabia is a state party to the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
APPEALS TO:
His Majesty King 'Abdullah Bin 'Abdul 'Aziz Al-Saud
The Custodian of the two Holy Mosques
Office of His Majesty the King
Royal Court
Riyadh
KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA
Fax: (via Ministry of the Interior) 011 966 1 403 1185 (please keep trying)
Salutation: Your Majesty
His Royal Highness Prince Naif bin 'Abdul 'Aziz Al-Saud
Minister of the Interior
Ministry of the Interior
P.O. Box 2933, Airport Road
Riyadh 11134
KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA
Fax: 011 966 1 403 1185 (please keep trying)
Salutation: Your Royal Highness
His Royal Highness Prince Saud al-Faisal bin 'Abdul 'Aziz Al-Saud
Minister of Foreign Affairs
Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Nasseriya Street
Riyadh 11124
KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA
Fax: 011 966 1 403 0645
Salutation: Your Royal Highness
COPIES TO:
Mr. Bandar Mohammed Abdullah Al Aiban
President
Human Rights Commission
P.O. Box 58889, King Fahad Road, Building No. 373
Riyadh 11515
KINGDOM OF SAUDI ARABIA
Fax: 011 966 1 4612061
Ambassador Adel A. Al-Jubeir
Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia
601 New Hampshire Ave. NW
Washington DC 20037
Fax: 1 202 944 5983
Email: info@saudiembassy.net
PLEASE SEND APPEALS IMMEDIATELY.
Check with the AIUSA Urgent Action office if sending appeals after 20 May 2009.
----------------------------------
Tip of the Month:
Write as soon as you can. Try to write as close as possible to the date a case is issued.
** POSTAGE RATES **
Within the United States:
$0.27 - Postcards
$0.42 - Letters and Cards (up to 1 oz.)
To Mexico and Canada:
$0.72 - Postcards
$0.72 - Airmail Letters and Cards (up to 1 oz.)
To all other destination countries:
$0.94 - Postcards
$0.94 - Airmail Letters and Cards (up to 1 oz.)
Amnesty International is a worldwide grassroots movement that promotes and defends human rights.
This Urgent Action may be reposted if kept intact, including contact information and stop action date (if applicable). Thank you for your help with this appeal.
Urgent Action Network
Amnesty International USA
600 Pennsylvania Ave SE 5th fl
Washington DC 20003
Email: uan@aiusa.org
http://www.amnestyusa.org/urgent/
Phone: 202.544.0200
Fax: 202.675.8566
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