General Women, Peace and Security

Interview with Elke Jonigkeit: Since 1985 Elke Jonigkeit has traveled through Afghanistan and produced seven films about the country and the women that live there. In 2003, she founded the Nazo training center in Kabul. Elke Jonigkeit is a 2010 award winner of the “Women's Worlds” film festival organized by “Terre des Femmes”. We met in a café in Berlin.

For me there are two reasons to be an MP. First, I come from a political family: my father was also a member of parliament during what we call the "democracy decade" in the 1970s. Second, I've experienced many different problems and discrimination just for being a woman, especially during the Taliban period, and I want to fight for that to change.

I've been fortunate to meet some very talented photographers and film-makers here in Afghanistan. We're planning an Afghan Film Festival for the United States this fall.

One film director Sahraa Karimi has produced an engaging and illuminating documentary called "Afghan Women Behind the Wheel."

Disturbing dispatches out of Yemen yesterday report that thousands of women, chanting “peaceful, peaceful,” as they protested against their country's president were beaten by police wielding sticks and rocks. This came just before news broke that America is (finally) supporting an exit strategy for Yemen's leader Ali Abdullah Saleh.

There is much about the Middle East that needs changing. It was always a matter of time, for example, before the people would rise up and demand freedom. But we have yet to see the leaders of the uprisings make a forceful case to address one of the most serious problems in the region: the routine abuse, harassment and even the brutalization of women.

Women in Black is a women's anti-war movement initiated in 1988 in Israel.

To watch the video, please click here

While representing a month of liberation for many in the Middle East, March was revolutionary for the area in more than one way. At the culmination of Women's History Month, I would like to take note of some very famous women as of late: the female revolutionaries of the Middle East.

Images of war, rendered on canvas, have traditionally been presented to us in the most morbid forms: John Singer Sargent's chilling trench portrait of blinded troops in Gassed, Picasso's orgy of civil-war violence in Guernica, bloodied battlefields and frontlines from which artists capture live conflict as bombs whizz past them.

Indevelop together with the foundation Kvinna till Kvinna is responsible for managing Sida's International Training Programme in 1325: Women, Peace and Security. It is a five week course with four weeks in Sweden and one abroad.

Addis Ababa, March 31, 2011 (Ezega.com) - As we celebrated International Women's day in March this year, one might ask the question how the status of African women has changed over the years, both on the grass roots level and on the policy level. On this question, both the United Nations and the African Union have been very vocal about the need for protection of women's rights. However, the problem remains in implementing it.