General Women, Peace and Security

The public campaign to end violence against women has come and gone but the issue of sexual violence against women is on the rise in Liberia.

Deputy Chief Prosecutor, George Sargbeh speaking recently at a news conference in Monrovia said, “the lack of sufficient evidence is an impediment to prosecuting sexual and gender-based violence.”

Almas Jiwani, President of the National Committee for the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women Canada) has been named one of 20 Women to Watch by Women's Post Magazine.

SADOKE KIKUNDA Mayele repeatedly cracks his knuckles as he sits restlessly in a small room up a dank stairway in Goma's central prison, the largest in eastern Congo. He cuts a distinctly underwhelming figure.

Working with ex-child soldiers of Charles Taylor's army, and the girls they have taken as wives, has convinced Nobel Peace laureate Leymah Gbowee that the abuse women suffer during conflict is a reflection of the interaction between men and women, boys and girls, during peace time.

Leymah Gbowee is one of three women who have been awarded jointly this year's Nobel Peace Prize. This article was first published in May 2011.

Ten years ago, life was still hard for the women of Ijuhanyondo village in Tanzania.

The number of reported rapes in camps for internally displaced people (IDPs) in Mogadishu, the Somali capital, has risen sharply, creating “a climate of fear”, according to a civil society source.

The government has not only empowered the womenfolk in the country but also working to provide them space in all walks of life, said, Goodwill Ambassador for Women Empowerment Syeda Fiza Batool Gilani.

There is an escalating pattern of physical attacks by Egyptian military and police officers against women and male protesters, journalists, and activists in Cairo, some of which are sexual in nature, Human Rights Watch said today. News reports and images of protestors in Cairo being stripped, beaten, and dragged through the street in the past several days are just the latest incidents.

The bodies of two women who had been raped and murdered in Gerud locality were found in the region of Kara, South Darfur on Sunday.

Speaking to a local radio station in Nyala on Monday, the government accused the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM-AW) led by Abdul Wahid of carrying out the attack.

Sharp statements about religion, powerful calls for international commmitments and resounding applause, marked the crowded seminar with the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize laureates in Stockholm 12 December.