Asia

Afghan women continue to face serious threats and injustice despite massive efforts at both a countrywide and international level to improve their situation.

There has been substantial progress in women's rights, but there is still a long way to go, the United Nations Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) in Afghanistan said.

The party elections of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) are being held in Lahore today. Ayla Malik and Dr Munazza are seen as strong candidates for the post of women wing president after documents of Fauzia Kasuri got rejected due to her holding of dual nationality.

Israel has detained more than 15,000 Palestinian women since 1967, the Palestinian Minister of Women's Affairs said on Thursday, according to the Middle East Monitor (MEMO) report received by Mi'raj News Agency (MEMO) Saturday.

Dozens of women protested Tuesday ouside Prime Minister Salam Fayyad's Ramallah office demanding the adaptation for laws that would protect them against violence and crime.

Woman's Affairs Technical Committee (WATC) member, Lubna Ashqar, told Wafa that they want a law that “can ensure dignity and justice for all the women of Palestine.”

The sheer number of women sexually abused and gang raped in a single public square had become too big to ignore. Conservative Islamists in Egypt's new political elite were outraged — at the women.

“Sometimes,” said Adel Abdel Maqsoud Afifi, a police general, lawmaker and ultraconservative Islamist, “a girl contributes 100 percent to her own raping when she puts herself in these conditions.”

Indian campaigners have accused the car company Ford of sabotaging attempts to reduce the rising number of rapes after an advertisement showed three scantily-dressed young women in the boot of its Figo car.

The ad, which was produced by its Indian advertising agency JWT, provoked an outcry after it was released onto the internet with women's rights groups attacking the company for insensitivity.

In March 2004, President George W. Bush gave a speech to an audience of 250 women from around the world to commemorate International Women's Day. His speech focused on the women of Iraq and Afghanistan who he proudly proclaimed were “learning the blessings of freedom” thanks to the United States.

Around 700 years ago, Queen Goharshad, wife of a Timouri heir, is said to have inspired a Renaissance in Herat, Afghanistan's western province. Seven centuries later, a group of women filmmakers in Afghanistan have inspired a similar change in their war-ravaged country.

Hivos welcomes the establishment of the Syrian Women's Forum for Peace (SWFP), which aims to strengthen the role of Syrian women in forging peace in Syria and push Syrian and international public opinion to ensure that decision-makers adopt peaceful means in building a democratic state in Syria.

The Women's Initiative Network for Peace has urged President U Thein Sein and the Deputy Commander in Chief of the Kachin Independence Organization to include representatives of ethnic women's civil society groups in all aspects of peace processes.

WIN-Peace, organised by 46 women representative from 30 ethnic women's organisations nationwide, sent the request via letter to the president and General Gon Maw on February 19.