Asia

The operator of the multibillion-dollar Porgera goldmine in Papua New Guinea has sacked five employees over an alleged pattern of violent abuse against villagers, including pack rapes.

Scores of women say they were beaten, tortured or raped by members of Barrick Gold Corporation's 450-strong private security force in abuses dating to 2008.

Business has always been a boy's game; suits, cigars and power lunches, with mistresses as well as money to boot.

Over the last 60 years, however, the rules have changed, with more women joining the workforce and doing so in fields long considered the preserve of the “stronger” sex.

Disability access, environment management, women and children's health issues, and improving health service delivery to senior citizens topped the list of human security and development priorities raised by twenty three local women leaders in Nadi during a new interactive policy dialogue with the Nadi Town Council Special Administrator Aisea Tuidraki and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Terence O'Neill this week.

UN agencies are concerned about the soaring figure of 1,750 conflict affected families in Mohmand Agency, Fata. This figure is likely to go up to 5,000 families according to the Fata Disaster Management Authority (FDMA), The Express Tribune has learnt.

A convenor of a non-governmental organization of Filipinos of mostly Muslim heritage on Monday expressed that Muslim women “are largely excluded from formal peace talks.”

Afghanistan's government is considering taking over the running of women's shelters, subjecting victims of domestic abuse to medical examinations and near-incarceration under a proposal rights groups say is a concession to the Taliban.

Human rights has been a hot topic in Afghanistan since the Taliban's near-medieval treatment of Afghan girls and women became known. Now that Afghanistan is working toward a more modern society and government, the rights of the nation's female population are moving front and center for those in charge of NATO Training Mission Afghanistan and Combined Security Transition Command Afghanistan.

A convenor of a non-governmental organization of Filipinos of mostly Muslim heritage on Monday expressed that Muslim women “are largely excluded from formal peace talks.”

When independent researchers fanned out across military-ruled Myanmar's mountainous Chin State to catalogue human-rights abuses, they expected to hear the usual disturbing stories of ethnic minority women being raped by government troops. But the research uncovered an unexpected new trend of abuse: Chin men were also being sexually violated by male soldiers in the country's remote northwestern corner.

Some 6,221 cases of violence against women were reported in the country from January to August 2010 including 778 cases of murder, 302 cases of honour killing and 1,611 cases of sexual assault.