Asia

In Afghanistan, despite a pledge from the government to protect women's rights and promote gender equality, more than 87% of Afghan women suffer from domestic abuse. According to the United Nations, between 60 to 80 percent of marriages are forced. In 2009, the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission registered about 2,269 cases of violence against women. In January of 2010 alone there were 235 cases.

A group of NATO Training Mission –Afghanistan mentors hosted a women's forum for female Afghan National Army members July 18 at the Logistics Command in Kabul. Afghan women face many challenges; cultural, societal and religious views create barriers that often prevent them from entering the work force, attending school or joining their military.

It was a typically hot, humid day in this eastern coastal village. The sun burned down from a cloudless sky, roasting the skin as an angry sea breeze swatted the faces of the few foolish enough to venture out onto the deserted main road that runs through town.

In spite of advances, discrimination against women persists in laws and in practice. Many women suffer numerous forms of discrimination and limited access to rights, resources and opportunities. This is a moment to celebrate but, simultaneously, a time to mourn for women. Celebrate, for finding a better place and entity in the bureaucratic system of the UN.

Amidst the disarray following General McChrystal's interview with Rolling Stone, a much less reported but profound event marked the course of the insurgency in Afghanistan. The recent female suicide operation in eastern Afghanistan reveals not only a paradigm shift in Taliban insurgent tactics, but also a mutation of the organization's founding ideology.

THIS IS not about the debate on purloined text and footnotes that found their way into a Supreme Court decision, and that has been picked up by bloggers abroad and by Prof. Evan Criddle, one of the affected authors who lamented that his writing had been lifted out of context to produce an opposite conclusion.

A female political prisoner in Kachin state's Putao prison was beaten up by prison guards when she tried to stop them from beating up two other inmates.

A lifetime of frustration in politics in Myanmar has not tired Ms Cho Cho Kyaw Nyein. Neither have the years as a political prisoner blunted her sense of humour.

"Some people call us the 'three princesses of Myanmar', but to the government, we are the three witches," she laughed. The "princesses" - Ms Cho, Ms Nay Ye Ba Swe, and Ms Mya Than Than Nu - are too old for fairy tales, she says.

Women who have fled Burma to escape what they describe as systematic violence against women by the military have banded together to help other survivors.

Last week, their work was recognized by the Peter Gruber Foundation, which awarded them $200,000 and the 2005 International Women's Rights Prize. The award was given jointly to the Shan Women's Action Network and the Women's League of Burma.

It has been three years since the report ''License to Rape" exposed to the world how troops of the Burmese military regime have been committing systematic sexual violence against women in Shan state, one of the ethnic regions of Burma where civil war has been continuing for more than four decades.