Asia

SOLOMON Islands' first female to enter parliament Hilda Kari describes the introduction of women's political party as a step in the right direction for women.

Speaking during yesterday's media forum, Mrs Kari said such initiative and interest can bring women into the focus.

“Inorder for women to actively involve, they must introduce their political parties or join political parties.

“Leave the kitchen and cooking for a while, come out and involve” is a strong message to women from Solomon Islands first female Member of Parliament Hilda Kari.

Fiji, a multi-racial, multi-cultural country of 300 islands in the South Pacific, has undergone another coup - the fourth in 22 years. The women of Fiji want their voices to be heard as they work on ways to bring peace back to their country, and they are asking for the United Nations to support their efforts.

The stories coming from Burmese and ethnic minority women along the border with Thailand are difficult to listen to. A woman describes being gang-raped while pregnant. When she begged for mercy the first soldier raped her anyway “and slapped my face.” Then he threatened to harm her unborn baby. Then there were more soldiers, “one after another, up to four.”

Lebanese-born photographer Rania Matar, who currently lives in the United States, frequently travels back to her native country. On her last trip home in 2007, she documented the changing and striking ways in which Lebanese Muslim women are engaging in politics.

Women who were raped by "security personnel" during the insurgency period have demanded that the government provide them compensation, state-owned news agency RSS reported Tuesday. They put forth the demand before the local Peace Committee which was collecting the details of conflict victims.

The struggle for human rights and gender equality continues in Iran as we mark the one-year anniversary of the demonstrations against the rigged elections. On June 12, 2009, the Iranian people took to the streets in droves to protest the fraudulent elections that returned Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to the presidency. The Iranian regime resorted to extreme violence against these peaceful demonstrations.

Since 2002, the International Women's Peace Service in Palestine (IWPS-Palestine) has been documenting and non-violently intervening in human rights abuses carried out by the Israeli military and Israeli settlers in the Occupied West Bank against the Palestinian civilian population.

Three girls from the UNRWA School at Askar Camp in Nablus have made history by becoming the first Palestinians to win an award at the world's premier youth science competition. Aseel Abu Aleil, Aseel Alshaar and Noor Alarada were competing with 1500 finalists from around the world.

They picked up a "special award in applied electronics" at the Intel Science and Engineering Fair in San Jose, California.

“I'm going to get my votes!” cried Mu Sochua as she stepped into a slender rowboat, holding one side for balance. “One by one.”

She was crossing a small river here in southern Cambodia on a recent stop in her never-ending campaign for re-election to Parliament, introducing herself to rural constituents who may never have seen her face.