September 21, 2010 is International Day of Peace. In 2001, the nations of the world came together at the UN General Assembly and jointly agreed on Resolutions 55/282, marking September 21 as the International Day of Peace. Combined with the objective to strengthen peace between and among nations, this special occasion also recognizes links with other aims of the UN, including development, elimination of poverty and prioritizing equality.
Peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority continued this week with little progress made. Essentially, the talks are between two men, Binyamin Netanyahu and Mahmoud Abbas, who are ideologically aligned in very different directions.
In an attempt to protect the vulnerable women in Kirkuk a number of organizations announced in a press conference on Saturday a camping for defending women rights in the province.
Many women have so far been killed under various social pretexts, the most notable one incentive for the murders is "honor".
Palestinian women hold photos of relatives being held in Israeli jails during a protest in front of the Red Cross office in the Israeli occupied West Bank town of Ramallah, on September 19, 2010.
The following summary incorporates the perspectives and recommendations of Noeleen Heyzer, Executive Director at UNIFEM and Ambassador Donald Steinberg, Principal Deputy Director of Policy Planning for the Department of State.
If anyone still doubted, or hadn't noticed, that misogyny is the fundamental pillar on which radical Islam is based, the news that poison gas was pumped into girls' schools in Afghanistan, likely by the Taliban, ought to confirm it.
Next week a small group of Utah women will travel to Iraq to take supplies to the women and children of the war torn country. And the women going to Iraq have one thing in common - they have lost sons in the war there.
ABC 4's Don Hudson recently caught up with one of the mom's at a humanitarian workshop. That's where Colleen Parkin not only helped pack supplies, but also tried her hand at a few of the projects.
A government's selection of a woman to oversee female education would hardly make headlines in many countries. But this is a first in Saudi Arabia, one of the world's most restrictive places for women. As experience in the region shows, even such a minor step can shift the political sands toward more equal opportunity for the sexes.
In mid-August in the northern Afghanistan province of Kunduz, the Taliban carried out a horrific sentence against two young Afghan lovers who had eloped against their families' wishes. The punishment was death by stoning. Deemed by Islamic extremists to be justified under sharia law, the process involves partially burying the accused, after which a male crowd hurls stones at the victims' exposed heads until they die.
