Women: Leading the Way
Monday, May 21, 2012   12:42 GMT    
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Parliamentarians Track Progress on Reproductive Rights
By A.D.McKenzie
PARIS - Have women around the world become more empowered in their reproductive health and rights over the past 18 years? This is one of the questions that some 300 parliamentarians from around the world will be examining when they meet in Istanbul, Turkey, this week for the Fifth International Parliamentarians’ Conference on the Implementation of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) programme of action.
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How Sex Education Programs Can Shape a Better Future
Aline Jenckel interviews JOVANA RIOS CISNERO, a member of the Asociación Panameña para el Planeamiento de la Familia (Panamanian Family Planning Association)
UNITED NATIONS - In Latin American countries and in the Caribbean, where income disparities are among the greatest in the world, too many people often lack access to comprehensive health services and information needed to live healthy lives.
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Caught Between Diarrhoea Bugs and Arsenic
By Naimul Haq
DHAKA - Achieving the Millennium Development Goal of providing access to safe drinking water for its 160 million people by 2015 is a tough call for Bangladesh, which is caught between arsenic contaminated groundwater and diarrhoea-causing microbes in its ponds and rivers.
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Women Farmers Are Key to a Food-Secure Africa
Busani Bafana interviews JANE KARUKU, the first woman president of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa
BULAWAYO - While women constitute the majority of food producers, processors and marketers in Africa, their role in the agricultural sector still remains a minor one because of cultural and social barriers.
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Trans Community Celebrates Groundbreaking Gender Identity Law
By Marcela Valente
BUENOS AIRES - Under a new law that recognises a broad range of rights for transvestites, transsexuals and transgender persons in Argentina, they will have the right to modify their legal documents to match their gender identity.
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Tunisia's Revolution is Just Beginning
By Isolda Agazzi
GENEVA - Lingering violence, intolerance and oppression in Tunisia, following the ousting of former dictator Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali in January 2011, tells the revolutionaries who sparked the Arab Spring that their work is just beginning.
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Africa’s Two Female Presidents Join Forces for Women
By Travis Lupick*
MONROVIA - The only two female heads of state in Africa, Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Malawian President Joyce Banda, have just committed to using their positions to improve the lives of women across the continent.
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Islamists Stall Gender Equality Bill
By Kafil Yamin
JAKARTA - The fate of a gender equality bill pending in Indonesia’s parliament and aligned with the United Nations convention on the elimination of all forms discrimination against women (CEDAW) has become uncertain after falling afoul of powerful Islamist groups.
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"Women's Leadership is Key to Ensuring Sustainable Development"
Fabíola Ortiz interviews REBECCA TAVARES, head of U.N. Women for Brazil and the Southern Cone
RIO DE JANEIRO - The vital role of women in creating a green economy will be highlighted at the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, to be held in Brazil in June.
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Women and Children Look to Community Justice
By Catherine Wilson
GOROKA, Papua New Guinea - A new community justice programme being rolled out in Papua New Guinea’s vast village court system is bringing international human rights-based laws to rural communities and boosting the protection and empowerment of women and children.
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Skipping Lunch to Afford a Mobile Phone in Africa
Kristin Palitza interviews GABRIELLE GAUTHEY, executive vice president of global telecommunications provider Alcatel Lucent
CAPE TOWN, South Africa - On a continent of over one billion people, where half the population have mobile phones, the use of mobile communication and internet technologies is crucial to boost development in Africa.
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Caste Blocks Revamp of Nepal's Sex Workers
By Naresh Newar
MUDA, Nepal - Social activists say that attempts to rehabilitate sex workers in this former monarchy call for special efforts to uplift the Badi, a Hindu caste that has for centuries been associated with entertainment and prostitution.
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Women 'Invisible' in Myanmar
By Roberto Tofani
YANGON - While Aung San Suu Kyi enjoys iconic status in Myanmar (also known as Burma), women remain invisible in this country steeped in Buddhist tradition and emerging from decades of military rule.
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Modern Obstetrics and Midwives Need to Join Forces
By Fabiana Frayssinet
RIO DE JANEIRO - María dos Prazeres de Souza has lost count of the number of births "without a single death" she has attended as a midwife, an occupation that there is renewed interest in strengthening in traditional communities in Brazil where state services are not available or are not entirely acceptable for cultural reasons.
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KYRGYZSTAN
Justice Elusive for Kidnapped Brides
By Azita Ranjbar*
BISHKEK - Even though she was kidnapped, pressured into marrying a man from a nearby village, and then abandoned without means to sustain herself and the couple's two young children, Totugul can't rely on Kyrgyzstan's courts for help.
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Child Soldiers Used in Mali Conflict
By William Lloyd-George
NIAMEY - It was tough for Hassan Toure to decide to stay in his small town on the outskirts of Kidal, in northern Mali. The government troops had withdrawn on Mar. 30, and several armed groups, including militias and bandits, were operating in the region.
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OP-ED
Nobel Laureates and Students Discuss Role of Women in Human Rights
By Kerry Kennedy*
CHICAGO, Illinois, U.S. - Last week, in a lecture hall at the University of Illinois Chicago, 2003 Nobel Peace Laureate Shirin Ebadi took a reality many of us working in human rights know well, and drove it home with a story from her own nation, a land her government says she is no longer allowed to call home.
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Epidemic of Premature Births in Rich and Poor Nations Alike
By Charundi Panagoda and Stephanie Parker*
WASHINGTON/UNITED NATIONS - Fifteen million babies, or more than one in 10 infants, are born prematurely each year. Over one million die soon after birth, or survive to face a lifetime of health complications, says a new report by the World Health Organisation and co- sponsors.
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Morocco Still Divided Over Marriage of Minors
By Abderrahim El Ouali
CASABLANCA - The widespread practice of marrying minors continues to be one of the most incendiary legal and political issues in Morocco today, causing open confrontations between hard-line Islamists and moderates throughout the country.
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Bangladesh Scores on Girls’ Schooling
By Naimul Haq
DHAKA - Bangladesh continues to score good grades in achieving the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of gender parity in education by 2015, with the trend of more girls than boys attending primary school accelerating this year.
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Another Olympics Sans Saudi Women?
By Sandra Siagian
SYDNEY - While athletes around the world enter their final stages of training for the 30th Olympic Games in London this July, Saudi Arabia stands alone as the only country that has banned females from participating.
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Energy Forests, the Feminine Art of Reforesting
By Edgardo Ayala and Claudia Ávalos
SAN JULIÁN, El Salvador - María Elena Muñoz industriously weeds a clearing in the forest and then digs several holes, where she and another four dozen women are planting plantain seedlings, to help feed their families in this poor farming area in El Salvador.
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Women in Brazil Turn to Eco-Friendly Farming in Wake of Storms
By Fabíola Ortiz
BONSUCESSO, Brazil - In the green belt of market gardens that feeds the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro, women farmers are learning environmentally friendly techniques in response to extreme weather events and their effects on the land.
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Sexual Abuse Keeps Girls Out of School
By Catherine Wilson
GOROKA, Papua New Guinea - Sexual harassment of school-going girls is one factor that may prevent this Pacific island nation from achieving the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of eliminating gender disparity in education by 2015.
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Armed Groups in Northern Mali Raping Women
By William Lloyd-George
NIAMEY - Increasing numbers of Malian women are being raped by Tuareg rebels and armed groups that have swept across the north of Mali since the beginning of year, expelling all government troops from the region.
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Women of the World Unite for Rights
By Jennifer Hattam
ISTANBUL - The world’s recent financial and political upheavals have not been kind to women. In Libya’s Tripoli, female suicide rates increased tenfold during the revolution, while dismal job prospects have young Greek women abandoning their career aspirations, participants in a global forum on women’s rights said over the weekend.
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Economic Crisis Hits Gender Budgeting
By Jennifer Hattam
ISTANBUL - Worldwide, women are largely responsible for managing family budgets, controlling 65 percent of global spending. But, women’s needs are often ignored when it comes to government budgeting, delegates at an international meet in Turkey's largest city observed.
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Papua New Guinea's ‘Missing Mothers’ Prompt Rural Healthcare Overhaul
By Catherine Wilson
GOROKA - While the number of women dying in childbirth globally declined by 34 percent between 1990 and 2008, that number doubled in Papua New Guinea over the same time period.
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Women's in RSS Half the world's population, but not with half the share of wealth, wellbeing and opportunity. And certainly, women do not get half of media attention, or an equal voice in expression - only 22 percent of the voices you hear and read in the news today are women's. In this set of reports IPS gives women and their issues their fair share of voice; not by way of artificial allowance, but as arising naturally in the news of the day.

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Advancing gender equality means a shift in thinking — from seeing boys and men as part of the problem, to including boys and men as part of the solution. (Credit: Sujoy Dhar/IPS) Dear Editors, Thanks for the story on working with males and females on gender equality. You may also be interested in work that ICRW has [...]
Dispatch from Kibera, East Africa’s Largest Slum
Photo Essay by Aline Cunico (IPS/Aline Cunico) Considered one of the biggest slums in the world, Kibera is Nairobi’s–and East Africa’s–largest urban settlement. Over one million people struggle daily to meet basic needs such as access to water, nutrition and sanitation. In this community lacking education and opportunities, women and girls are most affected by [...]
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“We Women Want to Be Heard”
Eva Carroll interviews activist FÁTIMA HERNÁNDEZ MANAGUA, Oct 25, 2011 (IPS) – Fátima Hernández, a young Nicaraguan rape victim who has become a symbol in her country in her fight for justice, is now working to help women in a similar situation, and preparing to take her case to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. [...]
Tackling Human Rights in Iran Is “Like a Minefield”
Christian Papesch interviews ELISE AUERBACH, Iran country specialist for Amnesty International USA UNITED NATIONS, Oct 21, 2011 (IPS) – The Islamic Republic of Iran has one of the most desperate human rights situations in the world. On Tuesday, the United Nations Human Rights Committee, which monitors states’ compliance with their obligations under the International Covenant [...]
Redesigning Urban Landscapes with People at the Centre
José Domingo Guariglia interviews NATÁLIA GARCIA, creator of the project Cidades para Pessoas UNITED NATIONS, Oct 13, 2011 (IPS) – In May 2011, Brazilian journalist Natália Garcia decided to spend one year travelling to different cities around the world to better understand how to make urban landscapes more liveable for inhabitants. She called her project [...]
Africa’s Legislated Civil Society Crackdown
Laura Lopez Gonzalez interviews CIVICUS secretary general, INGRID SRINATH MONTREAL, Canada , Sep 30, 2011 (IPS) – Assassinations, intimidation and disappearances were the manifestations of civil society repression in Africa, but this may be changing as the crackdown on civil society is becoming more formally accepted and increasingly “by the book”, according to Ingrid Srinath, [...]
“Things Are Bound to Change in China”
José Domingo Guariglia interviews advocate for the Uyghur people, REBIYA KADEER UNITED NATIONS, Sep 19, 2011 (IPS) – Before 1999, she was best known as the richest woman in China. Her business empire included a trading firm, real estate investments and a department store, putting her among the top 10 wealthiest individuals in the Asian [...]

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