Gender Violence

A Triple Threat in the Fight Against AIDS

By Tharanga Yakupitiyage
The exclusion of key regions, contexts and actors must be addressed in order to successfully and significantly reduce HIV and AIDS by 2020, many have noted during the High Level Meeting on Ending AIDS this week.

Reproductive Violence

By Tahir Mehdi
Two things happened in Islamabad on the same day recently, one pertaining to the Council of Islamic Ideology and the other to Pemra, the electronic media regulator. CII sanctioned `lightly beating` of wives and Pemra banned (and then partially withdrew) advertisements of contraceptives.

LGBT Communities Silenced in HIV Reduction Efforts

By Tharanga Yakupitiyage
Treatment for HIV and AIDS has increased, but key populations including lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) communities continue to be left behind and even excluded altogether.

Young African Women More Vulnerable to HIV

By Lyndal Rowlands
When Lebogang Brenda Motsumi was 16  years old she fell pregnant, terrified about what her life would look like, she went to a backdoor clinic for an abortion.

Time to Change Expectations: Zero Retribution to Zero Tolerance

By Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka
The drugging, abduction and violent gang rape of a 16-year-old girl in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil calls us all to turn the tide of sexual violence against women and girls in Brazil and in every country in the world.

A Jarring Anomaly of Society

By Aasha Mehreen Amin
It is easy to miss stories about child domestic workers being tortured and killed. Easy because stories of children being killed have become eerily regular. It is May 28 and there is the report of 14-year-old Konika Rani being hacked to death by a drug addict with three of her classmates also grievously injured by him. There is also the horror of having to read about a six-year-old being left critically wounded after being raped by her neighbour. Next to this is the news of 11-year-old Hasina Akhter dying in hospital from the fatal wounds inflicted on her, presumably by her employers.

UNFPA Funding Cuts Threaten Women’s Health in Poorer Nations

By Thalif Deen
The UN Population Fund (UNFPA), which has played a key role in ensuring maternal health and promoting reproductive rights of millions of women world-wide, is expected to suffer over $140 million in funding cuts by Western donors this year.

Will Canada Recognise Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Developing Countries Too?

By Aruna Dutt
While Canada’s long-awaited support for the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples brought hope and celebration last week, it's not yet clear whether the rights of Indigenous people in developing countries harmed by Canadian mining companies will also be included.

Best Strategies to Empower Girls

By Dr. Bjorn Lomborg
Between 2011 and 2020, more than 140 million girls worldwide will become child brides - defined by the United Nations as marriage before age 18. The effects from such early marriage can be devastating and long-lasting for women: lower education levels and lower lifetime earnings, higher rates of domestic violence, greater risk of dying from pregnancy complications, and increased mortality rates for the children of these young brides.

A Refugee Crisis with No End in Sight

By Silvia Boarini
"We don't want charity, we want a long-term solution."

Analysis: Why the UN Needs a “Peace Industrial Complex”

By Jonathan Rozen
In a world where annual defence spending is over 1.6 trillion dollars and the UN Peacebuilding Fund receives less than 700 million dollars, it would seem that the military industrial complex is unwaveringly entrenched.

Justice for Berta Caceres Incomplete Without Land Rights: UN Rapporteur

By Lyndal Rowlands
The murder of Honduran Indigenous woman Berta Caceres is only too familiar to Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, the UN’s Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

A Women`s Jirga

By Rafia Zakaria
When interviewed by Reuters, Zardad Khan, from the village of Makol to which 16-year-old Ambreen belonged, said, `This barbarity has never happened before.` The teenager was killed, her body put in a van and burned.

Compensation Hard to Ensure

By Shakhawat Liton
The dead do not feel anything, but those who survive do. The horrendous experience of the insensitive test after rape. The courtroom insults during trial because a draconian law permits the accused to question the victim's character. The families suffer no less humiliation as they wait for justice. While nations around the world have overhauled relevant laws with provisions that shield the rape victims, ours still favour the offender instead. Isn't it time we were a little more sensitive towards the victims of a crime now regarded as a crime against society? In the wake of Tonu murder after suspected rape, The Daily Star tries to shed some light on all these aspects. Today, we run the third and final instalment of the three-part series.

A long, Insulting Walk to Justice for Rape Victims in Bangladesh

By Tamanna Khan
The dead do not feel anything, but those who survive do. The horrendous experience of the insensitive two-finger test after rape. The courtroom insults during trial because a draconian law permits the accused to question the victim's character. The families suffer no less humiliation as they wait for justice. While nations around the world have overhauled relevant laws with provisions that shield the rape victims, ours still favour the offender instead. Isn't it time we were a little more sensitive towards the victims of a crime now regarded as a crime against society? In the wake of Tonu murder after suspected rape, The Daily Star tries to shed some light on all these aspects. Today, the first two instalments of a three-part series.

Violence Against Women Journalists Threatens Media Freedom

By Tharanga Yakupitiyage
For women journalists, violence and intimidation don't just happen in conflict zones, they are every day experiences.

Cold-Blooded Lechery and Hushed Silence!

By Shah Husain Imam
The photograph of a toddler in a Chinese street, published on an online portal, waving a steel pipe at an urban management force working to clear up pavements would itself have made news. But there was so much more to it with the infant actually shouting: 'Don't touch my grandma, go away', to the appreciating, if somewhat amused, glance of onlookers.

The Unknown Fate of Thousands of Abducted Women and Girls in Nigeria

By IPS Africa Desk
The plight of 219 Chibok schoolgirls abducted two years ago is all too common in Nigeria's conflict-affected north-eastern communities, and up to 7,000 women and girls might be living in abduction and sex slavery, senior United Nations officials on 14 April 2016 warned.

More Children Displaced, Used for Suicide Attacks by Boko Haram

By Tharanga Yakupitiyage
A dire humanitarian and security crisis continues to worsen in the Lake Chad Basin with severe consequences for youth, said Regional Humanitarian Coordinator for the Sahel Toby Lanzer.

Sliding Scale

By Hajrah Mumtaz
That Pakistan is a hostile terrain for women is widely known. The vast majority of the poor have little choice but to carry on with life as best as they can, holding out in the hope that the state and its set of laws, law enforcement and justice systems will be able to protect their freedoms and dignity.

Plan for Poorer Countries to Fund HIV Response Raises Concerns    

By Lyndal Rowlands
Calls for low and middle income countries to contribute an additional 6.1 billion dollars to the global HIV response by 2020 could see some vulnerable groups left behind, said HIV activists meeting at the United Nations last week.
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