Monday, March 9, 2009

Every day is "Women's Day"

Saudis order 40 lashes for elderly woman for mingling

Story Highlights

Saudi newspaper says religious officer found two men in Syrian woman's house
Khamisa Mohammed Sawadi said she breast-fed one of men when he was infant
Sawadi argues that under Islamic tradition, that makes man related to her
Men to receives lashes, too; case sparks outrage in conservative Saudi Arabia

CNN -- A Saudi Arabian court has sentenced a 75-year-old Syrian woman to 40 lashes, four months imprisonment and deportation from the kingdom for having two unrelated men in her house, according to local media reports.

According to the Saudi daily newspaper Al-Watan, troubles for the woman, Khamisa Mohammed Sawadi, began last year when a member of the religious police entered her house in the city of Al-Chamli and found her with two unrelated men, "Fahd" and "Hadian."

Fahd told the policeman that he had the right to be there, because Sawadi had breast-fed him as a baby and was therefore considered to be a son to her in Islam, according to Al-Watan. Fahd, 24, added that his friend Hadian was escorting him as he delivered bread for the elderly woman. The policeman then arrested both men.

Saudi Arabia follows a strict interpretation of Islam called Wahhabism and punishes unrelated men and women who are caught mingling.

The Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, feared by many Saudis, is made up of several thousand religious policemen charged with duties such as enforcing dress codes, prayer times and segregation of the sexes. Under Saudi law, women face many restrictions, including a strict dress code and a ban on driving. Women also need to have a man's permission to travel.

Don't Miss

Al Watan obtained the court's verdict and reported that it was partly based on the testimony of the religious police. In his ruling, the judge said it had been proved that Fahd is not the Sawadi's son through breastfeeding.

The court also doled out punishment to the two men. Fahd was sentenced to four months in prison and 40 lashes; Hadian was sentenced to six months in prison and 60 lashes. In a phone call with Al Watan, the judge declined to comment and suggested the newspaper review the case with the Ministry of Justice.

Sawadi told the newspaper that she will appeal, adding that Fahd is indeed her son through breastfeeding.

The case has sparked anger in Saudi Arabia.

"It's made everybody angry because this is like a grandmother," Saudi women's rights activist Wajeha Al-Huwaider told CNN. "Forty lashes -- how can she handle that pain? You cannot justify it."

This is not the first Saudi court case to cause controversy.

In 2007, a 19-year-old gang-rape victim in the Saudi city of Qatif was sentenced to 200 lashes and six months in prison for meeting with an unrelated male. The seven rapists, who had abducted the woman and man, received sentences ranging from 10 months to five years in prison. The case sparked international outrage and Saudi King Abdullah subsequently pardoned the "Qatif Girl" and the unrelated male.

Many Saudis are hopeful that the Ministry of Justice will be reformed. Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz announced in February a major Cabinet reshuffling in which many hard-line conservatives, including the head of the commission, were dismissed and replaced with younger, more moderate members.

The new appointments represented the largest shakeup since King Abdullah took power in 2005 and were welcomed in Saudi Arabia as progressive moves on the part of the king, whom many see as a reformer. Among ministers who've been replaced is the minister of justice.

The actions of the religious police have come under increased scrutiny in Saudi Arabia recently, as more and more Saudis urge that the commission's powers be limited. Last week, the religious police detained two male novelists for questioning after they tried to get the autograph of a female writer, Halima Muzfar, at a book fair in Riyadh, the capital of the kingdom.

"This is the problem with the religious police," added Al-Huwaider, "watching people and thinking they're bad all the time. It has nothing to do with religion. It's all about control. And the more you spread fear among people, the more you control them. It's giving a bad reputation to the country."

View source article

Sunday, March 8, 2009

Happy Women's Day?

The shame of Iraq's pariah widows

By Mike Sergeant
BBC News, Baghdad

Her husband and three brothers were killed. Her parents were already dead. Her house was burnt down. She was pregnant at the time and lost the baby.

But, in the months that followed, Nadia Hussein had to endure much more.

Now she lives at a refuge for women in the centre of Baghdad.

She spends her days feeding the pigeons and cooking. It's a place for her to escape the many dangers widows face in Iraq.

'Nephew beat me'

"After my husband died, I found work as a house keeper," she told me.

"A man and his brother tried to make advances on me. They tried to sexually assault me. I refused.

Nadia's Hussein's ordeal is an all too familiar story for Iraqi widows

"My nephew, who is an alcoholic, also used to beat me and accuse me of bad things."

Nadia said the people at the refuge are now her only family. But she still asks for their approval before doing anything or going anywhere.

Her story is not particularly unusual. Accurate figures are hard to obtain, but even before the invasion in 2003, there were hundreds of thousands of widows in Iraq.

Many lost husbands in the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. At the height of the violence of recent years, up to 100 women a day were becoming widows.

Almost everywhere you go in Baghdad, you can see them begging at traffic lights and outside mosques - dressed from head to toe in black.

The women are supposed to be given just over $1 (£0.70) a day from the government.

But a survey by the charity Oxfam has discovered that less than a quarter actually get the money.

'Will of God'

Many face physical and sexual abuse. Some are told to marry men who already have wives.

My husband always wanted me to be a suicide bomber

Umm Harith

Shia tradition also permits "temporary marriages" - which only last for a matter of days or weeks.

A few widows have themselves wanted to die violently - there have been many attacks by female suicide bombers.

Umm Harith was trained to carry one out but she backed away from going through with it.

"When my husband died I felt very isolated," she said. "He always wanted me to be a suicide bomber.

"When he was killed, I wanted to blow myself up. I wanted to kill the people who took away the person who was most precious to me."

Most of the widows we spoke to in Baghdad, though, do not seem to be interested in revenge.

They accept what has happened to them as the "will of God".

Indeed those who campaign on their behalf say one of the hardest things is getting the widows to think that they deserve better lives.

"It's not just about legislation," said Hana Adwar, a campaigner for women's rights.

"The problem is the way people behave inside the family. The question is how to change attitudes and behaviour towards them."

Nightclub dancers

She estimates that 40% of all prostitutes in Iraq are widows.

Improvements in security have certainly led to some shady opportunities for those who have lost their husbands and income. Nightclubs have started to reopen in Baghdad.

We visited one of them. The scene would previously have been unthinkable.

It's so difficult for women and girls to walk around freely - because of our traditions and our culture

Haifa Raheem

Men were sitting around drinking alcohol, listening to music and being entertained by women dancing.

Involvement in any of those activities a couple of years ago could have got you killed in Iraq.

I talk to the singer who works there. He says women are employed just to dance and talk to the customers.

But he tells me there are many other nightclubs in Baghdad where widows will leave with men for the right price.

There are a few places in this city where the women can get help.

At one centre, they are being taught the skills they need to find jobs - like IT and nursing.

Many are illiterate, though, and jobs are hard to come by.

The support available is dwarfed by the scale of the problem.

Just 120 - of the many tens of thousands who lost husbands since 2003 - have been given somewhere to live at a trailer park on the outskirts of Baghdad.

Respect

Haifa Raheem is one of them.

Inside her aluminium trailer, there is almost no furniture and just a few mats on the floor.

She lives here with her seven children and her mother. The family is almost entirely dependent on handouts.

"It's horribly hot in the summer," she said. "Staying here is better than nothing.

"But it's so difficult for women and girls to walk around freely - because of our traditions and our culture."

There's talk of passing new laws, and finding extra money for the hundreds of thousands of widows.

But campaigners say what they need more than anything is more respect in Iraqi society.

View source article

Saturday, March 7, 2009

Nepalese Women Free From War but Not Violence

http://www.truthout.org/030709F
Rosalie Hughes, Reuters AlertNet: "As Ashmi's belly grew, so did the insults. Eventually they turned violent. A female neighbour spat on her. Two boys she'd grown up with pelted her with rocks on her way home from school one day. She no longer felt safe in her village. Her growing belly reminded her that two lives were in danger. When she was three months pregnant, Ashmi followed the advice of a community-based organisation and left her village for a women's shelter in the capital Kathmandu. Ashmi's story embodies the hundreds of stories represented in a recently released report by the International Rescue Committee, United Nations Populations Fund (UNFPA) and Saathi, a Nepali NGO. The report looks at gender-based violence in two districts of mid-west Nepal, through interviews with over 400 women and focus group discussions with men, women and children."