Source: UN News Centre
The UN Trust Fund to End Violence against Women will give more than $8 million in grants to local initiatives in 18 countries to deal with the issue, the UN agency tasked with advancing gender equality announced today.
ZIMBABWE needs to enact a policy that enables more women to venture and participate in key sectors that drive the national economy, an official with United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has said.
While the 2011/12 crime statistics showed an official drop in the number of reported rapes, it still remains morbidly high. It reflects crisis levels in South Africa. A potent symbol of the culture behind those rapes is the men who try to pay their victims not to press charges
As Kenya gets ready for voter registration this month, ahead of the country’s Mar. 4, 2013 polls, women’s rights organisations are hoping that the provisions for gender equality in the new constitution will mean significantly increased representation in the government.
Overshadowed by daily reports from a horrific war in Syria, lingering violence in Libya and sporadic protests in Egypt and other regional nations, a struggle to salvage and advance the rights of women caught up in the revolutions of the Arab Spring is reaching a crucial stage.
Incomes have slipped to their lowest level in a decade since Madagascar’s 2009 coup d’etat, and, in parallel, domestic violence has sharply risen.
Egyptian bullies who sexually harass women in the streets, often taking advantage of mob situations and the anonymity these provide, are getting a taste of their own medicine – and they don’t like it.
Only 38 women – of a total of 586 candidates – will contest parliamentary seats in Sierra Leone’s November elections, and the blame for this can be laid squarely on the shoulders of the current group of female lawmakers, according to Barbara Bangura, the director of the women’s organisation Grassroots Empowerment for Self Reliance.
Source: The Guardian
Tennis stars spend afternoon coaching young players in club in Lagos before answering questions from children.
A United Nations high level taskforce on women, girls, gender equality and HIV for eastern and southern Africa has called for accelerated efforts in protecting the rights and well-being of women and girls in South Africa.
Efforts to hammer out a new constitution are getting messy as its authors fight over the role of sharia law, the power of the presidency and women’s rights.
Gisèle* sits in the relative safety of a clinic for victims of sexual violence in the district of Ituri. The mother of three, whose husband was killed during recent fighting, tells a harrowing but sadly typical story about her experience in the conflict in this part of eastern DRC.
Source: The Star
Police in Kuria West district are looking for a teacher who defiled 12 girls, infecting them with gonorrhoea and HIV. The 42-year-old husband of two worked at Nyamboge Primary School in Nyabohanse.
Source: IPS
During an interview at the Hilton Hotel in downtown Nairobi, David Kuria Mbote, Kenya's first openly homosexual candidate for public office, stresses that his campaign will not be only about gay rights.
Somalia is to get its first female foreign minister in a cabinet formed by new Prime Minister Abdi Farah Shirdon.
SEVERAL women, who turned out at meetings where the Constitutional Review Commission (CRC) collected people's views on the new constitution, called for review of laws on inheritance, divorce and protection of widows, saying the current ones were weak, obsolete and gender biased.
“This occupation is the cruelest one that the Malian people have had to undergo, nowadays women are deprived of all liberties and even the choice of a husband is dictated to them by the occupying forces,” says a displaced woman* living in Bamako and originally from Timbuktu – a city occupied by armed groups today.
The First Lady, Mrs Lordina Mahama, on Monday underlined the need to put premium on the socio-economic and political empowerment of women.
Source: UN News Service
The panel tasked with advising on the global development agenda beyond 2015, the target date for achieving the anti-poverty targets known as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), today reaffirmed its commitment to work together on a framework to combat poverty.
Source: The Observer
There was no fuss getting into Sheraton Kampala hotel's Lion's bar on Friday evening as a new all-girl band opened shop.