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When one hurts or kills a women
one hurts or kills hummanity and is an antrocitie.
Gino d'Artali
and: My mother (1931-1997) always said to me <Mi
figlio, non esistono notizie <vecchie> perche puoi imparare qualcosa da
qualsiasi notizia.> Translated: <My son, there is no such thing as so
called 'old' news because you can learn something from any news.>
Gianna d'Artali
21-30 Dec
2021 read below
20-13
Dec 2021
10-3
Dec 2021
Message from Gino d'Artali
30 Dec 2021
'This is a time for me to look back at the past year, to what I maybe
have contributed for the International Women's Day 2021 and that one is
for sure: I'll not stop supporting them and reporting, deeply believing
that their fight will persevere.
But to be able to do so I need to secure that my equipment is
updated/re-placed and as I always said when I worked at refugee camps
i.e. sites I did so with the motto <I work with and for children, not
for gaining a few coins more>. And so do I for the International Women's
Day 2021. I'll just need to be creative to have this update/re-place
thing done!'
The Guardian
Yashraj Sharma
27 Dec 2021
Global development is supported by
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
<<‘Families want a son at any cost’: the women forced to abort female
foetuses in India.
Laali was alone at home when she realised her legs were drenched in
blood. The bleeding did not stop for eight hours. As she fell
unconscious, the 25-year-old thought she would die alongside the foetus
she was losing. She had been three months pregnant when she was taken
for prenatal sex determination. <When I learned it was a girl, I started
feeling as though I was suffocating,> she says.
An abortion pill was forced down her throat, without a doctor’s
supervision, and subsequent complications led to hospitalisation. The
night she was released, Laali cried herself to sleep – and in the
morning returned to her work in the fields.
Laali’s unborn daughter is among India’s estimated 46 million <missing
females” over a period of 50 years, ten times the female population of
London. A deepening gender bias, breeding rampant sex-selective
abortions and female infanticides, means that India accounts for nearly
half of global missing female births.
<The traditional pattern of marriage and customs dictate an inferior
position to women in Indian societies,> says Prem Chowdhry, a gender
activist and retired professor at the University of Delhi. Since girls
leave their birth family after marriage, she says, the dowry and cost of
raising a girl is considered an unwelcome obligation, and sex-selective
abortions are common. Prenatal sex determination was criminalised in
1994, but it is a widely flouted law. The practice has thrived with
medical advancements, spread to more regions, and is still easily
accessible in privately run clinics.
Surrounded by vast sugar cane fields, Laali’s village is 40 miles from
Delhi. Social health activists who run an unregistered support group for
women here estimate that <every third house in the village> has aborted
a foetus because of the sex. <Families want a son at any cost. Any
cost!” Laali says. <If I die, my husband will remarry tomorrow morning,
hoping the next woman will give birth to a son.>
Laali was 19 when her marriage was arranged with a farmer in 2009. In
the next three years, she gave birth to two daughters. During her second
pregnancy, she was regularly drugged by traditional and faith healers in
order to <make> a boy.
When her baby girl was born, no one from her family came to see them in
the hospital. Returning home was worse. <My mother-in-law refused to see
my daughter’s face,> Laali said. <She refused to take care of me,
saying: ‘you are giving birth to girl after girl. How far can I take
care of you?’>
Every night, as she sat down for dinner after a day of labour in the
field, someone would toss in a taunt. <When anyone had a son in the
village, it was a nightmare for me,> she recalls. <My family abused me
in front of my girls.>
The government of India appears unwilling to act. A recent government
survey hailed the fact that there are more women than men for the first
time. However, activists on the ground and experts are sceptical of the
data. <The main objective of the survey was to look into data on
reproductive health and family welfare indicators and not on the
population sex ratio,> said Sabu George, a researcher and activist based
in Delhi. <All state-wise trends show a different picture.>>
Read more here:
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/dec/27/families-want-a-son-at-any-cost-the-women-forced-to-abort-female-foetuses-in-india
The Guardian
27 Dec 2021
Saba Vasefi
<<‘Finally I can buy a candle’: 61-year-old refugee released after nine
years in Australian detention.
A 61-year-old refugee who had been held for more than nine years in
Australian immigration detention has finally been granted a three-year
temporary protection visa.
Masoumeh Torkpour fled Iran in 2011 and has been in detention ever
since. In 2018 she was granted refugee status and a refugee tribunal
found that she should be issued a temporary protection visa because her
mental health issues – including OCD, depression and adjustment disorder
– were being exacerbated by conditions in detention.
However, she was denied a visa due to rigorous <character> tests.
Torkpour was sentenced to two months’ imprisonment during her detention
for spitting at and biting detention centre staff over disputes about
food and access to a mobile phone.
She had been granted asylum in Canada in 1991 after fleeing Iran two
years earlier, but was jailed for four years for stabbing a woman she
found in bed with her husband. As a result she was barred from obtaining
a permanent visa in Canada. She returned to Iran from Canada in 2005 to
care for her dying father, but was then detained for having left Iran
illegally. The prison sentence in Canada also made her ineligible for a
permanent visa in Australia on character grounds.
Torkpour was given accommodation in a Melbourne hotel after her release
on 15 December, but has now been advised she must find a new home.
A spokesperson for the Department of Home Affairs said eligible
individuals released from immigration detention could receive
transitional support for up to six weeks.>>
Read more here:
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/dec/28/finally-i-can-buy-a-candle-61-year-old-refugee-released-after-nine-years-in-australian-detention
The Guardian
Chanel Contos
27 Dec 2021
<<Australia has been forced to face the truth about the gender-based
violence behind its ‘safe and happy’ facade.
At university we were given a task to explain how the readings we did
that week on sexual coercion in the education system were applicable to
the contexts we came from. A woman from a low income country went first,
and described how <virginity testing> (where fingers are used to test if
the hymen is still intact) was part of childhood schooling in her
country. It was my turn directly after and I was slightly lost for
words.
<Uhh … I grew up in a privileged area of Australia so nothing like that
happened to me in my schooling … but when I was doing the readings on
sexual coercion, I realised I and people I knew experienced the
behaviour described pretty much every weekend.>
I was met with shock from the rest of the members of the group as I
described the ways in which sexual coercion was a fundamental part of
being a teenager in Australia. It was hard to comprehend for these
people from all parts of the world that this could possibly occur. How
could Australia let this happen? It’s such a <developed> country!
This and two other pivotal conversations spurred me to ask my Instagram
following if they or anyone close to them had been sexually assaulted by
someone who went to an all-boys school in Sydney. Over weeks this turned
into a national campaign demanding consent education with more than
45,000 signatures. It’s shocking to learn that Australia’s norm is
riddled with human rights violations and gender-based violence. It hides
under a big banner that screams <Australia is a safe and happy place>
but our attitudes toward gender and sexuality have created power
imbalances, taboos and widespread violence.
I now look back on 2021 and think about the year that Australia said we
want better.
I admire the more than 6,700 people who named the school that their
perpetrator of sexual assault went to. I remember every time a headline
emerged about allegations involving people in the highest ranks of our
country. I’m grateful that Brittany Higgins had the courage to come
forward with her allegation that she was raped inside our very own
Parliament House, which triggered the Jenkins report. I’m thankful Grace
Tame used her platform to advocate for victims of child abuse in every
way feasible. And I reflect in awe about the students across Australia
who protested, shared petitions, walked out, stood up, and spoke out.
All of this has meant that 2021 will be remembered for some big wins.>>
Read more here:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/dec/23/australia-has-been-forced-to-face-the-truth-about-the-gender-based-violence-behind-its-safe-and-happy-facade
Also read the related article: <<'Do they even know they did this to
us?': why I launched the school sexual assault petition.
Australia has been confronted with the harsh reality that we live in a
rape culture>>
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/15/do-they-even-know-they-did-this-to-us-why-i-launched-the-school-sexual-assault-petition
Al Jazeera
By Zeinab Mohammed Salih
Published On 23 Dec 2021
<<‘They won’t break us’: Sudanese protesters decry sexual attacks
Women take to streets to condemn sexual violence, after the UN said it
had documented 13 instances of rape and gang rape during recent
protests.
Khartoum, Sudan – Hundreds of women have taken to the streets in and
around Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, to protest against sexual violence and
harassment, including alleged rape by security forces during a
pro-democracy protest. The United Nations said this week security forces
were alleged to have raped or gang-raped at least 13 women and girls in
Sunday’s mass demonstration outside the presidential palace in Khartoum.
Suliema Ishaq, head of the gender-based violence unit at the Ministry of
Social Development, told Al Jazeera that eight women aged between 18 and
27 had approached her department to get treatment.
<Two of them were treated within the 24 hours and six others came later,
but I believe the number is higher than that,> said Ishaq.
Doctors also said at least two people were killed by security forces
during Sunday’s rally against a military coup in October and a deal last
month to reinstate Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok to office.
The protesters on Thursday delivered a memorandum to the Khartoum office
of the UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights, demanding an
investigation into the cases of sexual and physical violence. More than
40 rights organisations and so-called “resistance committees” –
neighbourhood groups with a horizontal command structure that have been
leading Sudan’s pro-democracy movement – signed the document.
Susanese activist Shaihinza JamalShaihinza Jamal [Zeinab Mohammed Salih/Al
Jazeera]
“We are here to put pressure so that this could stop happening,”
Shaihinza Jamal, a resistance committee member and prominent figure in
the women’s rights movement in Sudan, told Al Jazeera at the protest.
<We will not allow such things ever to happen, and we can stop them.>
The 46-year-old, wearing a blue dress, was at the helm of the
demonstration, chanting different slogans in praise of the women. Other
protesters were repeating, <They won’t break you.>
Similar protests took place in Omdurman, the twin city of Khartoum on
the west bank of the Nile River, as well as in North Khartoum.
Dozens of rapes were also reported in June 2019, when security forces
violently dispersed a pro-democracy sit-in outside the military
headquarters in Khartoum. More than 100 people were also killed,
according to doctors, and survivors recounted the security forces,
mostly made up of members of the Rapid Support Forces, throwing bodies
into the Nile River nearby.>>
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/23/they-wont-break-us-sudanese-protesters-decry-sexual-attacks
Read also the embedded articles/links by Al Jazeera:
-What will it take to end gender-based violence in India?
-A ‘lingering evil’: From residential schools to murdered women
-India to raise legal marriage age for women, activists sceptical
-Shortage of vaccinated nannies adds fuel to US childcare crisis
Al Jazeera
23 Dec 2021
Brandi Morin
<<A 'lingering evil'
From residential schools to murdered women.
Warning: This article recounts scenes of rape that some readers may find
distressing or triggering.
In this six-part series, Al Jazeera tells the stories of some of the
Indigenous women and girls who have gone missing or been murdered along
an infamous stretch of highway in British Columbia, Canada.
British Columbia, Canada - Fifty-seven-year-old Mary Nikal flops down
onto a blue Chesterfield couch. Her scruffy miniature black poodle sits
at her feet.
Mary is exhausted. She has given countless interviews to the press over
the past 30 years, but they still don’t get any easier.
Her hair - dyed a warm caramel brown - is tied back in a low ponytail,
her bangs - with their strands of grey - frame hazel eyes, similar to
those of her little sister, Delphine.
Delphine’s pictures are displayed on a nearby table, illuminated by
candlelight. She was 16 years old when she disappeared in 1990 - one of
three members of the Nikal family to have vanished; all of them under
20, all of them female.
Less than a year before Delphine disappeared, her 15-year-old cousin
Cecilia Nikal went missing from Vancouver. A year before that, in 1988,
another cousin, 19-year-old Roberta Nikal, disappeared near the city of
Surrey in British Columbia.
<She wasn’t a runaway,> says Mary of Delphine as rays from the setting
sun settle upon the houseplants that line the windows of her mobile home
on an acreage near the town of Hazelton.
<I was thinking the worst for years … She was either in the river,
someone beat her and raped her. Someone overpowered her because she was
pretty strong,> she says, forming a fist.
Delphine was the youngest of five siblings. Her Dutch father was 49 when
he met and married her Gitxsan mother, who was just 17 at the time. But
they had a good life, Mary says.
The family lived a few kilometres outside of Smithers, on a farm
surrounded by snowcapped mountains. They kept pigs, chickens, goats,
cows, horses and dogs. Delphine had a deep affection for animals, Mary
says, and an attraction to mischief.
<One time when Delphine was three, we lost her. We were looking all over
and dad found her sitting in the garden eating strawberries. Her mouth
was stained red,> Mary chuckles, adding that Delphine’s nickname was
‘baby’. Delphine was exceptionally close to her father who liked to
spoil her, says Mary. It was their mother, Judy Nikal, who enforced the
rules, handing out chores to the children. Mary attributes her mother’s
sternness to the fact she was a residential school survivor.
The notoriously abusive state- and Church-run schools - to which
Indigenous parents were forced to send their children under threat of
arrest - unleashed the sort of trauma that would be passed on through
the generations. Judy attended Lejac residential school. It operated
from 1922 to 1976 and was run by the Roman Catholic Church with the aim
of forcing Indigenous children to assimilate into settler culture while
forcibly removing them from their own culture, communities and families.
Abuse of all kinds was rampant, but there was one story, in particular,
that came to define Lejac in the minds of many Indigenous people. In
1937, four young boys ran away from the school, but before they could
make it home, they froze to death on a nearby lake.
<Mom went through a lot of pain and suffering she never dealt with,>
says Mary, her eyes distant and filled with tears.>>
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/features/longform/2021/12/23/a-lingering-evil-from-residential-schools-to-murdered-women
And also these embedded stories/articles i.e. links:
Read part 1: The stench of death
Read part 2: Snatched away
Read part 3: Hunted
The Guardian
Rights and freedom is supported by
Humanity United
By Chiara Eisner
21 Dec 2021
<<Rights and freedom
Honduras
The US military trained him. Then he helped murder Berta Cáceres.
When Roberto David Castillo graduated from the US Military Academy at
West Point, the Honduran cadet was confident he’d leave behind a legacy.
<He will be remembered by all as being a fearless leader committed to
God, his family and serving others,> read the caption under his yearbook
portrait. Castillo is certain to be remembered: earlier this year, the
Honduran high court found him guilty as the joint perpetrator in the
2016 assassination of the indigenous activist Berta Cáceres, then one of
Latin America’s most prominent environmental defenders. Cáceres was
killed by a team of hitmen after years of death threats linked to her
opposition of the 22-megawatt Agua Zarca dam, approved by the government
without permission from the local indigenous people. Castillo was the
president of the company building the dam and the court concluded that
he had used his military training to stalk her for years, while secretly
helping coordinate the assassination.
A Guardian investigation reveals how Castillo’s time at the prestigious
military academy helped shape his career – and raises questions about
the training provided by the institution to generations of Central
American soldiers, some of whom later became involved with human rights
abuses.>>
Read more here:
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/dec/21/the-us-military-trained-him-then-he-helped-berta-caceres
The Guardian
Rights and freedom is supported by
Humanity United
Helena Smith in Athens
21 Dec 2021
<<Rights and freedom
Greece
Calls for femicide to become separate crime in Greece mount as two more
women killed.
'It has to be recognised as a term and as a crime’, says government
opposition, after unprecedented number of women murdered by partners
The Greek government has come under growing pressure to introduce
femicide as an offence in the country’s penal code amid outrage over the
growing and unprecedented number of women being brutally murdered by
their partners. Two women were murdered by their husbands within five
days last week, bringing the death toll to 17 since January, according
to state-run television. Both men allegedly told police that they had
killed their wives out of fear that they would leave them. On Saturday
police narrowly prevented an 18th woman being killed by her husband when
officers broke down the door of the couple’s house as he held a knife to
her throat.
With the Mediterranean country shaken by the sheer savagery of the
killings, calls have mounted for tougher legislative action to confront
what are seen by many as hate crimes.
Highlighting the issue, Alexis Tsipras, the country’s former prime
minister and main opposition leader, emphasised that time was running
out. <Disgust and fury is not enough. It’s the time for action.
<We’re already late,> he said, deploring the Greek parliament’s refusal
to discuss the issue. <Recognition of femicides by the state ought to be
only the beginning.>
A dramatic rise in domestic violence – attributed increasingly to the
pandemic and months of confinement – has been accompanied by a string of
brutal murders, putting renewed focus on abuse in Greece.>>
Read more here:
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/dec/21/greece-femicide-crime-two-more-women-killed
Al Jazeera
2021 Dec 2021
<<From: The Stream
Why 2021 was defined by resilient women.
At the Stream, we work hard every year to ensure their achievements are
highlighted. Last year, we renewed our pledge to never again complete a
calendar year without at least 50 percent of our guests being women.
We’re proud to report that 2021 is the fourth year in a row we have
achieved that goal, with women making up 55.17 percent and men 44.8
percent of our more than 500 panelists.
But, when we look around the media industry, it is clear that too little
is changing, too slowly. Men still dominate television news shows,
all-male panels haven’t gone away, and too many in journalism think a
token woman guest is enough. It’s not.
The reason we’re doing this, the reason we do this every year, is
because we believe that journalism can only be truly effective when it
is representative and reflects the societies it covers.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres this year said: “COVID-19 is a
crisis with a woman’s face.” And, indeed, there are few global crises of
the sort we habitually cover at Al Jazeera that don’t disproportionately
impact women.
Globally, the loss of jobs due to Covid-19 cost women at least $800
billion in earnings, a figure larger than the combined GDP of 98
countries, according to Oxfam International. In the United States and
elsewhere, this has taken an especially heavy toll on women of colour.
As we move into the third year of the pandemic, how can economies
recover from the loss of female workers? How can women recover from the
loss of income? We’ll ask these questions in this episode.
Another major story of 2021 in which women were front and centre:
Afghanistan. The Taliban has been under pressure to uphold women’s
rights since they took power in August. Early this month, its leaders
issued a “special decree” outlining women’s rights.
It outlawed child marriage, but did not mention access to jobs or
education. In this show, we’ll look at why some women’s rights leaders
have stayed in Afghanistan to fight for their rights, and talk about why
giving them a seat at the negotiating table is more important than ever.
The biggest story of our time? Climate change. And that is another
crisis with a woman’s face. Women and girls around the world suffer
disproportionately from the impacts of the climate disaster because they
are on average poorer, less educated and more dependent on subsistence
farming.
A UN report in 2017 found that 80 percent of those displaced by the
climate emergency are women. At the Cop26 Climate Conference earlier
this year climate tsar Alok Sharma said: <We know from our efforts to
tackle climate change that it is more effective when we put women and
girls at the heart of those efforts.>
In this episode, we’ll talk about why women are vital to saving the
planet. Join us for this special edition of The Stream.
In this episode of The Stream, we are joined by:
Pashtana Durrani, Director, LEARN Afghanistan
Nisreen Elsaim,
Chair of UN Secretary General’s Youth Advisory Group on Climate Change
Martha Ross,
Senior Fellow, Brookings Metro
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/program/the-stream/2021/12/21/why-2021-was-defined-by-resilient-women
Al Jazeera
21 Dec 2021
<<Two deaths, 13 rape allegations reported after Sudan protests
UN receives 13 allegations of rape by security forces during Sunday’s
rally in Sudan, while medics report second death.
The United Nations Human Rights Office has said that it had received 13
allegations of rape and gang rape by security forces during protests in
Sudan, while opposition medics reported a second person killed.
Sunday’s demonstration drew hundreds of thousands of people to the
capital Khartoum to protest against a military coup on October 25 and a
November 21 agreement signed to reinstate Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok.
Demonstrators converged on the presidential palace, where they attempted
a sit-in before being dispersed after sunset.
The UN Human Rights Office spokeswoman Liz Throssell told a briefing on
Tuesday that the office received 13 allegations of rape and gang rape as
well as reports of sexual harassment against women by security forces as
they attempted to flee. She did not give details of the alleged rapes or
gang rapes.
<We urge a prompt, independent and thorough investigation into the
allegations of rape and sexual harassment as well as the allegations of
death and injury of protesters as a result of the unnecessary or
disproportionate use of force in particular the use of live ammunition,>
said Throssell.
Read more here:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/21/deaths-rape-allegations-sudan-protests
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