Tag: Gender Violence

Latin America Still Has a Long Way to Go to Eliminate Gender Violence — Global Issues

“He who loves does not kill, does not humiliate or mistreat” reads a poster carried in a protest against violence against women in Lima, the capital of Peru, which is part of a slogan repeated in demonstrations against femicides and other forms of sexist violence in Latin America. CREDIT: Mariela Jara / IPS
  • by Mariela Jara (lima)
  • Inter Press Service

LIMA, Nov 24 (IPS) – This article is part of IPS coverage of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, celebrated Saturday, Nov. 25.”The Latin American and Caribbean region has made many advances in the fight against gender violence, but now we are facing reactions that show that our rights are never secure and that we must always be on the alert to defend them,” said Susana Chiarotti, a member of Mesecvi’s Committee of Experts.

The Committee of Experts is the technical body of the Follow-up Mechanism to the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment and Eradication of Violence against Women (Mesecvi), known as the Convention of Belem do Para, which will celebrate its 30th anniversary in force in the countries of the region in 2024. The committee is made up of independent experts appointed by each state party.

Chiarotti summed up the regional situation of progress and setbacks in a conversation with IPS from her home in the Argentine city of Rosario, ahead of the United Nations’ Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, commemorated on Saturday, Nov. 25.

Gender violence violates the human rights of one in four women in this region with an estimated female population of 332 million, 51 percent of the total, and escalates to the extreme level of femicide – gender-based murders – which cost 4050 lives in 2022, according to figures confirmed Friday, Nov. 24 by the Gender Equality Observatory for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Likewise, UN Women‘s regional director for the Americas and the Caribbean, María Noel Vaeza, told IPS from Panama City that the emblematic date seeks to draw the attention of countries to the urgent need to put an end to violence against women once and for all by adopting public policies for prevention and investing in programs to eliminate it.

She pointed out that Nov. 25 is the first of 16 days of activism against gender-based violence, which run through Dec. 10, Human Rights Day.

Vaeza said that less than 40 percent of women who suffer violence seek some kind of help, which clearly shows that they do not find guarantees in the prevention and institutional response system and therefore do not report incidents.

“This has serious consequences for their lives and those of other women, as the perpetrators do not face justice and impunity and violence continue unchecked,” she said.

Uruguayan María Noel Vaeza, UN Women regional director for Latin America and the Caribbean, draws the attention of countries to the urgent need to put an end to violence against women through the adoption of public policies for prevention and investment in programs to eliminate it. CREDIT: UN Women
Uruguayan María Noel Vaeza, UN Women regional director for Latin America and the Caribbean, draws the attention of countries to the urgent need to put an end to violence against women through the adoption of public policies for prevention and investment in programs to eliminate it. CREDIT: UN Women

Vaeza said that, despite these worrying trends, there is more evidence than ever that violence against women is preventable, and urged countries in the region to invest in prevention.

“The evidence shows that the presence of a strong, autonomous feminist movement is a critical factor in driving public policy change for the elimination of violence against women at the global, regional, national and local levels,” said the UN Women regional head.

She explained that many studies have shown that large-scale reductions in violence against women can be achieved through coordinated action between local and national prevention and response systems and women’s and other civil society organizations.

So in order to move towards regulatory frameworks and improve the institutional architecture and budget allocations to prevent, respond to and redress gender-based violence, strengthening the advocacy capacity of feminist and women’s movements and organizations is indispensable.

She also mentioned that whenever progress is made, there are setbacks as well, and “unfortunately history shows us that social changes against things like machismo/sexism and violence require the efforts of society as a whole and plans and policies that give answers to the victims today, but also make it possible to improve the system in the medium and long term.”

Vaeza stressed that violence against women and girls remains the most pervasive human rights violation around the world. Its prevalence worsened in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic and is growing further due to the interrelated crises of climate change, global conflicts and economic instability.

She also mentioned the proliferation of new forms of violence and the persistence of those “who believe that we do not have to guarantee women’s human rights, and organize themselves, and in the region we have situations such as attacks against women human rights defenders and activists that have become more frequent.”

Vaeza, from Uruguay, underlined that there is more evidence than ever that it is possible to change this reality and that in order to have peaceful societies, reducing inequality and poverty is key, and all this will depend on advancing gender equality and the rights of those who have historically faced discrimination.

They are mainly, she said, women living in poverty, indigenous women, women of African descent, rural women, women migrants, and women and girls with disabilities.

Susana Chiarotti is a member of the Committee of Experts of the Follow-up Mechanism to the Belém do Pará Convention, which has been monitoring the performance of States in their obligation to prevent, punish and eradicate violence against women for the past 30 years. CREDIT: Cladem Argentina

Strong reactions to progress

Chiarotti said: “I have been with Mesecvi for 20 years and I can see the changes. Let’s remember that it was only in 1989 that laws on violence against women began to be enacted and that we did not have services, shelters, specialized courts and even less a specific Convention to address this issue, which was the first in the world.”

The lawyer and university professor emphasized that in 40 years the women’s movement has put the issue of violence against women on the public agenda and has made such huge strides that “we could be called the most successful lobby in history in positioning an issue in such a massive and global manner.”

And she added that “we did not believe then, in 1986, 1987 or 1988, that the phenomenon had permeated all structures, not only the intimate sphere; there was symbolic, institutional, political and many other forms of violence, which led us to demand more answers, especially from the State, which, being patriarchal, admitted women only with forceps.”

Chiarotti, who is also a former head of the Latin American and Caribbean Committee for the Defense of Women’s Rights (Cladem), warns that they are now facing reactions to the extent that unimaginable alliances have arisen to stop them, such as that of the Vatican with conservative evangelical churches and far-right groups.

She also mentioned the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court that in June 2022 overthrew the right to abortion in that country, which had been in force for almost 50 years.

“That makes you realize that our rights are never secure, that we must always be on the alert to defend them. And it is difficult for a movement that is cyclical, that has waves, that rises and falls, to be always alert,” she said.

In addition, she mentioned the recent victory of the candidate Javier Milei as future president of Argentina and the dangers he represents for women’s rights, sexual diversity and the historical memory of human rights abuses.

“This will not be the first time that this people, and women especially, will enter a stage of resistance, because we have been resisting misogynistic attacks and fighting for life for centuries, but we have a very hard time ahead of us,” Chiarotti said.

She added that Latin America has fragile democracies that are only a few decades old and in crisis, which impact women’s rights. “Many of our countries came out of dictatorships, the longest has had 50 or 60 years of democracy. We will have to work to defend democratic institutions, to use them to defend our rights,” she said.

Holding up signs demanding “No to violence” and “No to machismo,” women demonstrate against gender violence in front of Peru’s main courthouse in Lima. CREDIT: Mariela Jara / IPS

Prevention: a task eluded by the States

The expert argued that since the work of preventing gender-based violence is more costly and time-consuming than that of punishment and less politically profitable, the efforts of countries are weak in this area despite their importance.

“Limiting the work to punishment and addressing incidents is like seeing a big rock that people stumble over and bang up against, and they are cured and taught to go around it, but without removing it from the path. Without prevention we will always have victims because the discriminatory culture that reproduces violence will not be transformed,” she warned.

But even adding up what countries invest to address and eradicate violence against women in the region, none of them reach one percent of their national budget according to the Third Hemispheric Report published by Mesecvi in 2017, a proportion that has apparently not changed since then.

In September of this year, the United Nations published a study showing that an investment of 360 billion dollars is needed to achieve gender equality and women’s empowerment by 2030, established as one of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This would help to eliminate the scourge of gender-based violence.

© Inter Press Service (2023) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service

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Hurricane Otis and the Indifference Toward the Children of Acapulco — Global Issues

  • Opinion by Rosi Orozco (acapulco, mexico)
  • Inter Press Service

ACAPULCO, Mexico, Nov 02 (IPS) – Acapulco is a paradise. A port of golden sunsets, toasted sand, and deep blue sea. Its dream beaches captivated the hearts of Elvis Presley and Elizabeth Taylor. US President John F. Kennedy chose its shores to spend his honeymoon with Jackie Kennedy. Its luxury hotels and the untamed sea made it the most famous tourist destination in Mexico.

Rosi OrozcoToday, Acapulco is devastated. A Category 5 hurricane—the deadliest possible rating—called “Otis” hit the beach on October 25 with incomparable force. No one anticipated it. Hours before it made landfall, it was just an inconvenient storm. Suddenly it became a deadly cyclone. Most of the hotels are destroyed, the sea swallowed people, houses were blown away, and dozens of people are dead.

In the last century, its beauty attracted the world’s most influential celebrities. Its tranquil mornings and lively nightlife attracted actresses, singers, politicians, aristocratic musicians, and families who wanted to spend their summers by the sea. I myself spent my youth at the family timeshare apartment in Acapulco, and it was there that I met my husband Alejandro, with whom I’ve been married for 40 years. My life is permanently connected to Acapulco.

Luxury businessmen, millionaire athletes, and Michelin-starred chefs arrived. Also drug dealers, money launderers, and men looking for girls and boys to rape in exchange for food or a few dollars for their parents who lived in the city’s poor areas.

Because there are two Acapulcos. They both share an airport and roads, so all roads lead to that pair of versions of the same city. There is a “diamond Acapulco” where the rich vacation with all the amenities at their disposal. And there is a “traditional Acapulco,” where the poor live who work for wealthy tourists.

The people who inhabit “diamond Acapulco” and “traditional Acapulco” do not usually cross paths. They live in the same city, but they are separated by golf courses and exclusive shopping malls. Only rich foreigners and wealthy nationals cross to the poor side when they feel a repugnant urge: to make their plans for child sex tourism a reality with girls and boys as young as 3 years old.

Acapulco is one of the most unequal tourist destinations in the world. In Mexico, it is the most unequal municipality of all: more than 60% of its 900,000 inhabitants live in extreme poverty, which means they do not know what they will eat today or tomorrow. They are the workers who serve plates of fresh seafood, who sweep marble floors, who fill the wine glasses of tourists.

For years, journalists and human rights organizations have told horrific stories that combine poverty, inequality, and sex tourism: a 6-year-old boy rented out to be photographed naked in exchange for milk and eggs; a 9-year-old girl sold to a Canadian tourist to be his wife for a month; homeless teenagers invited to sex parties on lavish yachts in exchange for food; parents and mothers waiting outside hotels for their children to be raped for a price paid in dollars per hour.

Those pedophiles and child molesters turned Acapulco into the country’s primary destination for child sexual tourism. They also led Mexico to the disgraceful second position in the production of child pornography, only surpassed by Thailand, according to data from the Mexican Chamber of Deputies and the United Nations Children’s Fund.

Today, Acapulco is a different place. Little remains of the port that enchanted singers Agustín Lara and Luis Miguel. There are thousands of poor families without homes, hundreds of workers who lost their jobs, and dozens of fishermen without boats to go out to sea to find sustenance. The destruction is so extensive that complete economic recovery is estimated to take decades, not years.

Under these conditions, childhood is at very high risk. Many families have lost so much that their bodies are the only currency they have left. And in the dirty business of forced prostitution, child bodies are the most sought after.

Amid this unprecedented crisis in Mexico, the Chamber of Deputies approved amendments to the general law against human trafficking. These changes aim to broaden the scope of the law enacted in 2012 and update it to address new technologies that traffickers and organized crime engaged in sexual exploitation can use. The wording has some issues that we are still analyzing, but it also includes positive aspects.

For example, it introduces new protections for individuals with injuries, intellectual disabilities, and Afro-Mexican towns and communities. The latter represent 6.5% of the total population in Guerrero and 4% of the residents in Acapulco, according to the National Population Council.

Civil society organizations are monitoring these changes and hope that the deputies will honor their commitment to protecting the victims.

Meanwhile, it is the responsibility of all, not just in Mexico, to help Acapulco back on its feet, a place that has given so much to both nationals and foreigners. It won’t be easy or quick, but every day we delay puts the vulnerable children at risk due to the magnitude of sexual tourism in that beautiful port.

After Hurricane Otis, Acapulco will be different. Its reconstruction is an opportunity to build a new city on the ruins of depravity, one with values and respect for human dignity. I long for the day to see it standing and for its coastline, beach, and air to remain a paradise, especially for children like me who grew up happily by the sea.

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Women and War — Global Issues

  • Opinion by Jan Lundius (stockholm, sweden)
  • Inter Press Service

STOCKHOLM, Sweden, Oct 31 (IPS) – In 1968, the tobacco company Philip Morris introduced a new cigarette brand called Virginia Slims. Under the slogan “You’ve come a long way, baby” it was exclusively marketed to women. The advertising campaign exploited the civil rights movements of the 1960s, indicating that those cigarettes were enjoyed by strong, independent, and liberated women. A blatant lie – why would “independent” women choose to poison themselves with a commodity which each year causes more than 480,000 deaths in the US alone – nearly one in five deaths? Another question arising from this deceitful ad is: “How far have women come on their way to independence and liberation?”

What is the global status of women today? Progress has been made, but this cannot fool us to believe that there is no difference to the plight of men and women. War is raging in Ukraine and Palestine, with all that this encompasses of human suffering and fake news. Israel and Hamas, Russia and Ukraine, are accusing each other of atrocities and for sure – abominable acts are committed by every warring faction. This is what happens in war – people are traumatized, mutilated, tortured, and killed. Nevertheless, the image of war we obtain from our daily news does in a way remind of tobacco ads. The crowning absurdity of war and cigarettes is ignored – they actually cause death and immense suffering. Crimes against humanity are presented as depending on which side perpetrators and victims find themselves, as well as their respective supporters, who generally are not suffering from the horrors of violence and displacement.

War is not healthy and it is far from normal. It makes people abnormal, and its fatal effects linger. Furthermore, war is affecting men and women in different ways. It is driving up domestic violence, as stress levels raise when traumatized men return to their families after long spells on the front lines, finding their domestic situation changed.

War veterans returning from Germany after World War I committed more crimes against women than ever before. The same happened after World War II in the US and the Soviet Union, a country where as late as 1959 there were still 20 million more women than men due to male casualties from war and repression. This is just one indication that war is extremely gendered. Police reports of domestic violence spiked in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Many women and children fled the war and some of those who stayed behind bore the brunt of male frustration. Battered women confess: “With all due respect to our military, we may indeed find ourselves in a situation where a veteran returning from war will be respected and sympathized with to such an extent that such a minor offense as domestic violence may well be forgiven on all levels.” This occurs in Russia as well, and all over the world in countries suffering from armed conflicts. All levels of human interaction are affected by an unavoidable process of “militarization”, meaning that belligerent values become dominant, lingering long after armed aggression has ceased.

In modern warfare civilian casualties by far outnumber those of armed combatants. Defenceless civilians suffer human rights violations, while women are subjected to specific gender related abuses. Women and girls targeted by sexual violence often face insurmountable obstacles if they try to seek justice. Many suffer from social stigma, worsened by the fact that women and girls tend to have a disadvantaged social position . This despite the fact that women constitute the backbone of most communities. Their ideas, energy and involvement are crucial for maintaining resilience during conflicts, as well as they are important during the rebuilding of society in the aftermath of war. To ensure lasting peace, it is thus essential that women’s specific exposure to violence is recognized and that they are allowed to play an essential part at all stages of a peace process.

Combatting soldiers often find themselves surrounded by civilians who they consider to be their enemies, or even worse – inferior beings. It is quite common that soldiers are by their commanders’ eagerness to increase their fierceness are given licence to ignore normal boundaries of civil behaviour. Women might be perceived as upholding and embodying “enemy culture, and support”. Destroying the enemies’ domestic security and sense of cultural/ethnic belonging might become a military goal and violence against women thus becomes legitimized.

Attacks on women may sometimes focus on their role as mothers. During the Nazi regime’s ruthless extermination of Jews, Roma and Sinti, as well as several other ethnic groups, the elite troopers of SS considered their victims to be vermin “unworthy of life”. The leader of these ruthless exterminators, Heinrich Himmler, reminded them that not only grown-ups, but their children as well had to be killed: “Otherwise they will grow up and revenge themselves on their parents’ murderers”. Similar arguments have been used by other perpetrators of massacres on ethnic minority groups; killing children, destroying foetuses and mutilating women’s sexual organs to “eliminate guerrilla spawn”.

Young women and girls have been abducted and forced to become sex slaves, while children and youngsters have been forced to become “warriors”. Children are easier to influence and threaten than older people, who furthermore might be needed to supply troops and guerrillas through their agricultural work and other activities. China Keitetsi, a former child soldier from Uganda now living in Denmark, wrote in her book Child Soldier: “When I was nine years old, I came into the National Resistance Army. When I got there, there was not only me. There were many children. Some were only five years old. I thought at first it was exciting, it was like a game, they were marching left, right, and I wanted to be a part of it. The moment I became a part of it, that meant that all my rights were over, I had to think, to feel, according to my instructor.”

In more than 150 countries there are currently child soldiers within government and opposition armed forces and an estimated 30 percent are girls. China Keitetsi remembers :“We were bodyguards to our bosses, we cooked, and we looked after them, instead of them looking after us. We collected firewood, we carried weapons and for girls it was worse because we were girlfriends to many different officers. Today, I can’t think how many officers slept with me, and at the end it became like I don’t own my body, it’s their body. It was so hard to stay the 24 hours a day thinking which officer am I going to sleep with today.”

The widespread use of rape is common in any armed conflict. Rape is employed to intimidate, conquer and control women and all members of their communities. It is used as a form of torture to extract information, to punish and intimidate. Wartime rape is committed by a wide range of men. Even those mandated to protect civilians tend to sexually abuse women and girls under their care. Women may be targeted for rape not just because they are women, but also because of their social status, ethnic origin, religion or sexuality. In Rwanda, it is estimated that between a quarter and half a million rapes were committed during the 100 days of genocide between 7 April and 15 July 1994.

Rape is often accompanied by extreme brutality. Women and girls often die during the attack, or later of their wounds. This is particularly true of young girls. Other medical consequences include transmission of HIV and serious complications in reproductive health. Fear, nightmares and psychosomatic body pain are just some of the problems experienced by survivors. Sometimes women are raped in front of others, often family members, to deepen their sense of shame. Some rape survivors state they would rather die than let what has happened become public.

Widowhood and/or separation increase during armed conflicts and it is often women who have to flee and bring their children with them, since men and boys are targeted to be killed or forcefully recruited by warring factions. Homes are destroyed and entire families uprooted. The loss of the family home brings about specific problems for women, including rise in domestic violence, enormous practical and financial difficulties and a harmful dependency on strangers. Women and girls in flight may be forced to offer sex in return for safe passage, food, shelter and/or documentation. Government officials (such as immigration officials or border guards), smugglers, pirates, members of armed groups and male refugees have all been known to abuse refugee women in transit. Desperate women may be forced into illegal activities, putting them at risk for repercussions from authorities.

If homes have been destroyed and families evicted, women are particularly hard hit because of their responsibility for providing shelter and food for their families. Even in assumed “safe havens”, like refugee camps, women and girls are at risk of sexual exploitation by those who control access to food and supplies, and if they venture out of the camps to find water, food and fire wood, perpetrators may be lurking, ready to attack them.

A slogan like “You’ve come a long way, baby” is, to say the least, offensive to millions of women suffering hardship from war and displacement. The list of historical and current abuse and suffering of women in war is immense and constantly updated. Some examples:

During World War II women were by the Imperial Japanese Army forced into sexual slavery. Estimates vary with numbers ranging from as low as 20,000, to as high as 360,000 to 410,000 ( according to Chinese sources). In Europe, large numbers of women were during World War I “recruited” to “field brothels” by both warring factions and the practice was continued in the eastern territories occupied by the German army and its auxiliary forces. Even the horrific concentration camps were equipped with brothels.

During World War II, the eastern front was a veritable hell. German officers and soldiers were violating women and girls, while military commanders did not attempt to put an end to such atrocities. The Russian vengeance was horrible. The exact number of German women and girls raped by Soviet troops during war and occupation is uncertain, but historians estimate their numbers are likely in the hundreds of thousands, and possibly as many as two million. During the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War, Pakistani military and so called Razakar paramilitary raped between 200,000 and 400,000 Bengali women and girls. There are no exact figures on how many women and children who were systematically raped by Serb forces in various concentration camps, estimates range from 20,000 to 50,000. In Eastern Congo, the prevalence and intensity of rape and other sexual violence is described as the worst in the world. A 2010 study found that 20 percent of men and 30 percent of women reported conflict-related sexual violence and the brutal bloodshed has not yet abated.

We may all agree that war is horrible and women and girls are suffering from its effects. However, we also have to admit that violence against women take such horrific proportions due to the fact that in most countries women are even in peacetime victims of misogyny, religious/traditional contempt and subjugation, unequal rights and a wide range of other types of discrimination. In war, injustices and mistreatment are multiplied many times over. One means to avoid the horrors of war would be to guarantee equal rights to women and men, ensuring that laws are enacted for that purpose, followed to the letter and that those who violate them are duly punished. Only then can women be said to have come a long way.

Main Sources: Keitetsi, China (2005) Child Soldier: Fighting for My Life. Johannesburg: Jacana Media. Lamb, Christina (2020) Our Bodies, Their Battlefield: What War Does to Women. Glasgow: William Collins. Wiiliams, Jessie (2023) “’This War Made Him a Monster.’ Ukrainian Women Fear the Return of Their Partners”, Time, March 13.

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Undocumented Afghan Women Fear Eviction from Pakistan — Global Issues

Afghans living illegally in Pakistan have asked the authorities to reconsider their threat to evict them by November 1 because of the Taliban’s attitude toward working women and education for girls. Credit: Ashfaq Yusufzai/IPS
  • by Ashfaq Yusufzai (peshawar)
  • Inter Press Service

PESHAWAR, Oct 12 (IPS) – Amid a looming threat of forceful eviction, Afghan women who arrived in Pakistan after the Taliban’s takeover in Kabul have asked the host country to allow them to stay because they want to continue their education.

On October 4, Pakistan asked more than 1 million undocumented Afghans to leave by November 1 or face deportation or prison. The announcement has caused concern among the thousands of women and girls who arrived after the Taliban took power in Afghanistan in August 2021.

Floods, Now Torrential Monsoon Rains Leave Pakistani Women in Crisis

“We want the Pakistani authorities to show mercy towards women so that they could continue work here because sending them would expose them to brutalities back home,” Mushtari Bibi, 35, who arrived in Peshawar from Nangrahar province in January this year, told IPS.

Bibi is among thousands of women who left her native country after the Taliban banned working women in December 2022.

“I am not only concerned about my life, but my two daughters are studying here in a school because the Taliban has also banned female education,” she said. Bibi said she has also applied for asylum or settlement in a third country, but the process done by the UN agency in partnership with the NGO Society for Human Rights and Prisoners’ Aid (SHARP) is terribly slow.

Bibi stitches clothes and lives with her relatives.

A college student, Noor Mashal, told IPS she would never return to Afghanistan. Mashal, 17, a grade 12 student, left Kabul for Peshawar along with her parents when the Taliban banned women’s education last year.

“The entire world knows the Taliban’s human rights record, especially towards women. In Pakistan, women are doing odd jobs, and girls are studying in schools located in slum areas, which is far better than Afghanistan,” she said.

Pakistan has 2.18 million registered Afghan refugees. Of them, 1.3 million have Proof of Registration (PoR) cards, and 880,000 have Afghan Citizens Cards (ACCs). After the fall of Ashraf Ghani’s government in 2021, an estimated 800,000 came to Pakistan. More than 1 million don’t have valid documents.

Others who fled after the Taliban’s rule are former servicemen, human rights activists, singers, and musicians. Some arrived on valid visas, but mostly crossed into Pakistan without any travel documents.

Qaiser Khan Afridi, spokesperson for UNHCR, told IPS that Pakistan has remained a generous refugee host for decades. “UNHCR acknowledges and appreciates this hospitality and generosity. This role has been acknowledged globally, but more needs to be done to match its generosity by the international community,” Afridi said.

According to the UN refugee agency, any refugee return must be voluntary without any pressure to ensure protection for those seeking safety.

“UNHCR stands ready to support Pakistan in developing a mechanism to manage and register people in need of international protection on its territory and respond to particular vulnerabilities,” Afridi said.

An Afghan student who wished to be identified as Spogmay said Pakistan’s announcement regarding the eviction of refugees has also caused alarm among her classmates.

“My father sold his properties in Herat province at a throwaway price when the Taliban started their anti-women activities. We arrived in Nowshera district near Peshawar and lived with relatives who already lived there,” the 20-year-old student said.

Spogmay was studying computer science at Herat University in Afghanistan. She is now studying in a private academy.

My father has been selling vegetables to survive. “Going back to Afghanistan means sending us to the Stone Age because women have no education and work. What will we do except sit idle at home? We appreciate the hospitality of the host communities and expect the same from the government,” she said.

On October 3, caretaker interior minister Sarfaraz Ahmed Bugti said that since January this year, 24 terrorist attacks have occurred, and Afghan nationals were involved in 14 of these attacks.

More than half of the refugees live in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), one of Pakistan’s four provinces, close to Afghanistan. Afghan Taliban chief spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, said he doubted that the refugees were the cause of Pakistan’s security problems and described Pakistan’s “behaviour” towards Afghan refugees as “unacceptable” and urged Islamabad to reconsider its plan, saying if they were staying there voluntarily, Pakistan should “tolerate them.”

Civil society organisations and analysts want the government to review its decision as the country’s crackdown against illegal refugees is in progress.

Rahim Khan, a Peshawar-based political science teacher, told IPS that the government should deal with the terrorists with an iron hand but spare the women because the situation back home wasn’t worth living.

“It is common knowledge that most women have left Afghanistan because of the Taliban’s hostilities. Repatriating them forcefully or throwing them in jails is an utter violation of human rights,” Khan said.

Human Rights Commission of Pakistan said that refugees’ right to shelter, healthcare and legal counsel must be protected and slammed reports that Afghan refugee settlements were being razed and their occupants summarily evicted.

Maulana Fazlur Rehman, leader of Jamiat Ulemai Islam, a religious-political party, opposed the ongoing drive to repatriate Afghans.

He said even those with the requisite paperwork were being hauled away in an indiscriminate crackdown. “We cannot afford to strain ties with neighbours and a joint Pakistan-Afghanistan commission be formed to resolve the issue,” he said.

In a joint appeal posted on X (formerly Twitter), the UNHCR-IOM asked Pakistan to continue its protection of all vulnerable Afghans who have sought safety in the country and could be at imminent protection risk if forced to return.

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To End Child Marriage in Southern & East Africa, Governments Need to Strengthen Laws & Implementation — Global Issues

Nafissa, 17 from Niger, was married at 16. Three months after marrying she became pregnant. She gave birth to a still born baby. Credit: UNICEF/Marieke van der Velden
  • Opinion by Divya Srinivasan (geneva, switzerland)
  • Inter Press Service

The UN commemorates International Day of the Girl Child on October 11 — an annual and internationally recognized observance that empowers girls and amplifies their voices.

New research reveals that while some SADC countries have taken commendable action to strengthen legal protections in this area, other Member States have made little or no progress.

These findings feature in new policy briefs produced by Equality Now in partnership with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the Southern African Development Community Parliamentary Forum (SADC PF). Ending Child Marriage In Southern Africa: Gaps And Opportunities In The Legislative Frameworks and Domesticating The SADC Model Law On Child Marriage analyzes laws across the 16 SADC countries and identifies positive legal advances, best practices, and challenges.

A third brief, Ending Child Marriage in Eastern and Southern Africa: Challenges in Implementing Domestic Laws and the SADC Model Law on Child Marriage, examines the implementation of domestic and regional laws on child marriage, focusing on Malawi, Uganda, and Zambia as case studies.

While the SADC Model Law is having a positive impact, its success depends on effective implementation and enforcement by states. To assist governments, the briefs also provide recommendations on strengthening elimination efforts through good application of child marriage laws and policies.

SADC Model Law

Child marriage severely harms girls and exposes them to various human rights violations. It impedes their right to education, as marriage often entails being forced to drop out of school to assume adult responsibilities. This lack of education perpetuates a cycle of poverty, limiting girls’ opportunities for personal development and financial independence.

Early marriages increase the likelihood of early pregnancies, posing significant health risks to girls whose bodies aren’t mature. This can result in complications during pregnancy and childbirth and is associated with higher maternal and infant mortality.

Moreover, child brides are often subjected to domestic violence and marital abuse as they lack the power to assert their rights, and alternative safe spaces are rarely available.

The SADC Model Law defines a child as any person below the age of 18 and recognizes that child marriage violates children’s rights, including the right to education, health, and protection from harm. It calls for prohibiting child marriage, creating prevention and response mechanisms, and promoting birth registration. Other components include supporting child brides and their families and ensuring access to education and healthcare.

The Model Law sets 18 as the minimum age for marriage for both boys and girls without exception and is applicable to all types of marriages – whether under statutory, religious or customary law — with marriages involving a child declared null and void.

To address the complex root causes contributing to child marriage, the Law promotes a comprehensive, multi-sectoral approach based on coordination and collaboration between legal, education, healthcare, and social services sectors.

Inconsistencies and weak implementation of laws

It is important to recognize that some progress in reducing child marriage has been achieved in Eastern and Southern Africa. However, progress is too slow as the prevalence rate has only reduced from 39% to 32% over the past 25 years, while other regions have made much faster progress.

At the current trajectory, it is estimated that child marriage in the region won’t end until 2240.

Concerningly, most progress in Sub-Saharan Africa has occurred amongst the wealthiest families, while in poorer communities, there has been a rise in child marriage. This perpetuates an unacceptable and deeply entrenched divide along socio-economic lines and demonstrates how governments need to focus more on prioritizing elimination of child marriage.

Problems include a lack of adequate resourcing to programs addressing child marriage and a general lack of effective implementation of laws and policies, which feeds into low prioritization of decision-making and lack of action on child marriage.

Out of the 16 countries in Southern Africa, only six countries – DRC, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Seychelles, and Zimbabwe – set 18 as the minimum age of marriage for both boys and girls, with no exceptions.

Five countries – Angola, Botswana, Comoros, Madagascar, and Namibia – set the minimum age as 18, but allow exceptions for customary and religious marriages and for marriage with consent from judicial or other government officials.

Statutory law in the remaining five countries – Eswatini, Lesotho, South Africa, Tanzania and Zambia – provides for a minimum age ranging between 15 and 18. These are different for boys and girls, with the boys invariably having a higher age limit.

In addition, all five countries allow for judicial or parental consent to lower the age of marriage even further, and in Eswatini and Lesotho, there are exceptions for customary law that permit marriage from the age of puberty.

These domestic laws violate the international and regional human rights standards that SADC countries have signed on to. Deeply entrenched cultural practices, poverty, and limited access to education and sexual and reproductive healthcare are slowing progress and hindering reform efforts.

Such is the case in Tanzania. In 2016, the Tanzanian High Court gave a landmark ruling that struck down sections of the Marriages Act of 1971, which set the marriage age at 18 for boys and 15 for girls, with additional exceptions allowing marriage at 14 with court approval.

Despite the ruling being upheld by the Court of Appeal in 2019, Tanzania’s government has thus far failed to amend the law accordingly.

However, there is encouraging progress elsewhere.

In Zimbabwe, the Constitutional Court ruled in 2016 that child marriage is inconsistent with the Constitution. A new Marriage Act enacted in 2022 prohibits marriage for those under 18 in all cases, including for customary marriages, and allows up to five years imprisonment for offenders.

In addition, the country’s National Action Plan and Communication Strategy to End Child Marriage requires registration of all marriages.

In February 2023, the Constitutional Court of Uganda issued a ground-breaking decision in the case, Kirya Martins & Aboneka Michael v. Attorney General, striking down provisions of customary and religious law, including in Hindu and Muslim family laws, that conflicted with the minimum age of marriage set out in the Constitution.

Prioritizing legal reforms to end child marriage

Contradictory provisions in different laws on child marriage create confusion in the application of the law and the inconsistencies make jurisprudence difficult to interpret and implement. All SADC countries must prioritize legal reform and enact robust legislative and policy frameworks that comply with international and regional human rights obligations. This means setting the minimum age of marriage at 18, without any exceptions.

While legal reform is crucial, governments must close the divide between legal approaches and those aimed at influencing social and community norms. Prosecution and punishment of perpetrators should be accompanied by a multi-sectoral approach with an ample budgetary allocation.

Community awareness-raising is key and requires comprehensive sexuality education and behavior change campaigns that foster understanding about the negative impact of child marriage on girls and the wider society.

So too is the empowerment of girls through education and other opportunities that increase their agency and decrease their vulnerability to human rights violations.

Child marriage prevention must also be fully integrated into climate change mitigation and disaster response strategies. Africa is bearing the brunt of global warming, with extreme weather events, prolonged droughts, and food shortages intensifying economic hardships, conflicts, and forced migration.

Girls are especially vulnerable, as families may view marrying daughters as a strategy to cope with financial difficulties and as a way of protecting them from the heightened risks of sexual violence and exploitation found in unstable environments.

Having the right laws in place is the foundation upon which access to protection and justice is built. But only through a multifaceted approach championed by governments can we create a future where every child and young woman in East and Southern Africa can reach their full potential, free from the shackles of child marriage and early motherhood.

Divya Srinivasan is Global Lead for End Harmful Practices at Equality Now.

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Afghan Women Speak Out About Life and Resistance Two Years After the Taliban Takeover — Global Issues

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell
  • by IPS Correspondent (united nations)
  • Inter Press Service

UNITED NATIONS, Oct 06 (IPS) – The Taliban takeover of Afghanistan on 15 August 2021 has devastated millions of Afghanis. But women and girls have been particularly affected by progressively restrictive decrees that have created a virtual system of gender apartheid.

The stories of more than 50 women living in Afghanistan are featured on the new After August website – a collaboration between UN Women Afghanistan, Zan Times, Limbo, and independent storytellers. These unvarnished stories capture the fear, hardship, and sense of loss that shapes their lives, but also their strength, resistance, and resilience.

A few excerpts:

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“I sold my daughter out of poverty and desperation. I sold her so that the rest of the family wouldn’t starve to death… If I do not receive any aid, I will have to sell another daughter. I have a one-year-old daughter. I will take her to the city and auction her off in front of the Central Mosque. The older girls are sold off for 100,000 Afghani. I will sell my baby daughter for 50,000.” —Belquis, a mother from Ghor

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“Every day, I hugged my two children. I was afraid that the Taliban would take them from me. But consciously, responsibly, and honestly, I went to the streets every day to fight even harder than the day before … The Taliban surrounded us many times and tried to stop us with electric shocks and pepper spray, but we picked up their rifles with our bare hands and continued marching.” —Adela, a teacher and protester from Kabul

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“In the past, I used to share my feelings on social media with my friends, but today the atmosphere of fear and mistrust has deepened so much that I cannot share my pain with my friends. I have never felt so alone. Many times, I have decided to end my life, but I think about the fate of my son.” —Hira, a former public servant from Kunar

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“It is natural that fighting in the current situation also brings risks, but my life is sweeter as a woman who takes risks and has made sacrifices, even if this leads to my isolation and loss of neutrality. Changing society can only happen with our own awareness and efforts. I want a free life, the right to choose clothing, the right to choose a profession, the right to choose a field of study, the right to work.” —Amina, an engineer and activist from Langman

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“Afghanistan has become the graveyard of buried hopes. This past year was one of the most challenging years of all for people living here, particularly for women and girls. They have turned thousands of young people’s hopes and dreams into ashes, especially women and girls, and I am one of them.” —Ghotai, a computer science student from Baghlan

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“When we were children, children would hit animals and dogs with stones and harass them. Now this is the situation for women in my country. Being insulted and humiliated is the biggest change that we women see in our lives.” —Amina, a psychotherapist from Zabul

Credit: UN Women/Sayed Habib Bidell

“I am standing up for my sisters who have no support and whose men cannot raise their voices because they fear the Taliban. I want to raise the voices of these innocent women to the international community so that it no will longer just monitor and react, but instead act. Act for the benefit of the brave women of my country, because we do not get anything from reaction!” —Fatana, a protester from Nuristan

Echoing the words of Fatana, this collection aims to raise awareness and incite an international audience to reflect and, hopefully, to act.

Note: These first-person accounts have been anonymized, with names and locations changed to protect their identity. The photographs of women have also been randomly matched to stories.

**The views expressed in these stories belong to the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of UN Women and/or any affiliated agencies.
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Where is India Heading? — Global Issues

  • Opinion by Jan Lundius (stockholm, sweden)
  • Inter Press Service

STOCKHOLM, Sweden, Oct 06 (IPS) – Some time ago I watched the Indian blockbuster RRR (Rise, Roar, Revolt). It received universal praise for direction, screenwriting, cast performances, soundtrack (which won an Oscar) and thrilling action sequences. RRR is filled with gore; bodies beaten, pierced and torn apart. An overblown combination of Quentin Tarantino and Bollywood, far away from Satyajit Ray’s emotionally moving films, as well as Bollywood’s romantic comedies and mythological dramas. RRR never pauses for breath. The two male protagonists are supermen, not exposing many recognizable human traits, even if they might occasionally sing and talk about love. Hard to understand, since the few women of the story are cut-out clichés.

This to date most expensive Indian movie is actually a jingoistic show of patriotic pomp. A quasi-historical tale hiding the fact that the Republic of India (Bh?rat Ganar?jya) is a multi-faceted conglomerate, including concepts like Bhakti, love and devotion and Ahimsa, non-violence applied towards all living beings. Instead it appears to be a tribute to “Modi-land”, a politically constructed ideal chimera, based on the concept of Hindutva (Hinduness),where Hindu identity is considered as the essence of Bharat (India).

India was on 20th April declared as being the world’s most populous nation with 1,428 million inhabitants, of which more than 80 percent define themselves as Hindus, making religion a useful tool for political campaigning. However, the Hindu faith has countless variants and the nation is a subcontinent with 20 official languages and a plethora of customs and cultures.

The RRR movie fits well into the current Prime Minster Narandra Modi and his Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, BJP’s embrace of its interpretation of Hindu Pride, Hindutva, was strengthened and supported by a growing economy. Nevertheless, there are cracks in the political fresco depicting a harmonious India, not the least widespread anti-Muslim prejudice. From fear of Muslims and neighbouring Pakistan many people take their refuge in BJP. Almost 15 percent of the Indian population are Muslims, meaning that The Republic of India has the third largest Muslim population in the world.

Playing the religious card and claiming an unprecedented economic growth Narandra Modi is now probably the most popular leader in the world. In the 2014 general elections BJP became the first Indian political party since 1984 to win a majority and becoming able to govern without the support of other parties. The G20 summit coincided with Modi’s aims to raise New Delhi’s global clout following nearly a decade-long tenure in power in which he has positioned himself as a leader intent on shedding the country’s colonial past – emphasizing the need to “liberate ourselves from the slavery mind-set.”

A view apparent in RRR, which is rooted in a vision of a genocidal racism of British colonialists. The British Governor of the Princely State of Hyderabad (today’s Telangana) might be equalled to any murderous Nazi-SS officer and is together with his sadistic wife flaunting dehumanizing prejudices against indigenous people. Muslims act as treacherous collaborators with the British and their subjugated Deccan Mughal Prince is an enthusiastic supporter of the Britsh Raj. To liberate a girl kidnapped by the villainous Governor-wife, the Hindu hero Raju disguises himself as a loyal Muslim officer serving the British Raj and as such he does not hesitate to kill and torture fellow Hindus, while planning a Hindu revolt and liberating the confined girl.

All this fits well into BJP’s efforts to depict the Indian subcontinent’s 4 500 year long history as being developed within a Hindutva frame. This in spite of the historical presence of thousands of kingdoms, diverse peoples, different religions, being the birth place of at least three world religions, and with the powerful presence of Christianity, Parsism, and not the least Islam – blending into the creation of a unique and rich Indian culture.

A common trait among leading BJP politicians seems to be that their chauvinistic Hindutva vision has convinced them that everything that do not conform with their simplistic view of “Bh?rat culture” might be considered as intrusion/pollution of Hindu past and present. The splendours of the Mughal culture is exorcised from school books and Muslim rulers like Akbar are referenced as cruel invaders. The names of Muslim sounding towns are changed; Allahbad has become Praygray, Aurangabad is Chhatrapatri Sambhaji Nagar, and Osmanabad has become Dharashiv, while the official name of the Indian Republic now has been established as Bh?rat Ganar?jya.

Anything awkward in the history of this utopian Hindu Bh?rat is swept under the carpet, or whitewashed, like the legacy of untouchability and exclusion, misogyny and intolerance. There is also an apparent discomfort with BJP’s rather tarnished history. For example, Nathuram Godse who murdered Mahatma Gandhi in 1948 was an esteemed member of the Hindu supremacist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) organisation, which still is the ideological fountainhead of the BJP. He killed Gandhi because the Mahatma’s insistence on a secular India, integrating members of all religions and castes (the entire caste system was declared to be illegal).

In spite of Modi’s popularity it is generally agreed that BJP is considered as a North Indian, Hindi-speaking and upper-caste party, even if BJP has declared that “the caste system is responsible for the lack of adherence to Hindu values and the only remedy is to reach out to the lower castes.” The major themes on the party’s agenda has been banning cow slaughter and abolishing the special status given to the Muslim majority state of Kashmir, as well as legislating a Uniform Civil Code in conformity with “Hindu values”. Most of the people living in Kashmir do not vote for BJP and neither do those of the Sikh dominated Punjab, while non-Hindi speaking people in Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, and Kerala are reluctant to share BJP’s ideology and prone to consider the party as adhering to Ethnic democracy, meaning that it is supported by a prejudiced majority.

The RSS organisation was in 1925, founded on the claim that India was a Hindu nation and Hindus were thus entitled to reign over the Nation’s minorities. The RSS’s original base was higher-caste men, but in order to grow it had to widen its membership and lower-caste recruits were accepted, among them a young Narendra Modi, who soon became a pracharak—the group’s term for its young, chaste foot soldiers. He rose quickly in the ranks. RSS is by BJP often described as the party’s “scout branch”, but it is more than that – it is a uniformed paramilitary organisation in which young men obtain physical fitness through yoga, weapon- and martial arts exercises, taught Hindutva ideology, as well as partaking in activities encouraging civic awareness, social service, community living, and patriotism. Pracharaks are full-time functionaries, renouncing professional – and family lives while dedicating their lives to the cause of the RSS.

Modi rose in the RSS ranks and in 1987 he entered its political branch – BJP. When Modi joined the party it had only two seats in Parliament. It needed an issue to attract sympathizers and found one in an obscure religious dispute. In the city Ayodhya it was among local Hindus rumoured that a mosque had been built above an ancient temple dedicated to the god Ram, a Vishnu avatar. In 1990 a senior member of BJP called for the demolition of the mosque. Two years after, a crowd led by RSS partisans completely razed the mosque.

This happened when economic liberalization under the BJP’s regime was resulting in increased economic growth, urbanization, and consumerism. A new, affluent middle class developed, becoming the core electorate of the BJP. In a rapidly changing world persons were searching for an identity, several found one in Hindu nationalism, turning to gurus, and sectarian movements, participating in yoga classes and watching saffron-clad ideologists on TV. The Ayodhya incident and the following bloody clashes between militant RSS members and Muslims, triggered by press campaigns, and Pakistan supported terrorist attacks, enabled the BJP to capitalize on a growing Hindu nationalism. BJP membership soared, and already by 1996, it had become the largest party in Parliament.

Like his good friend Donald Trump, Narandra Modi has by his enemies been provided with several characteristics they consider to be dangerous. He is reluctant to give press conferences and in-depth personal interviews, but based on those and some knowledgeable acquaintances he has been described as a person having all traits of an authoritarian, narcissistic personality, and in addition he practices a puritanical rigidity, having a constricted emotional life, and an enormous ego, which apparently covers up an inner insecurity. Like Trump, Modi is also prone to reveal harmful conspiracy theories, like India being targeted by a global conspiracy, in which every local Muslim is likely to be complicit.

When Modi served as chief minister in the Gujarat state a train with pilgrims and RSS militants was returning from Ayodha. When it stopped at the station of Godhara quarrels erupted between the pilgrims and Muslim food vendors, resulting in a fire that burned 58 Hindus to death. Independent investigators deemed the tragedy to be a tragic accident, though RSS consider it to be a Muslim terrorist attack. Horrific lynchings of Muslim men and women followed, Narendra Modi was accused of condoning the violence that allegedly was supported by police and government officials accused of providing rioters with lists of Muslim property owners. Officially 1,044 persons were killed, while The Concerned Citizens Tribunal estimated that 1,926 persons had been lynched. Parallel to accusations of having been knowledgeable about politicians and administrators’ crucial role in the lynchings, Modi-collaborators were accused of corruption and even extra-judicial killings.

Apart from these unresolved incidents Modi’s reforms during his time as Gujarat minister have benefitted his political career. His regime supported the establishment of new industries, reformed the bureaucracy, and made huge investments in electricity and infrastructure. The state’s growth rate boomed as subsidies were provided to politically connected conglomerates and state-owned players.

The “Gujarat model” has been a prerequisite for Modi’s fame as India’s great modernizers. However, even if Modi after his election victory in 2014 pledged to add 100 million manufacturing jobs, India actually lost 24 million of those jobs between 2017 and 2021. COVID-19 was blamed for the failure, but 11 million jobs had already been lost before the pandemic hit. This might be compared with similar, but much smaller economies, like those of Bangladesh and Vietnam, which manufacture employment doubled between 2019 and 2020, while India’s share barely rose by two percent. Currently, Vietnam exports approximately the same value in manufactured goods with its 100 million people, as does India with its 1.4 billion. Modi’s huge investments in logistics and transport has so far not provided the expected results. Indian investors tend to offshore their profits and demonstrate a preference for financial assets. Private investment was in 2019-20 only 22 percent of GDP, down from 31 percent in 2010-11. One obstacle to investment is India’s profoundly unequal society. Modi’s economic strategy puts wealth before health. The Modi government is reluctant to prioritize investments in primary health care and education.

In 2019, the Modi government declared “war on pollution” but allocated a scanty USD 42 million. Female employment have been dropping for over three decades, with only 7 out of 100 urban women now employed. Modi’s tactics to blame minorities for economic shortcomings, social ills and other problems that could be amended by more effective policies may prove to be disastrous and lead to unmitigated violence. One example is his government’s crackdown on Sikh separatist movements and alleged extra-judicial killings of Sikh militants in Britain and Canada, which has reawaken and militarized Sikh opposition and soured diplomatic contacts with Canada. Likewise is the Government’s move to revoke the Constitution’s Article 370, which granted some autonomy for Kashmir, India’s only Muslim-majority state, likely to fuel Muslim anger and desperation and so is the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, making religion a criterion for obtaining Indian nationality. Only non-Muslim refugees from Bangladesh, Afghanistan, and Pakistan are eligible for citizenship. Added to this are new laws passed to make interreligious marriages more difficult.

The extreme Hindu pride violence depicted in RRR might be more of a source for worries than admiration for its stunning visual effects and joyous patriotism. It is doubtful if Indian unity can be realised through State homage to an idealized Hindu past, combined with an obvious marginalization of minorities. Instead of being impressed by Indian moon landings, prosperity for the wealthy and adoration of “great” leaders, it might probably be more constructive to look into and address pollution, waste, inequality, poverty, poor health, and education. History proves that harassing minorities cause general human misery. It might be much more beneficial to study history through a scientific/objective lens than as BJP and RRR adhere to invented traditions, i.e. cultural practices and ideas perceived as arising from people in a distant past, though they actually are quite recent and consciously invented by identifiable political actors.

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The Vast Potential of the Human Spirit — Global Issues

  • Opinion by Gordon Brown (london)
  • Inter Press Service

LONDON, Sep 15 (IPS) – With hope and courage, we must rise to the challenges before us. We must rise to the challenge of a world set afire by climate change, forced displacement, armed conflicts and human rights abuses. We must rise to the challenge of girls being denied their right to an education in Afghanistan. We must rise to the challenge of a global refugee crisis that is disrupting development gains the world over. We must rise to the challenge of brutal and unconscionable wars in places like Sudan and Ukraine that are putting millions of children at risk every day.

By ensuring every single child has access to quality education and embracing the vast potential of the human spirit – especially the 224 million girls and boys caught in emergencies and protracted crises that so urgently need our support – we can rise to this challenge. It’s a chance for girls with disabilities like Sammy in Colombia to find a nurturing place to learn and grow, it’s a chance for girls that have been forced into child marriage like Ajak in South Sudan to resume control of their lives, it’s a chance for refugees like Jannat in Bangladesh to find hope and dignity once more.

As Education Cannot Wait (ECW), the United Nations global fund for education in emergencies, has successfully completed its first strategic plan period and now enters its second strategic period, we are seeing time and again the power of education in propelling global efforts to deliver on the promises outlined in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the Paris Agreement, the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and other crucial international frameworks. By ensuring quality holistic education for the world’s most marginalized and vulnerable children in crisis settings, we invest in human capital, transform economies, ensure human rights, and build a more peaceful and more sustainable future for all.

The achievements outlined in ECW’s 2022 Annual Results Report tell a story of a breakout global fund moving with strength, speed and agility, while achieving quality. Together with a growing range of strategic partners, ECW reached 4.2 million children in 2022 alone. It was also the first time girls represented more than half of the children reached by ECW’s investments, including 53% of girls at the secondary level, which is a significant milestone in achieving the aspirational target of 60% girls reached. Now in its sixth year of operation, ECW has reached a total of 8.8 million children and adolescents with the safety, power and opportunity of a quality, inclusive education. An additional 32.2 million children and adolescents were reached with targeted interventions during the COVID-19 pandemic.

We are also seeing a global advocacy movement reaching critical mass, together with stronger political commitment and increased financing for the sector. In 2022, funding for education in emergencies was higher than ever before. Total available funding has grown by more than 57% over just three years – from US$699 million in 2019 to more than US$1.1 billion in 2022.

However, the needs have also skyrocketed over this same period. Funding asks for education in emergencies within humanitarian appeals have nearly tripled from US$1.1 billion in 2019 to almost US$3 billion at the end of 2022. This means that while donors are stepping up, the funding gap has actually widened, and only 30% of education in emergencies requirements were funded in 2022.

With support from key donors – including Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States, as the top-three contributors among 25 in total, such as visionary private sector partners like The LEGO Foundation – US$826 million was announced at the ECW High-Level Financing Conference in early 2023. Collective resource mobilization efforts from all partners and stakeholders at global, regional, and country levels also helped unlock an additional US$842 million of funding for education in-country, which was contributed in alignment with ECW’s Multi-Year Resilience Programmes in 22 countries, and thus illustrates strong coordination by strategic donor partners who work in affected emergencies and protracted crises-contexts.

We must rise to this challenge by finding new and innovative ways to finance education. To date, some of ECW’s largest and prospective bilateral and multilateral donors have not yet committed funding for the full 2023–2026 period, and there remains a gap in funding from the private sector, foundations and philanthropic donors. In the first half of 2023, ECW faces a funding gap of approximately $670 million to fully finance results under the Strategic Plan, 2023–2026, to reach more than 20 million children over the next three years.

The investments will address the diverse impacts of crisis on education through child-centred approaches that are tailored to the needs of specific groups affected by crisis, such as children with disabilities, girls, refugees, and vulnerable children in host communities. These investments entail academic learning, social and emotional learning, sports, arts, combined with mental health and psycho-social services, school feeding, water and sanitation, as well as a protection component.

Since ECW became operational, we have withstood the cataclysmic forces of a global pandemic, a rise in armed conflicts that have disrupted social and economic security the world over, the unconscionable denial of education for girls in Afghanistan, floods and droughts made ever-more devastating by climate change, and other crises that are derailing efforts to deliver on the Sustainable Development Goals.

Now is the time to come together as one people, one planet to address the challenges before us. Now is the time to embrace the vast potential of the human spirit. With education for all, we can make sure girls like Sammy, Ajak and Jannat are able to reach their full potential, we can build a better world for generations to come.

Rt. Hon. Gordon Brown is United Nations Special Envoy for Global Education

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The Lesotho Highlands Water Project Who Benefits? — Global Issues

  • Opinion by Marianne Buenaventura Goldman, Reitumetse Nkoti Mabula (cape town, south africa)
  • Inter Press Service

CAPE TOWN, South Africa, Sep 05 (IPS) – The Role of the New Development Bank in Monitoring Project Impacts on Communities

The 15th BRICS Summit held in Johannesburg, South Africa this month has once again put the spotlight on the Lesotho Highlands Water Project (LHWP) as a shining example of multilateralism and the New Development Bank’s (NDB)commitment to financing sustainable development projects within BRICS countries and other developing countries. During the 2023 BRICS Summit, the New Development Bank and the Trans-Caledon Tunnel Authority (TCTA) signed a 3.2 billion Rands loan agreement for the implementation of Phase Two of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project (LHWP) in Lesotho. This funding complements contributions by other financiers, notably the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the Development Bank of Southern Africa (DBSA).

LHWP is a multi-phased water infrastructure project which involves construction of a number of dams in Lesotho to transfer water to South Africa, while generating hydropower for Lesotho. The entity that is responsible for implementation of LHWP in Lesotho is the Lesotho Highlands Development Authority (LHDA). The TCTA, a state-owned entity charged with financing bulk raw water infrastructure in South Africa, is responsible for financing and building the LHWP.

News of the signing of this agreement was received with some interest and enthusiasm in many quarters in Lesotho, partly because of the participation of Prime Minister Matekane during the Summit, as an observer, and largely due to the perceived benefits of this loan for Basotho. On the other hand, the news was also viewed with skepticism by civil society organisations working with communities directly affected by LHWP in light of the adverse social, economic, environmental and gender impact which communities continue to experience daily. The truth is, whilst it is laudable and important for both Lesotho and South Africa that the NDB provided this crucial financing for socio-economic development of their peoples, it is equality imperative that this development should not come at a cost to vulnerable and marginalised communities who have been forced to host this project.

The benefits for communities in South Africa are straightforward; according to the media release issued by the NDB on the 21st of August 2023, LHWP Phase II will increase the water yield of the Vaal River Basin by almost 15%, supporting economic growth and livelihoods of approximately 15 million people living in Gauteng Province, including communities in three other provinces which also stand to benefit from increased water supply. However, these benefits are not guaranteed for thousands of people and communities directly affected by this project in Lesotho.

LHWP Phase II has garnered its fair share of criticism and controversy recently, for its operations and impact on the people of Polihali, Mokhotlong. These include heavy handed police intervention against people who rightfully express dissent and protest to some aspects of the project or how it is implemented. There are also complaints about the project’s implementing authority, the Lesotho Highlands Development Authority (LHDA)’s compensation policy. These include unfair compensation amounts to communities which were based on unilaterally determined compensation rates and periods, non-payment of communal compensation which has prevented communities from developing income generating projects, and lack of developments such as provision of water and sanitation for communities.

Implementation of LHWP requires acquisition of land from local communities; it is estimated that 5,000 hectares of land will be flooded by the Polihali Dam.1 This acquisition of land will result in significant negative impacts on the livelihoods and socio-economic status of the local populations. Communities are going to lose arable land, grazing ranges for livestock which is the main store of wealth for communities in the area, medicinal plants, useful grasses and wild vegetables which form the basis of livelihoods for communities.

Another challenge of the construction of this Dam is the required resettlement and / or relocation of communities. It is currently estimated that 270 households and 21 business enterprises will need to be relocated, mainly due to the impoundment of Polihali reservoir.2 About 12 communities will be relocated, and an additional 5 communities will be required to resettle entirely, a process that will have great economic and socio-economic and cultural implications for generations to come. Regrettably, there is no livelihood restoration strategy that has been developed by the LHDA to ameliorate the plight of these communities or at least no such strategy has been shared and/or discussed with communities and their representatives.

Negative gender impacts have also been noted; women within LHWP Phase II project area are already marginalised because of cultural stereotypes and practices which prevent them from owning land. The LHWP Phase II Compensation Policy has only served to solidify and exacerbate the problem of gender inequality through its gender biased payout of compensation procedure which deprives women of compensation for land previously managed or shared. This increases their economic vulnerability and susceptibility to gender-based violence. In fact, there have been concerning news reports in recent months, of increasing number of gender-based violence cases including teenage pregnancies and girl-child school dropouts, sex work/transactional sex, sexual violation especially of young girls, and increased HIV infection prevalence. These have been linked directly to the influx of immigrant contractors and labour workers who have come to work on the LHWP, continuing a trend which was first observed during implementation of the previous phases of this project. It is worrying to note, that at this point in the of implementation LHWP Phase II, there is still no gender policy, and the implementing authority still insists on turning a blind eye to the vulnerability of women as a result of this project.

The news of the NDB providing a loan for Phase 2 of the LHWP, totaling an amount of 3.2 billion Rands (US $ 171.5 million) raises further questions on the NDB’s policies and practices concerning transparency, accountability and its environmental and social safeguards, including gender. The NDB has indicated its plans to further strengthen gender mainstreaming in all its projects in its second five year General Strategy (2022-2027). As called by BRICS civil society organisations since the start of NDB operations, the NDB needs to urgently put in place a gender policy, with support of gender specialists at the NDB to oversee that gender is integrated in all aspects of its projects, in strong partnerships with its clients such as the TCTA and the LHDA.

All eyes are on the former Brazil President, Dilma Rousseff, new President of the NDB on her ability to transform the NDB from a multilateral development bank whose track record appears to be gender neutral towards one can proactively empower women and delivering on gender equality as part of New General Strategy and operations. In a recent statement, Rousseff explained that a priority of the NDB will be to “…promote social inclusion at every opportunity we have. The NDB needs to support projects that help to reduce inequalities and that improve the standard of living of the vast communities of the poor and excluded in our countries.”

The NDB has now grown beyond the BRICS countries, and recently included new member countries such as the United Arab Emirates, Bangladesh, Egypt and Uruguay and has greater aspirations to add many more countries. Given the NDB’s expansion, it is critical that the NDB begin to live its vision of being an accountable institution for the South, by the South. The NDB should urgently put into practice its policies such as on Information Disclosure. By doing so, the NDB will enable communities to access information on projects that directly affect their lives and livelihoods. The NDB also needs to work more closely with its clients to follow through on the NDB guidelines provided in its Environmental and Social Framework. The Civil Society Forum of the NDB (South Africa / Africa), including Lesotho community-based organisations calls on the NDB to learn from past mistakes experienced during the implementation of Phase 1 of the LHWP. During Phase II of the project, the NDB and other development finance institutions such as the DBSA and AfDB should ensure that the LHDA convenes effective and timely community consultations, provide basic services such as clean water, and ensure adequate and fair compensation to all affected communities – especially women who have in the past been left behind.

During the 2023 BRICS Summit, which took place on 22-24 August, Minister Naledi Pandor of South Africa’s Department of International Relations and Cooperation underscored the need for the NDB to do outreach at the local level in terms of sharing information on the projects the NDB funds, including vital project information, including the $3 billion the NDB plans to invest in South Africa. All eyes are now on South Africa and Brazil with leadership from NDB President Rousseff and Minister Pandor to push for stronger and more inclusive development outcomes of the NDB, with women front and centre of all future NDB projects.

The LHWP Phase II is an example of the challenges faced by communities affected by large infrastructure projects with funding from Public Development Banks (PDBs) such as the NDB, AfDB and the DBSA. As the hundreds of PDBs convene at the 4th Finance in Common Summit (FICS) in Cartegena, Colombia on 4-6 September to join forces to transform the financial system towards climate and sustainability, it will be important that PDBs transform their models to be more effective in promoting positive development outcomes for communities. PDBs have been advocating to increase volumes of finance for development. Civil society across the globe are in solidarity, making their voices heard at the FICS expressing concerns that limited attention is being given to the need to shift the quality of that finance to ensure it does not exacerbate the current crises and to ensure it shifts the power in decision making. Such attention is even more needed as the current financial architecture hinders the ability of governments to protect people and the planet.

1https://www.lhda.org.ls : accessed on the 11th July 2023
2 Ibid

Marianne Buenaventura Goldman is co-Chair, Civil Society Forum of the NDB (Africa) & Project Coordinator, Forus
Reitumetse Nkoti Mabula is Executive Director, Seinoli Legal Centre

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Sexual Violence Survivors in Tigray Need Urgent Medical, Psychological and Economic Support — Global Issues

Hilina Berhanu Degefa, researcher, gender policy expert and co-founder of the Yellow Movement AAU, addresses the UN Security Council. CREDIT: UN Photo/Loey Felipe
  • by Francis Kokutse (accra)
  • Inter Press Service

ACCRA, Aug 22 (IPS) – The war in Tigray, northern Ethiopian, led to sexual and gender-based violence against women, but when Hilina Berhanu Degefa, researcher, gender policy expert and co-founder of the Yellow Movement AAU, appeared before the UN Security Council Open Debate on Sexual Violence in Conflict last year, and catalogued the problems that the victims of the war faced, it didn’t shock the world.

Giving a background, Degefa said, “When the war first started, Blen, a 21-year-old waitress from Badme, along with around 30 other Tigrayan women, was held against her will and subjected to sexual slavery, starvation, and gang rape by a group of Eritrean and Ethiopian soldiers who took turns with her.”

“I documented many other stories like Blen’s during multiple visits to the Tigray region before June 2021. Sexual violence was used to terrorize communities and build camaraderie amongst allied forces of the Eritrean Defence Forces, Ethiopian National Defence Force, Amhara regional militia, and special forces through the shared experience of exploiting women’s bodies.

“The consistency across victims’ accounts shows that these crimes were committed with a degree of organization, planning, and intent to dehumanize individuals and communities,” she said.

Now, a new study has confirmed that 99 percent of the survivors of sexual and gender-based violence during the conflict have not received medical or psychological care because most health facilities were destroyed and looted.

Girmatsion Fisseha – Lead Author

The authors have, therefore, suggested the establishment of an urgent survivor centre approach with medical and psychological services, together with sustained community support, to reduce the lifelong impact on the behavioural, emotional, sexual, social, and economic fortunes of the victims.

Published by BMJ Global Health journal, the study, “War-related sexual and gender-based violence in Tigray, Northern Ethiopia: a community-based study,” is a survey conducted in six zones of Tigray after the Eritrean, Ethiopian and Amhara forces left Mekelle, the capital of Tigray.

The western zone of Tigray and the districts bordering Eritrea were not included for security reasons. Women of reproductive age (i.e., 15–49 years) recruited from the study communities were included as primary respondents in this survey. Information on girls under 15 years and women above 50 years of age was also collected from the primary respondents, and the period of the SGBV incidents covered from 4 November 2020 to 28 June 2021.

Findings from this study indicate a higher incidence, nearly 10 percent more of rape, than those reported in other studies during conflicts, such as in Northern Uganda, 4.2 percent; Sierra Leone, 8 percent and Ukraine, 2.6 percent. In the case of physical violence, 28.6 percent observed in this study was higher than the findings for East Timor, Indonesia, where 22.7 percent of the women were physically assaulted.

Co-author of the study, Kiros Berhane, professor at the Cynthia and Robert Citron-Roslyn and Leslie Goldstein, and Chair, Department of Biostatistics Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University in the U.S. told the IPS why they were motivated to conduct the study. “During the war period in Tigray, there were unprecedently high incidents of SGBV reported by various humanitarian agencies, local and international media, including gang-rape and other extreme types of abuses such as insertion of foreign objectives to the victims’ private parts.

Kiros Berhane Professor of Biostatistics at Columbia University

“Most of the reports were coming from health facilities around big towns. Health professionals working at university hospitals (including many on the author list of this manuscript) observed many rape survivors admitted to Mekelle Hospital and Ayder Comprehensive Specialized Hospital (one-stop centre),” he said.

Berhane said the main objective of the study was to scientifically and thoroughly document the level and severity of war-related SGBV in Tigray beyond the sporadic and incomplete (but still shocking) reports in hopes that policies and actions could be activated to help rape survivors and further prevent the rape incidence in the community, adding that, “this study provides first-of-its-kind objectively/carefully collected primary data on scale/level of SGBV in Tigray.”

Degefa gave a chilling account of a Tigrayan woman who was fleeing the conflict zone with her children, and encountered the Amhara militia, who separated her from her family, gang-raped her and inserted a hot metal rod into her uterus and declared that a Tigrayan should never give birth.”

“Similar incidents of rape with claims of cleansing “Tigrayan blood” and mutilating women’s bodies to prevent the birth of more generations of Tigrayans have been extensively covered by different human rights reports,” she said.

Degefa said sexual violence was also used to humiliate survivors and their families and cited a case of an Amhara woman who was beaten and raped in the presence of her husband and child by two members of Tigrayan forces. Men and boys were also sexually assaulted, she said, adding that the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission found in Samre town, in Tigray, 600 men and boys who were stripped and forcibly paraded, some completely naked, while Eritrean female soldiers mocked them and took pictures.

She said women with disabilities and other vulnerable communities were also at particular risk during this conflict. “Many women with disabilities were specifically targeted in the Tigray region as they were presumed to be fighters in the previous war. Girls, older women, and women belonging to a minority or indigenous communities also faced higher risks, Degefa added.

The lack of access to the region for independent human rights monitoring means it has been tough to document the impact of the conflict in minority communities and especially those living in disputed areas on the Eritrean border, such as the Irob and Kunama in Tigray.

In her opinion, the conflict in Northern Ethiopia, and the effective siege of the Tigray region, in particular, has undermined women’s rights, including access to reproductive healthcare and psychosocial support, exacerbating the impacts of sexual violence.

Degefa said the lack of access to psychosocial support services means that the mental health of survivors of sexual violence hangs in the balance. Many have already died by suicide, adding that the story of a 50-year-old Amhara woman from Shewa-Robit in central Ethiopia, who was gang-raped by Tigrayan fighters in the presence of her son in the next room and later died of suicide.

Following their study, Berhane said he would expect the Ethiopian government and the international community “to provide immediate action such as supporting survivors, their children and provide the opportunity for medical, psychological and economic rehabilitation.”

In addition, there is a need for the supply of adequate medical supplies and medications to health facilities in the war zone. The government must also work with all partners and NGOs to try and trace survivors at the community level for further medical and psychological support.

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