Turkey Gives 22-Year Jail Term to Kurdish Female Politician, Leyla Guven, On Terror-Related Charges
New
Age Islam News Bureau
22
December 2020
• Karima Baloch a Vocal Critic Of The Pakistan Government In Balochistan And A Strong Proponent Of Gender Equality, Found Dead in Cnada
•
Intisar Foundation’s Drama Therapy Heals Arab Women Effected by Wars
•
Sheikha Al-Harbi, First Saudi Woman To Receive COVID-19 Vaccine
•
Islamic Feminists Speak on Fight to Reclaim Rights
•
Alkhorayef: Industrial Sector Opens Up Great Space for Women
•
Female Participation In Non-Agri Sector: Bangladesh Better Off Than India, Pakistan
•
Mothers At Work: Project For Women’s Employment In Turkey Expands Scope
Compiled
by New Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/turkey-gives-22-year-jail/d/123845
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Turkey Gives 22-Year Jail Term to Kurdish Female Politician, Leyla Guven, On Terror-Related Charges
21
December 2020
Leyla Güven's legal team said they would appeal
against the verdict
------
A
court in Turkey has sentenced a former pro-Kurdish lawmaker who was stripped of
her parliamentary status earlier this year to more than 22 years in jail on
terror-related charges.
On
Monday and at the court hearing in the predominantly Kurdish southeastern city
of Diyarbakir, Leyla Guven was given 14 years and three months on a charge of
membership in a ‘terrorist organization,’ and an additional eight years for two
separate charges of disseminating ‘terrorist propaganda.’
Guven,
an opposition Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) deputy, was not present at the
hearing and her whereabouts were not immediately clear.
The
court ordered Guven’s immediate arrest. Her legal team said it would appeal.
The
daughter, Sabiha Temizkan, said her mother was convicted for her work with the
pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Congress (DTK), a civil society group which
remains under close scrutiny by the Turkish state. She called the Turkish
government “the enemy of the law.”
The
56-year-old female politician shot to fame two years ago by spearheading a
hunger strike by thousands of inmates who called for an end to jailed Kurdish
leader Abdullah Ocalan’s years of isolation.
Last
year, Guven was freed under judicial control after serving a one-year term for
labeling the Turkish military operation against Syrian Kurdish militant groups
an ‘invasion.’
“I
uttered a scream in the dark... I started by daring to die for this cause,”
media outlets then quoted Guven as saying.
The
Turkish government-backed militants were deployed to northeastern Syria in
October 2019, when the Turkish military launched a long-threatened cross-border
invasion in a declared attempt to push militants of the Kurdish People's
Protection Units (YPG) away from border areas. Ankara views the US-backed YPG
as a terrorist organization tied to the homegrown Kurdistan Workers' Party
(PKK).
In
recent years, Ankara has jailed dozens of mayors and other officials from the
HDP, which is the third largest party in the Turkish parliament.
Guven
had been accused of having links to the PKK.
Other
members of the HDP, including its co-leaders, face similar charges. They deny
the charges, saying they are victims of a crackdown by the government which was
launched after a failed coup less than two years ago.
Thousands
of people, including a large number Kurds, have been jailed over alleged links
to the July 15, 2016 coup or other terrorism-related charges.
Rights
advocates have criticized Ankara for suing people over expressing opinions,
describing it as a means of aggressive muzzling of dissent in Turkey.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/12/21/641214/Turkey-HDP-Guven
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Karima
Baloch a Vocal Critic Of The Pakistan Government In Balochistan And A Strong
Proponent Of Gender Equality, Found Dead in Canada
Pia
Krishnankutty
22
December, 2020
Activist Karima Baloch | Twitter | @KarimaBaloch
------
New
Delhi: Human rights activist and former chairperson of Baloch Students
Organisation – Azad, Karima Baloch was reportedly found dead in Toronto, Canada
Sunday.
According
to a report in The Balochistan Post Monday, 35-year-old Karima, who was a vocal
critic of the Pakistan government, went missing Sunday and was last seen at
approximately 3 pm in the Bay Street and Queens Quay West area. The Toronto
Police carried out a search along with public assistance before Baloch’s family
confirmed that the body was found.
The
activist, who had taken refuge in Canada, was critical of the atrocities meted
out to the people of Balochistan in Pakistan. She had also raised the issue of
gender inequality in Pakistan at the United Nations during the 39th Session of
the Human Rights Council in 2018.
“If
a woman is killed by her brother in the name of honour, the Islamic law allows
him to settle the case with the father or the rest of the family. In most of
the cases, the family forgives the murderer who goes scot-free. Also, as a
testimony of two women is equal to one man, rape cases are less likely to be
decided in favour of the victims,” said Karima in her speech.
She
added: “Apart from these basic flaws in the legal system, religious groups have
launched an assault against the women’s freedom throughout Pakistan, especially
in Balochistan.”
Part
of BBC’s 100 most influential women in 2016
In
2016, she was named as one of the world’s 100 most “inspirational and
influential” women by the BBC, which she said she would share “with countless
inspirational women in Balochistan freedom struggle (sic)”.
Baloch
last tweeted on 11 December about Shabeer Baloch, activist and Baloch Students
Organisation – Azad information secretary who was allegedly abducted by the
Pakistani Army on 4 October 2016, from Gowarkop in Balochistan.
This
is not the first time an activist from Balochistan has died under mysterious
circumstances. In May this year, Baloch journalist Sajid Hussain was found dead
in Sweden after going missing from the city of Uppsala earlier in March.
The
Balochistan province, located in southwestern Pakistan, is one of the
longest-running insurgencies in the world with several Baloch groups engaged in
an armed conflict with the Pakistani Army due to Punjabi dominance and economic
alienation, among other issues.
https://theprint.in/world/baloch-activist-gender-inequality-critic-karima-baloch-found-dead-in-canada/571456/
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Intisar
Foundation’s Drama Therapy Heals Arab Women Effected By Wars
Jackie
Abramian
Dec
20, 2020
Women
comprise 50 percent of the over 25 million refugees, internally displaced, or
stateless population worldwide. Of the nearly 80 million displaced people
worldwide, over 50 percent are from the Arab region. With the Arab world
plundered in escalated militarism and wars, over one million Syrian refugees
live in Lebanon–nearly 70 percent live below the poverty line, one in four
suffers from anxiety, one in three from depression and two-thirds of Syrian
refugees in Lebanon have post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
“There’s
an aversion in the Arab world about seeking psychological help,” explains HH
Sheikha Intisar AlSabah of Kuwait, founder of the UK-registered charity,
Intisar Foundation which in 2018 became the world’s first and only nonprofit,
charitable organization that offers Drama Therapy for Arab women traumatized by
wars. “Arab women affected by wars are uncomfortable about discussing their
problems with male psychologists–alone in a room. And there’s a cultural habit
of burying your trauma so it’s not surfaced.”
Sheikha
AlSabah’s mission is to empower 1 million Arab women for peace across the Arab
world as women remain frontline victims of the consequences of war, domestic
abuse and cultural oppression. With only few female Drama Therapists in the
Arab world currently, the Foundation has signed recently an MOU with Lebanon’s
Holy Spirit University of Kaslik (USEK) to offer 15 scholarship grants every
year to female students from across the Arab world to enroll in USEK’s Drama
Therapy Master’s degree program. It hopes to have 300 certified Drama
Therapists and 300 supporting aids to build the foundations for peace,
empowering Arab women affected by wars.
The
Foundation’s advisory board are top experts in the field including Dr. Nisha
Sanjnani, Associate Professor and Director, Drama Therapy Program at NYU and
Richard Hougham, Principal Lecturer, Drama and Movement Therapy at UK’s Royal
Central School of Speech and Drama, and the Foundation’s CEO, Karima Anbar
attest to its continued success.
To
date, the Foundation has completed 10 Drama Therapy programs with 200 women
participants who spent nearly 400 hours learning and practicing
transformational exercises. The women have performed six Acting Out Our Mission
of Peace plays for audiences across Lebanon and Jordan–the countries where the
Foundation is currently active.
Sheikha
AlSabah’s humble, charismatic and spirited personality is refreshing and a
testament to her commitment to Intisar (victory in Arabic) Foundation’s mission
having herself traumatized by war during the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in August
1990. Within hours of the invasion, the over four million populated, oil-rich
country’s capital city fell and its head of state, Sheikh Jaber al-Ahmad
al-Sabah, fled to Saudi Arabia.
The
invasion ended Sheikha AlSabah’s peaceful life surrounded by nature, palm
oasis, and wildlife. As a young mother of four daughters, she focused on
protecting her children from the bombings and violent scenes, while suppressing
her own trauma after witnessing corpses of soldiers, and her country’s
destruction.
“I
had no emotions throughout the violent invasion,” Sheikha AlSabah remembers
shielding her daughters from bombings as they escaped through the desert into
Saudi Arabia and from there to London, where they remained until Kuwait’s
liberation. “Reflecting, I know I suppressed emotions. I was traumatized and
angry–fearful and scared of angry emotions.”
Sheikha
AlSabah found “positive psychology as a way to overcome the chaos” around her.
To share the impact of focusing on the positive aspects of life with the
masses, she created a six-week mini curriculum that piloted in Kuwait’s schools
in 2016. The curriculum is currently in 47 public schools, taught by 470
teachers to over 11,000 students.
“While
everyone thought at first that I lived in a bubble, was rich and wasn’t in
touch with realities of the world, studies prove that attitudes can change from
negative to positive. If you highlight the bad, people follow it. If you
highlight the good, people follow it and see a way to change,” Sheikha AlSabah
is proud of the curriculum’s significant impact on the students’ academic
achievements–which was measured, presented to the Ministry of Education in 2018
and now integrated into Kuwait Vision 2035. An MOU with Kuwait University will
further develop the curriculum. Its impact will be measured and published as
part of KU’s Master’s program.
Drama
Therapy’s Transformational Powers
The
idea for the Intisar Foundation came about when Sheikha AlSabah and the
International Committee of Red Cross (ICRC) organized an art exhibit in Kuwait
on women affected by wars. Well aware of the powers of positive psychology,
AlSabah found there were no mental health programs for women victims of war.
She joined ICRC and UNHCR for a trip to Lebanon to work with women living in
refugee camps.
Of
the various therapy sessions, Drama Therapy–a therapeutic approach using
theatrical techniques to facilitate psychological healing– proved the most
altering mental and emotional outlet, reversing the adverse effects of war
among women. The multi-generational group of participating women opened up,
discussed fears, laughed, made friends with a community of supportive
women–showing affirmation, self-confidence, and self-worth.
Partnering
with local NGOs, which Sheikha AlSabah vetted to ensure their full and genuine
dedication to humanitarian work, not profiteering, the Foundation uses the
NGOs’ networks and space to work in Lebanon’s Shatila camp and Tripoli and in
Jordan. They focus on women refugees and socio-economically disadvantaged,
suffering from problems stemming from atrocities of war. Living in dire
circumstances lacking basic human rights and infrastructure, the women suffer
from post-migration trauma, escalated rates of abuse, high rates of
“comorbidity of post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, generalized
anxiety, low self-esteem, and a distorted self-image.”
While
the NGOs provide women participants, the Foundation underwrites the free Drama
Therapy programs, rental fees for a safe site to hold the sessions,
transportation to and from the site and food and refreshments during the
sessions. The Foundation also hires Drama Therapists and the assistants for the
intensive 12-16-week sessions, where up to 20 women (Lebanese, Palestinian,
Syrian and Jordanian), between the ages of 16 to 70-years-old, spend three
hours per week. The sessions integrate storytelling, dance, movement,
socio-drama multidisciplinary tools from playback and physical theatre, to
theatre of the oppressed, and psychodrama–integrating music, theater and props.
“Women
who are numb to pain can also become numb to pleasure. But with the right
training, the women blossom,” AlSabah’s face brightens as she admits that
witnessing the change in the women is one of the best things she has seen. “The
most noteworthy change among the war traumatized women is they gain the courage
to minimize the abuse done to them. After seven or eight weeks of training, the
women raised their arms to stop their husbands from hitting them. They also
became gentler with their children.”
The
women have also learned to better manage anger, shame and grief as they
“revisit and transform rage into empathy within a safe, contained environment.”
The four stages of the sessions begin with developing a rapport among the women
to contain social and “emotional skills and self-confidence enabling both
inter–and intrapersonal skills.” Women open up, cry, share their pain, push
their boundaries to move and express their inner feelings, phobias, fears,
oppressed silences and find solace among a community of women. Research has
shown that through Drama Therapy war refugees have reduced symptoms of
impairment and improved mathematical performance, suggesting a boost in
cognitive abilities.
Monthly
follow-up sessions continue after the completion of the program. Amidst the pandemic, Drama Therapists check in on the women via
virtual sessions–a new way of working not thought possible. Due to domestic
chores, sessions are shorter but remain efficient.
Research
has shown that transforming 12 or 14 percent of the women will impact their
entire community. To create a “ripple effect” the Foundation plans to train
100,000 women to impact nearly one million across the Arab world. Intisar
Foundation’s publication of a new research booklet, “Can Drama Therapy Evoke
Neuroplastic Changes in The Brain?” is an unprecedented study on the
neurobiological aspect of trauma and Drama Therapy–proving “constant, repeated,
and strong stimuli” activities of new learning experiences foster positive
alterations in the brain and behavior, builds and strengthens certain brain
pathways reinforcing “thinking habits, emotional processing, and physical
activities.”
“We
advocate that women can and will be advocates of peace. Why can’t peace start
from the bottom–war starts from the bottom? When we talk about Arab women
bringing peace to the Arab world–we show the research. Neuroscience of Drama
Therapy and peace prove women spiritually and physically change through the use
of cognitive, narrative, emotional and body movement,” confirms Sheikha
AlSabah.
Measuring
the impact of its success to date will be used as evidence to change policy. As
a social philanthropist, Sheikha AlSabah dedicates 50 percent of profits from
her other businesses–mainly her two brands of jewelry, to fund the Foundation.
Now with social impact results measured and available, the Foundation now seeks
support in the Arab world.
“People
are hungry for things that make them feel good – not only in Kuwait, but around
the world. When you feel good, you can
conquer the world,” Sheikha AlSabah says determined. “It’s critical for women
to have access to mental health support to feel safer and stronger. Mental
health must be a priority to stop trauma from solidifying among war
victims–only then can women become actively involved in achieving peace.”
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jackieabramian/2020/12/20/intisar-foundations-drama-therapy-heals-arab-women-effected-by-wars/?sh=49edf4453eaa
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Sheikha
Al-Harbi, First Saudi Woman To Receive COVID-19 Vaccine
Ismaeel
Naar
21
December 2020
Sheikha
al-Harbi became the first Saudi Arabian woman to receive the Pfizer COVID-19
vaccine in Saudi Arabia and said she advises all throughout the Kingdom to get
vaccinated in order to reach an end to the coronavirus pandemic.
“I
insisted because since this disease came and we have not been able to get out
and leave the house. We were kept being told not to visit others and not let
others visit us. The moment they told us there was a vaccine, I said I'd take
it,” al-Harbi told Al Arabiya during an interview.
Al-Harbi’s
decision to be the first to take the COVID-19 vaccine has a personal reason as
well, after the virus took her own sister and her brother-in-law’s life
recently.
“It
has taken my sister and her husband. And people are afraid of diseases and of
mixing with each other. My sister was older than me. She had blood pressure,
diabetes and asthma. She herself was in a poor health state. She was in Medina
and I wasn't with her, but it didn't last long, one week and she passed away,”
al-Harbi said.
Saudi
Arabia’s Ministry of Health on Monday confirmed 168 new coronavirus infections,
bringing the total number of total confirmed cases in the Kingdom to 361,178.
The health ministry also reported nine more virus-related deaths over the past
24 hours, marking the lowest single-day fatalities in as many months.
Earlier
in the weekend, Saudi Arabian citizen Emad al-Daihan became the first citizen
from Saudi Arabia on Thursday to receive the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19
coronavirus vaccine (Tozinameran) in the capital Riyadh.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/coronavirus/2020/12/21/Coronavirus-Coronavirus-Meet-Sheikha-al-Harbi-first-Saudi-woman-to-receive-COVID-19-vaccine
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Islamic
Feminists Speak on Fight to Reclaim Rights
By
Mariya Salim
22
December 2020
NEW
DELHI, India, Dec 22 2020 (IPS) - The court victory to allow women into the
inner sanctum of a Sufi shrine in Mumbai was a significant victory for a
secular rights-based movement led by Muslim women. However, there is a fear the
political climate in India regarding Muslims, could put the women’s rights
agenda on the back foot.
Zakia
Soman, co-founder of the Bhartiya Muslim Mahila Andolan (BMMA) or the Indian
Muslim Women’s movement, in an exclusive interview to IPS, said the historic
victory was important for the women-led group to check this (Patriarchal male
clergy-led) arrogance.
“Most
of our members have an intimate devotion to Sufism. We cannot allow a bunch of
conservative men to take it away from us. We are equal humans, equal Muslims,
and equal citizens in a democracy,” she says.
“When
they refused to listen to us and continued to bar us from entering the shrine,
we unanimously decided to take them to court.”
The
BMMA in 2016 filed Public Interest Litigation when after years of unfettered
access to a Sufi shrine, the Haji Ali Dargah, a sudden restriction was placed
on women entering the inner sanctum of the shrine.
The
submissions made by the organisation to the High Court questioned this
prohibition both based on constitutional guarantees as well as women’s rights
in Islam. The verdict was in their favour and in 2016 the High court held that
‘Women must be permitted to enter the sanctum sanctorum on a par with men’.
Soman
says the Haji Ali victory was personally a tribute to her maternal grandmother
who was a devout Sufi.
Another
achievement for the BMMA has been the slow acceptance of Female Qazi’s
performing the ‘Nikah’ or marriage for Muslim couples. A domain which has
exclusively remained with men, despite there being nothing in the religion that
prohibits a woman from solemnising a Nikah.
However,
the BMMA has been at the receiving end of criticism for their fight to codify
Family laws in India. Many believe the anti-Muslim communal climate in the
country calls for other issues to take the lead.
“Today
Indian Muslims are facing tremendous onslaught in the form of lynching,
discriminatory laws citizenship laws and the looming National Registry of
Citizens, so-called love jihad laws etc.,” says Soman.
“There
is a direct onslaught that puts a question mark on the citizenship and
patriotism of Muslims. I am not sure how many women would come forward to fight
for rights in the family when faced with such huge political dangers.”
She
recognises the need to keep fighting for gender-just reforms in family laws
from within.
BMMA
and many other Muslim women’s movements across the globe question the
patriarchal interpretations of religious texts which treat women as unequal. As
Islamic Feminists, they believe that their religion believes that they are
equal to their male counterparts.
Zainah
Anwar, Executive Director of Musawah, the global movement for equality in the
family and Co-Founder of Sisters in Islam, Malaysia says: “For many of us
Muslim women who choose to engage with religion in the realm of women’s rights,
it is an article of faith that Islam is just, and God is just”.
“If
justice is intrinsic to Islam, then how could injustice and discrimination
result from the codification and implementation of laws and policies made in
the name of Islam,” she asks in an exclusive interview with IPS, questioning
the patriarchal family laws implemented in the name of religion.
Historian
and academic Dr Margot Badran defines ‘Islamic feminists’ and says that they
draw on the ‘Quranic concept of equality of all human beings’ and thereby
insist on applying this concept to everyday life. Defining ‘Islamic feminism’
she says that it “explicates the idea of gender equality as part and parcel of
the Qur’anic notion of equality of all insan (human beings) and calls for the
implementation of gender equality in the state, civil institutions, and
everyday life.”
Throughout
the world, Muslim men have been at the realm of interpreting Quranic texts, and
these interpretations have been mostly patriarchal. Islamic feminists, however,
are changing the contours of these debates.
The
movement has a long history and in March 2005, Amina Wadud, an Islamic scholar,
and feminist was at the centre of the debate, criticism, and discussion. Dr
Wadud accepted the invitation to lead a mixed prayer, and led it, in the Synod
House, New York. At the receiving end of death threats and criticism from those
who believed that Islam prohibits the act, the former Islamic studies professor
at Virginia University said in many media interviews that followed, that,
“There is nothing in the Qur’an or the hadith that forbids me from doing this.”
Post
the Shah Bano judgment in India and the passage of the Muslim Women’s bill in
1986, and amidst a communally polarised atmosphere, Muslim women who developed
a feminist consciousness tried to address gender injustice in the Muslim
personal law being followed at the time by invoking and relying on Islamic
reinterpretations of sacred texts.
As
in Muslim societies at the time, in India as well, in this period, women were
perceived as symbols of religious tradition with any dissent on their part
being construed as a betrayal to community identity.
This
paradox, however, came to a halt in Muslim societies, as the twentieth century
drew to a close. Like their counterparts in the Muslim majority states,
conservative (mostly Ashraf or higher caste) male clergy in India started
laying greater emphasis on patriarchal gender notions which in turn provoked
many women to take up activism to counter these claims.
These
women saw no inherent connection between patriarchy and Islam. By the end of
the 1980’s there was an emergence of a movement which was ‘feminist in its
aspirations and demands yet Islamic in its language and sources of legitimacy,
one version of this new discourse is Islamic feminism’.1
In
recent times, there have been several efforts in various parts of the country
for Muslim women to enter the religious realm interpreting the Quran and
Shariat from a women’s perspective. They have worked towards reclaiming spaces
using constitutional means and the law of the land as well, that have been
increasingly taken away from them.
Questioning
status quo, however, is not easy and Muslim women across the world challenging
patriarchal norms have faced resistance from within and outside their
communities. Anwar tells IPS: “We are often accused of being westernised
elites, anti-Islam, anti-Shari’ah, women who have deviated from our faith and
have weak Iman (faith). Reports are made against us to the police, to the
religious authorities to take action against us, to silence us, to charge us
for insulting Islam, to ban our groups.”
“We
cannot be told that Islam is a way of life … and then confer on Muslim men the
sole authority to decide what Islam is and what it’s not. That’s despotism. As
we can see from Muslim women leading movements all over the world for reform
and rights – we will not be silenced and intimidated,” says Anwar.
1
Ziba Mir‐Hosseini, ‘Muslim Women’s Quest for Equality: Between Islamic Law and
Feminism’ (The university of Chicago Press 2006) 32 (4) Critical Inquiry 629
Mariya
Salim is a fellow at IPS UN Bureau
http://www.ipsnews.net/2020/12/islamic-feminists-speak-fight-reclaim-rights/
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Alkhorayef:
Industrial sector opens up great space for women
December
21, 2020
RIYADH
— Bandar Alkhorayef, the minister of industry and mineral resources, and the
chairman of the board of directors of the Saudi Authority for Industrial Cities
and Technology Zones (MODON), said that the industrial system is working to
enhance the participation of women in the development process and to create
opportunities for them in this vital sector.
Addressing
the virtual conference on “Women in Industry 2020” on Monday, the minister said
that the industrial sector is passing through a golden and historic phase in
which women can play a greater role.
Alkhorayef
said that the industrial sector has begun to change radically, which opens up a
great space for women to work in this sector, in a manner befitting their
capabilities. He indicated that the ministry sought to create an appropriate
environment for women in the sector, especially in light of the adoption of the
techniques of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, and the automation of work,
which will provide many opportunities for entrepreneurs and young women who are
eager to take advantage of the opportunities. There are also ample qualitative
jobs appropriate and suitable to the capabilities of women.
Alkhorayef
noted that the factories of today and the factories of the future are different
from the factories that were in the past, as the latter is more amenable to
creative work apart from the routine work, especially with the spread of
technology that will replace many jobs. “The industrial system relies heavily
on the female component, to be a source for creativity and change, moving from
the realm of typical work in the industrial sector to that of the future work,”
he added.
In
his speech, the director-general of MODON Eng. Khalid Al-Salem said that the
conference represents an exceptional platform that brings together officials,
experts, specialists, and interested parties to discuss the best ways to
empower women in the industrial sector and to enhance their vital role in the
national economy as well as to achieve sustainable development.
https://saudigazette.com.sa/article/601684/SAUDI-ARABIA/Alkhorayef-Industrial-sector-opens-up-great-space-for-women
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Female
participation in non-agri sector: Bangladesh better off than India, Pakistan
Kamrul
Hasan
December
22nd, 202
In
the non-agri sector of Bangladesh 20.7% of the employees are women
Among
the three countries with a comparatively big economy and population in South
Asia, a higher number of women is participating in non-agriculture jobs in
Bangladesh, than in India and Pakistan, finds a latest report.
The
Human Development Report 2020 titled "The Next Frontier: Human Development
and the Anthropocene" by the United Nations Development Programme published
globally six days ago and in Bangladesh on Monday morning, came up with the
ranking.
The
Life Course Gender Gap data of the report says 20.7% of the employees in this
sector are women in Bangladesh while the share is 15.9% in India and 11% in
Pakistan.
According
to the Gender Development Index, estimated gross national income per capita (in
Purchasing Power Parity -- PPP, in theory, 1 PPP dollar has the same purchasing
power in the domestic economy of a country as $1 (USD) has in the US economy),
is PPP$2,873 for Bangladeshi female employees while it is PPP$2,331 for Indian
female employees. Income for Pakistani employees stands at PPP$1,393.
Ironically,
the presence of women at mid and senior management is less in Bangladesh than
India. According to the Women’s Empowerment data of the report, some 11.5%
people are female at mid or senior level management in Bangladesh while it is
13.7% in India.
Only
4.2% employment is occupied by female participants in Pakistan.
Same
scenario could be found in the case of women with accounts in financial
institutes or mobile money service providers. This indicates how many women
have been empowered in a family and is enjoying money spending rights.
In
Bangladesh, 35.8% women have at least one such account while it is 76.6% in
India, more than double from Bangladesh. Only 7% of the Pakistani women are
enjoying the right.
UNDP
warns that multidimensional poverty would turn into a crisis if no inclusive
measures are taken soon.
According
to a report in 2019, 24.6% of Bangladesh’s population was multidimensionally
poor, with a further 18.2% classified as vulnerable to multidimensional
poverty.
In
India 27.9% of their population was multidimensionally poor, with a further
19.3% classified as vulnerable to multidimensional poverty.
The
situation is much worse in Pakistan. In the country, 38.3% population was
multidimensionally poor, with a further 12.9% classified as vulnerable to
multidimensional poverty.
Again,
the report has mentioned that Bangladesh’s 2019 Human Development Index (HDI)
value falls by 24.4% when discounted for inequality in the HDI dimensions.
India’s HDI falls by 26.4% for inequality and the losses stand at 31.1% for
Pakistan.
The
female HDI value is 10% lower than for males (for Nepal, this difference is
about 7%; for Pakistan, markedly higher at about 25%).
https://www.dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/2020/12/22/female-participation-in-non-agri-sector-bangladesh-better-off-than-india-pakistan
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Mothers
at work: Project for women’s employment in Turkey expands scope
DEC
21, 2020
Aproject
launched by the government two years ago to boost women’s employment has
reached out to more than 42,000 people. Minister of Family, Labor and Social
Policies Zehra Zümrüt Selçuk said in a written statement released on Monday
that Mothers At Work launched by the Turkish Employment Agency (IŞKUR)
benefited women with its vocational training courses and programs.
The
government launched the project in September 2018 for disadvantaged women,
namely those who cannot work since they have to care for their children at
home. It prioritized women who relied on social benefits, those suffering from
domestic violence and women with children below the age of 1 and up to the age
of 15.
The
project, applied in 81 provinces across the country, first provides job
training and consultancy services for applicants. Further vocational training
and on-the-job training are also provided and IŞKUR partially guarantees that
the women will find jobs once going through the training programs. Each woman
is entitled to a daily allowance throughout the training and an additional TL
400 ($52) monthly to pay for child care, therefore allowing housewives who
devoted their time to their children rather than a career, to join the
workforce. “We took important steps for empowerment of women. We work for women
to have qualified education, to help their access to the job market, have
social security and to help more women be entrepreneurs,” the minister said.
Women’s
employment rate in Turkey stands at around 34%, but the government hopes to
raise this number using several incentives. This includes financial support for
women’s cooperatives and interest-free loans for female entrepreneurs. It also
increased the length of maternity leave for working women and provides
financial support for daycare needs. Grandparents looking after the working
mothers' children also are entitled to allowances as part of the employment
scheme.
https://www.dailysabah.com/turkey/mothers-at-work-project-for-womens-employment-in-turkey-expands-scope/news?gallery_image=undefined#big
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