Youngest Nobel-Prize Laureate, Malala Yousafzai: Women Have the Right to Choose between Burqa and Bikini
New Age Islam News Bureau
07 March 2022
• In Remote Pakistani City, Jacobabad, Young Women
Break Taboo with Hockey Sticks
• Rami Malek, Yara Shahidi to Celebrate International
Women's Day in Dubai
• In Greek Migrant Camp, Afghan Woman Finds Strength
in Art
• Angelina Jolie Arrives In Yemen to Draw Attention to
Dire Humanitarian Situation
• A Year on from Iraq’s Yazidi Survivors Law, Nothing
Has Changed for Those Who Return
• As Women’s Marches Gain Steam in Pakistan,
Conservatives Grow Alarmed
• Indonesian Envoy Urges To Promote ‘Women Economic
Empowerment’ In Islamic World
• International Women’s Day: Condition of Pakistani
Women Continues to Decline, Says Report
Compiled by New
Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/nobel-prize-laureate-malala-burqa-bikini/d/126524
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Youngest Nobel-Prize Laureate, Malala Yousafzai: Women
Have the Right to Choose between Burqa and Bikini
Youngest Nobel-Prize Laureate,
Malala Yousafzai
------
March 07, 2022
The youngest Nobel-Prize laureate, Malala Yousafzai,
has often made headlines while sharing her opinion on imperative Matters. As
Women's Day approaches, Malala has put her words to paper and shared her two
cents on defending every woman’s right to determine what she wears.
She started with how one of her relatives complained
to her father about how she "should be at home, not in front of the
cameras," as she gave interviews to the local publications while shedding
light on the need for girls' education in her hometown. She further revealed
that her relative then added how if Malala was "going to speak, she should
at least cover her face!” She penned, "Girls should be neither seen nor
heard – and especially not both at once."
Adding on, she continued, "Many people in Swat
Valley, Pakistan shared his [Malala's relative] perspective. Like other Pashtun
women, my mother wore a long, hefty embroidered shawl that swirled around her
shoulders and covered her face." Malala further shared, "When the
Taliban took over Swat Valley, and these shawls were not Islamic enough for
them. They mandated that all women must wear a black Abaya and shuttlecock
Burqa. Dare to step outside in anything other than the uniform chosen for you
by Taliban men and you risked a severe beating. I, too, wore a Burqa for a
while when I was 10 or 11 years old."
She then commented how in Pakistan today, Muslim
girls’ and women’s clothing varies by region, community and family. "They
might wear Shalwar Kameez or a business suit. They may wear a scarf around
their neck, on their head, covering their face, or no scarf at all. They might
wear a Burqa," Malala asserted. She added, "As Pakistani girl
transitions into adolescence, her family, neighbours and even strangers expect
her to look a certain way. How a girl chooses to dress determines what people
think of her and how they will treat her. If you do not follow your community’s
established dress code, you’re a threat to the culture, to religion. You’re an
outsider, not to be trusted or befriended."
Malala, however, said was determined to decide for
herself. "My face meant identity, presence and power for me – and I
refused to cover it," she wrote.
Policing women on clothing
"Around the world, girls are under attack for
what they wear. Last month the Indian state of Karnataka banned girls wearing
hijabs from classrooms and colleges, forcing them to choose between their
educations or suffering the humiliation of removing their head coverings at the
school gates. Senators in France voted 160 to 143 to ban hijabs in sports
competitions in January," she then communicated. "Until last year,
schools in Indonesia directed all girls to wear a jibab covering their head,
neck and chest. Though a recent government decree banned this practice,
Christian and other non-Muslim girls report some teachers are still insisting
that they wear the Jilbab. Meanwhile in Afghanistan, Taliban officials advise
women to wear blankets to work."
Adding on, Malala retorted, "South Africa’s High
Court found that a school had violated a Hindu girl’s rights by requiring her
to remove her nose ring. Schools in both the United Kingdom and United States
have punished Black girls for their hairstyles, sending them home or giving
them detention for wearing their hair as they pleased. The International
Handball Federation required women to wear revealing outfits in competition,
while a woman in a similar outfit was told she couldn’t board a plane unless
she covered up. In Japan, women are told to wear high heels and take off their
eyeglasses at work."
Malala continued that women and girls in every corner
of the globe understand that, if they are harassed or assaulted on the street,
their clothes are more likely to face trial than their attackers.
"Women are constantly being told to put on or
take off various items of clothing, constantly sexualised or suppressed. We are
beaten at home, punished at school and harassed in public for what we
wear," she remarked. "Years ago I spoke against the Taliban forcing
women in my community to wear burqas – and last month I spoke against Indian
authorities forcing girls to remove their hijabs at school. These aren’t
contradictions – both cases involve objectifying women. If someone forces me to
cover my head, I will protest. If someone forces me to remove my scarf, I will
protest."
She then made a point and shared, "Whether a woman
chooses a burqa or a bikini, she has the right to decide for herself. Come and
talk to us about individual freedom and autonomy, about preventing harm and
violence, about education and emancipation. Do not come with your wardrobe
notes."
Malala's 'westernised' shift
The 24-year-old then spoke about the time when people
criticised her for wearing jeans and a jacket in a picture. "A decade
after the Taliban forced women in my community to wear Burqas, a photo of me at
college in Oxford made news around the world. In it, I am wearing a jacket,
jeans and a scarf around my head," she wrote.
Further adding on, Malala commented "Some people
were shocked to see me out of the traditional Shalwar Kameez I wore for much of
my early life. They criticised me for being too Western and claimed I had
abandoned Pakistan and Islam. Some said the jeans were permissible as long as I
kept my scarf on. Others said my scarf was a symbol of oppression and I should
take it off as if I could not be fully emancipated until I erased all traces of
my ethnicity and faith. I said nothing. I felt no obligation to defend myself
or meet anyone’s expectations of me."
Malala then opines, "The truth is, I love my
scarves. I feel closer to my culture when I wear them. I hope girls from my village
will see that someone who looks like them and dresses like them can complete
her education, have a career and choose her own future."
She concluded with, "Someday I might make changes
to my wardrobe. I also might not. But exploring and understanding clothing will
remain part of my life, as will defending every woman’s right to determine what
she wears. I love my patterned, floral Shalwar Kameez. I love my jeans too. And
I am proud of my scarves."
Have something to add to the story? Share it in the
comments below.
Source: Tribune Pakistan
https://tribune.com.pk/story/2346790/women-have-the-right-to-choose-between-burqa-and-bikini-malala
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In Remote Pakistani City, Jacobabad, Young Women Break
Taboo with Hockey Sticks
Erum Baloch, founder of
Stars Women Hockey Academy in Jacobabad, Sindh, Pakistan, poses during
training. (Photo courtesy: Erum Baloch)
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March 07, 2022
JACOBABAD: When Erum Baloch’s hopes of becoming a
professional hockey player were shattered by social norms, she started to dream
even bigger and promised to create an environment where the dreams of other
girls could come true.
For many girls in Jacobabad, a city of 200,000 in an
impoverished rural area of southern Pakistan’s Sindh province, sports remain a
taboo and a source of stigma.
“It was very difficult for me to proceed,” Baloch told
Arab News. “Girls could not join sports.”
But in 2017, when she was only 23, Baloch established
the Stars Women Hockey Academy Jacobabad. The club she and her friends founded
from their own savings was the first such academy for women in the region.
“It became my dream to establish a hockey academy, so
that girls who wanted to play would not find themselves in the situations like
those that I faced,” Baloch said.
Orphaned by her father at the age of four, and having
lost her only brother to a bomb blast in 2015, Baloch found all support in her
mother, Asifa Begum, who allowed her to pursue her childhood dream in hopes
that it could heal her trauma.
“My son’s death was a tragedy for the whole family.
One way for Erum to come out of it was to concentrate on her childhood dream of
running a hockey club,” Begum said.
“Despite pressure from extended family and friends, I
let her do what she wanted.”
In the beginning, it was not easy.
“People were not mentally prepared for how girls play,
so they started creating hurdles. Many also threatened us. But we didn’t stop,”
Baloch said.
The girls struggled to find a pitch, but eventually
were permitted to play at a sports ground of a girl’s college.
They still spend their own savings on the club, but
recently have also started to receive small donations to keep the academy
running.
Eighteen of their players have participated in
provincial and national-level tournaments, including Nabeela Bhayo, 21, one of
the club’s co-founding members, who now plays for the provincial Sindh Hockey
Team as a goalkeeper.
Bhayo is also one of the four Jacobabad girl hockey
players who were admitted to study at Punjab University under its sports quota
in 2019 and completed her master’s of commerce degree.
“Back home, people are so conservative that they
object to us wearing sports trousers and shirts,” she told Arab News. “I am
thankful that my family is supportive.”
Bhayo’s biggest supporter is her father, Nabeel Bhayo,
who says it is an honor that his daughter is representing Jacobabad on the
national level.
He has also been advocating among other parents to let
their daughters play sports and achieve something in their lives.
“Jacobabad is a highly conservative area,” he said.
“My daughter and her club members are breaking the taboo.”
Source: Arab News
https://www.arabnews.com/node/2037326/world
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Rami Malek, Yara Shahidi to celebrate International
Women's Day in Dubai
March 07, 2022
DUBAI: Expo 2020 Dubai has world-class attractions for
International Women’s Day on March 8 including the Middle East’s biggest
female-led music festival and the appearance of top celebrities.
US actress Yara Shahidi and Egyptian-American star
Rami Malek are scheduled to turn up at the Women’s Pavilion in collaboration
with French luxury brand Cartier.
Meanwhile, the two-day music event has been taking
place at the Festival Garden ending March 7. The performances are part of the
collaboration between “Dignified Storytelling,” the Expo 2020 Dubai Women’s
Pavilion, and Cartier’s campaign “We, The Women.” This is in line with the 2022
theme of International Women’s Day “Break the Bias.”
The artists were picked for their contribution to
culture, diversity, and the promotion of gender equality. The performers
include Les Amazones d’Afrique, a musical group from Mali, East African retro
pop band Alsarah & The Nubatones, Algerian singer Souad Massi and Egyptian
musician Dina El-Wedidi.
The concerts will be supplemented with a string of
panel talks and forums that will feature a group of celebrities, including
Lebanese actress and director Nadine Labaki, who will appear alongside several
notable women including Sheikh Hasina, prime minister of Bangladesh and Dr.
Anwar Gargash, diplomatic adviser to the UAE president.
Rounding off the celebrations is a guest appearance
from Oscar-winning Malek, who will hit the stage at the Al-Wasl Dome for a ceremony
to celebrate the day, also organized by Cartier.
Slam poet Emi Mahmoud and the orchestra of renowned
composer Thomas Roussel will also perform during the ceremony on March 8.
Source: Arab News
https://www.arabnews.com/node/2037641/lifestyle
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In Greek migrant camp, Afghan woman finds strength in
art
Mar 07, 2022
In a tiny classroom in a migrant camp in Greece,
18-year-old Roya Rasuli teaches a bustling group of young girls how to paint.
For Rasuli, it's also a lesson in women's empowerment.
"What is your message for women, for girls?"
Rasuli, who was born in Iran to Afghan refugees, asks her class.
"To be strong!" one of the girls shouts.
Hanging on the blue wall behind her is some of
Rasuli's own artwork, including a painting of the green-eyed "Afghan
Girl" whose iconic 1985 photo in National Geographic in a red headscarf
became a symbol of Afghanistan's wars. Rasuli painted her without a mouth.
"I think this is the situation for a lot of
women. Maybe in Syria, maybe in Iraq, maybe in Pakistan, maybe in some country
in Europe."
Rasuli had never picked up a paintbrush before
arriving in Greece three years ago but she has since taught herself to draw.
She along with about 500 asylum-seekers - most of them
Afghans - live in the Thiva camp, one of dozens set up across Greece since
Europe's 2015 migration crisis, when nearly a million refugees and migrants
fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and beyond arrived on the continent
through Greece.
She leaves the camp at 5 a.m. for an hour-and-a-half
long bus ride to the Athens School of Fine Arts for class, from where she hopes
to receive a scholarship to study full-time.
"When I start to paint (it's) like I'm traveling
in another world, in another place that there is peace," said Rasuli, who
also taught herself English.
Another one of her paintings, in the style of Vincent
van Gogh's "Starry Night", shows a woman in the traditional blue
Afghan burqa playing the guitar.
Rasuli, whose class in the Thiva camp in central
Greece meets every week thanks to a UNICEF-funded program run by Greek charity
Solidarity Now, says she hopes to inspire other young women to pursue their
goals.
"I changed my life with my hopes and my
dreams," she said. "I will try my best to show them that they can do
whatever they want, to be free." Reuters
Source: Tribune India
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Angelina Jolie arrives in Yemen to draw attention to
dire humanitarian situation
06 March ,2022
UNHCR Special Envoy Angelina Jolie arrived in Yemen as
part of a visit that aims to draw attention to the implications of the dire
humanitarian situation in the country, the United Nations refugee agency said
on Sunday.
According to the UNHCR, Jolie will visit Yemeni
families, including internally displaced ones to learn from them how the
conflict, which is now in its seventh year, has ripped their lives apart.
The Hollywood actress’s visit to Yemen comes ahead of
the annual High-Level Pledging Conference for Yemen, which will be held on
March 16.
The agency voiced hope that her visit “will highlight
the increasing humanitarian needs in Yemen and help mobilize urgent support for
humanitarian work” ahead of the conference.
“I’ve landed in Aden, to meet displaced families and
refugees for UNHCR and show my support for the people of Yemen. I will do my
best to communicate from the ground as the days unfold,” Jolie wrote on
Instagram.
“As we continue to watch the horrors unfolding in
Ukraine, and call for an immediate end to the conflict and humanitarian access,
I’m here in Yemen to support people who also desperately need peace,” she
added.
Jolie also described the situation in Yemen as one of
“the worst humanitarian crises in the world,” noting that one civilian is
either killed or injured every hour in 2022.
Known for her philanthropic activities, she added in a
post on Instagram that the “shocking situation” in Ukraine where more than 1.5
million people have fled the war must be a lesson which teaches everyone that
people “cannot be selective about who deserves support.”
She reaffirmed that the lives of civilian victims are
all of equal value.
“After seven years of war, the people of Yemen also
need protection, support, and above all, peace,” Jolie added.
Source: Al Arabiya
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A year on from Iraq’s Yazidi Survivors Law, nothing
has changed for those who return
05-03-2022
KHANKE, Kurdistan Region - A little under two months
ago, from her home in the village of Khanke in Iraq’s Kurdistan Region, Khansa
Khder Khadida received a phone call informing her of the discovery of her
eldest grandchild, 18-year-old Roza Ameen Barakat, by the Syrian Democratic
Forces (SDF) near the Syrian town of Tal Abyad on the Turkish border. On
February 16, after returning to her hometown of Shingal the previous day, Roza
was reunited with her two sisters, youngest brother and grandmother for the
first time in almost eight years.
Among the most irredeemably grotesque acts of the
Islamic State (ISIS) was its attack upon the Yazidi homeland of Shingal, northern
Iraq, on August 3, 2014, setting into the motion the killing of thousands, and
capture of thousands more, as it irreparably fractured the religious minority’s
community. Over seven years later, thousands of Yazidis remain unaccounted for
and there is little provision for survivors who live in Iraq, existing below
the poverty line despite warm words.
Mostly women and young children, over 6,417 Yazidis
were kidnapped, according to the Kurdistan Regional Government’s Office for
Rescuing Kidnapped Yazidis. In recent years, some have been found in Turkey,
Yemen, and even Halabja, and hundreds more have returned to ruptured families
as a result of uncomfortable bribes and people smuggling operations, chiefly in
Syria.
In 2022, the fate of almost 3,000 of the abducted is
unknown.
Figures issued by the same office, approved by the
United Nations, put the number of those left in the hands of ISIS at 2,763:
1,293 women and girls, and 1,470 boys and men; many of whom were children at
the time of capture.
Until last month, Roza was among the missing.
Just over a week later, dressed in jeans and silver
jewellery, she pushes open the gate outside the stone building she lives in,
ushering a curious journalist into the courtyard. Her grandmother - clothed in
a traditional white dress and headscarf, with a black sweater and cardigan for
warmth - brings tea.
In this outhouse of survivors, Khansa looks after four
of her grandchildren: Roza and three siblings; a brother, 11, and two sisters
aged 14 and 16. Almost immediately, as she introduces the family, Khansa
explains how the youngest sister spent ten months in ISIS captivity, and the
middle child was held for just under four years. Listening, the three young
women touch each other gently as they settle onto doshaks (mattresses) in a
bare stone room.
The following day, under the tree in the courtyard, a
relative recounts a story of how, heavily pregnant, Khansa once stood in front
of US military tanks on the outskirts of Mosul in 2003, requesting access to
the city to give birth. She is a tough woman. The youngest daughter she birthed
after the tanks passed is now one of the missing.
Of Roza’s family of 14, seven are still unaccounted
for. The children haven’t seen their mother, Hazu Murad, and father since
August 2014, and they long to know their fate. A further three sisters remain
in captivity, along with an older 13-year old brother. Nobody knows where they
might be, so nobody can actively search for them.
The youngest child was released from Mosul only after
his extended family paid $9,000 to a smuggler three years ago as the so-called
caliphate fell. He sits politely, engrossed in playing a Lego game on a
borrowed smartphone. None of the rescued have yet received support.
“Just imagine that someone has to buy their children,”
Roza says, describing how relatives and friends contributed to securing his
freedom. They have received nothing to date from the Kurdistan Region’s Office
for Rescuing Kidnapped Yazidis, affiliated to Kurdistan Region President
Nechirvan Barzani, nor as a result of last year’s groundbreaking Yazidi
Survivors Law, passed by the Iraqi parliament on March 1, 2021.
Around 200,000 displaced Yazidis live in the Kurdistan
Region, and there is rampant confusion as to what the law might mean for their
community; so far, it has not been implemented, so reparations and support have
not been delivered.
The Yazidi [Female] Survivors Law
The legislation formally recognises that genocide was
committed against the Yazidi, Turkmen, Christian, and Shabak communities by
ISIS, promising a number of reparation measures, including financial, medical,
and psychological support, the provision of land, housing, education, and a two
percent quota in public sector employment to women survivors, Yazidi children abducted
and released, and members of these four communities - both women and men - who
survived mass killings.
Under the auspices of Iraq’s ministry of labour and
social affairs, the General Directorate of Yazidi Female Survivors' Affairs was
established, headed by Sarab Alias, with an office opened in Mosul in August
2021 in a ceremony attended by survivors, and Iraq’s Prime Minister Mustafa
al-Kadhimi.
The directorate has responsibility for providing
support and searching for the missing; the first in the list of survivors’
priorities. Under Article 3, it may open branches in locations with high
numbers of survivors; a Shingal branch is planned, as well one in Duhok and Tal
Afar. Many survivors were not happy with the headquarters being based in Mosul;
the location where many women had been held captive and sold into slavery.
Among the Yazidi community, there is understandably
little faith in the system, compounded by fake information circulating on
social media. As time passes, trust wanes.
There is still no application process, but there are
hopes for an online portal, allowing survivors to directly seek the support the
law promises in as burdenless a way as possible. Monthly salaries will be
provided, it says, no “less than twice the minimum pension salary stipulated in
the Unified Pension Law No. 9 of 2014 and its amendments.” The law itself is
yet to be costed. An alliance of 31 Iraqi civil society organisations, the
Coalition for Just Reparations (C4JR) are pushing a survivor-centred approach
to implementing the law.
It also needs the funding to function. “Apart from the
preliminary emergency funding allocated in 2021, no financial means have, as of
yet, been envisaged to support sustainable and thorough implementation of the
law in 2022,” they say.
With political chaos continuing in Baghdad, and a new
government still to be formed following Iraq’s October election, the Iraqi
Federal Budget for 2022 has been kicked down the road meaning there is nothing
for survivors to access.
Head of Program for Rights and Justice at Jiyan
Foundation for Human Rights, Bojan Gavrilovic, explained to Rudaw English that
a renewed commitment from political stakeholders and the international
community is necessary to deliver on the law's promises.
“Let us not forget that delayed and ineffective
implementation of the Yazidi Law prolongs the agony of survivors, many of whom
still linger in IDP camps or live under the poverty line, traumatised, without
access to services and recognition,” he said.
Reflecting on the anniversary of the law’s passage,
barely a week after Roza’s arrival in Khanke, the Kurdistan Region’s SEED
Foundation called upon the Iraqi government to act on its obligations to
survivors and to ensure the allocation of sufficient funding in the budget. But
while the KRG is not mandated to contribute to funding the law, it can provide
information to the committee tasked with processing claims (Article 10 of the
Survivors Law).
Roza's story
Half a dozen children from Khanke’s sprawling camp,
just down the hill, run around the courtyard, occasionally peering through the
door. Birds chirp, a cockerel cries, electricity flickers.
Speaking in a mix of Arabic and Kurmanji, Roza begins
to explain how she was abducted in August 2014, aged just 11. She lived at
first with an ISIS family from Tal Afar who treated her terribly. After
attempts to escape, she was moved to Raqqa; the de facto capital of the
caliphate.
As the years passed and the coalition bore down on
ISIS, Roza found herself in Baghouz, where she endured heavy bombing and
limited information about what was happening in the outside world. Her foot and
back were injured in two airstrikes. The ISIS fighter she had been forced into
marriage with was killed.
Following his death, and before the liberation of
ISIS’ last-stand in March 2019, she says she was smuggled out of Baghouz by a
Lebanese family. The majority of her next three years were spent in Deir
ez-Zor, as well as a period in Idlib.
From there, towards the end of 2021, Roza attempted to
reach the town of Tal Abyad on the Turkish border when the SDF set in motion
the process of her return to Iraq last month.
Distant relatives - neighbours, visitors - frequently
sit next to us as we talk, stunting Roza’s flow and subtly changing the depth
of conversation. Later, Roza notes the date - December 24 - that she was brought to a Yazidi safe house
in Hasaka. From now on, she says, she will mark her birthday on this day.
While it has been good to return to her community, her
happiness is not complete. “Many of my Yazidi friends and relatives remain in
captivity.”
Roza is calm and strong. She doesn’t want to think
about the things she experienced, she says. She thought about the past when she
was in Syria; now she is in Iraq, it must be forgotten.
Contemplating the future
Asked about the future, she says she wants to complete
her studies. It would be nice to make friends, and she audibly contemplates
what it might be like to return to school like her sisters, and how much effort
it will take to register to attend.
If she can, she would like to be a psychiatrist. Along
with her siblings, Roza has not received any psychological support herself.
There’s shattered faith in what one naively assumes
might have been provided by the international community, federal government, or
Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).
“If they wanted to help us, they would have helped us
before,” Roza says. “Since returning, I have not received any support, but
maybe this will change in the future.”
Farhad Ali, 24, also from Shingal, agrees. If there
was genuine support for these survivors, he told Rudaw English, assistance
would be available already and immediately. In an effort to help his community,
Farhad founded an NGO, Progress in Peace. Unsurprisingly, they do not receive
government funding of any kind, relying solely on donations.
Roza continues. The main thing she says her community
wants is the release of the thousands of others in captivity. “Still there are
so many Yazidi women suffering from persecution at the hands of ISIS.”
“The other thing that is so difficult for us is our
financial situation,” Roza says, stressing the point throughout the
conversation, lamenting the limited income opportunities for her household. “It
is so bad, we are a house of women and an eleven-year-old boy.”
The family have little savings, and will be unable to
live without support for much longer, Khansa frets. The rent for the bare,
ramshackle building is $100 a month, not including water and limited
electricity; a cost covered by a distant taxi-driving uncle. With no men in the
home, there is no income, and it is difficult to live without the support of
Roza’s father, Amin Barakat. “We need financial support, and someone to tell us
they are with us,” she says; something her family have asked for many times.
Later, in a corrugated shed structure in nearby Khanke
camp, home to around 20,000 Yazidis, a neighbour of Roza’s family from their
time in Shingal explains how hard the situation is for the matriarch of the
family. Avoiding the need to ask directly, the women estimate that she is at
least in her late 60s.
“She [Khansa] only had one son, Roza’s father. Now he
is gone, there is no one to support her, and she has all of these
grandchildren.”
Outside, as the sun sets overlooking the Tigris river,
children dressed in tatty clothing run around, keen to try out their English.
For Rondik, 8, Khanke camp is the only home she can remember. Slightly older,
her cousin, Shahira, asks questions about countries she wants to visit.
The great narrative of Yazidi suffering is essentially
just this; children, teenagers, young adults across Iraq with stunted lives,
wondering who they are and how to pick up the pieces.
As the conversation with Roza closes, a group of
distant, desperate relatives and neighbours from the days of her Shingal
childhood arrive at the house to ask about their own missing relatives; some
have returned to Shingal, others live in Duhok and nearby camps. They hope that
during her time in Raqqa, Baghouz, Deir ez-Zor and Idlib, she may have seen a
glimpse of someone; a lead on their whereabouts, perhaps, or confirmation of a
final moment.
The chances of this seem slim. Earlier, Roza said she
hadn’t seen another Yazidi woman since she left Baghouz just over three years
ago. Yet even in this futile attempt, in this one moment, an eighteen-year-old
woman is perhaps doing more to help find Yazidis than entire governments.
In passing the Yazidi Survivors Law in 2021, Iraqi
decision-makers laid the groundwork for a bearable future for a broken and
traumatised community. Until it is implemented, however, for the thousands of
missing Yazidis yet to return, and young women like Roza and her siblings,
there is little to come back to.
Source: Rudaw
https://www.rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/030320222
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As Women’s Marches Gain Steam in Pakistan,
Conservatives Grow Alarmed
By Zia ur-Rehman
March 6, 2022
KARACHI, Pakistan — The reaction to Pakistan’s first
women’s march was relatively mild: criticism and condemnation from Islamist
parties and conservatives, who called the participants “anti-religion” and
“vulgar.”
That did not deter the organizers of the 2018 march in
Karachi, the significance of which reverberates to this day.
What started as a single demonstration to observe
International Women’s Day has become an annual lightning rod for religious
conservatives across Pakistan, who have been adopting harsher attitudes toward
female activists. Now, as women prepare to march on Tuesday in Karachi and
other cities, powerful figures in Pakistan want the event banned altogether.
Women planning to join the Aurat Marches, as they are
called — Urdu for “women’s march” — have faced countless threats of murder and
rape, along with accusations that they receive Western funding as part of a
plot to promote obscenity in Pakistan.
“The growing uneasiness surrounding Aurat March every
year shows that the campaign for women’s rights has been making an impact,”
said Sheema Kermani, one of the march’s founders.
Last year, opposition peaked when Islamist groups
demonstrated in major cities, accusing the marchers of using blasphemous
slogans — a crime punishable by death in Pakistan, accusations of which have
provoked lynchings and murders. The Pakistani Taliban have ominously warned the
marchers to “fix their ways.”
The first Aurat March was organized by a small group
of women in the port city of Karachi, who hoped to draw attention to the
violence, inequality and other challenges faced by women across the country.
“We had held discussions and mobilized women in
various communities, collected funds by small contributions from individuals,
and wrote a manifesto to articulate demands related to women’s bodily rights to
the government and Pakistani society,” Ms. Kermani said.
It worked. On March 8, 2018, the march drew thousands
to the grassy grounds of Frere Hall, a majestic monument in Karachi dating from
the British colonial era.
It also inspired women in other Pakistani cities, like
Lahore and Islamabad. Since then, Aurat Marches have been held annually in
major urban centers.
Analysts said the success of the first march made it a
polarizing event in Pakistan, even as it advanced the possibilities of women’s
activism in the Muslim-majority nation.
“Younger feminists who were inspired by a series of
global women’s marches took their rage against violence, moral policing and
lack of bodily or sexual choices for women and marginalized genders to the
streets,” said Afiya Shehrbano Zia, the author of a book on feminism and Islam
in Pakistan.
Girls brought placards proclaiming, “My body, my
choice,” and performed an Urdu version of a Chilean protest song, “A Rapist in
Your Path,” that assails rape culture and victim-shaming.
“There was nothing subtle about their slogans and
banners from the first march,” Ms. Zia said, noting that the protesters had
even highlighted L.G.B.T.Q. rights, a bold move in Pakistan.
As the event grew bigger over the years, marchers
started raising even more sensitive issues, including abortion rights.
Pakistan’s abortion rate is among the highest in the world; women who end their
pregnancies often do so themselves, because many doctors refuse to perform the
procedure on religious and cultural grounds.
Some Islamist parties responded to the marches’
growing popularity by organizing their own “modesty march.” In 2020,
conservatives filed court petitions in an unsuccessful attempt to stop the
Aurat Marches. That same year, a group of students and supporters of the Lal
Masjid, the mosque at the center of a bloody 2007 clash between militant
Islamists and the army, assaulted marchers in Islamabad.
After last year’s march, opponents doctored footage to
make it appear that marchers had used blasphemous slogans, then circulated the
faked videos on social media. A newspaper published a front-page story that
referred to the marchers as prostitutes.
Pakistan’s minister for religious affairs, Noorul Haq
Qadri, has spoken out against the Aurat March, claiming it violates the
principles of Islam. He recently asked Prime Minister Imran Khan to declare
March 8 to be International Hijab Day.
And some Islamist parties have threatened further
violence. “The marchers spread obscenity in the name of women’s rights,” said
Abdul Majeed Hazarvi, a leader of the Jamiat-e-Ulema Islam-Fazl party in
Islamabad. “If the government allows the march, we will use a baton to stop
it.”
Kiran Masih, 46, a Christian nurse with two daughters,
has joined an Aurat March for the past two years, bringing a placard that
reads, “Save our daughters.”
“As a minority, we feel increasingly insecure,” Mrs.
Masih said. “At the workplace, we fear anyone can harm us on the false
allegations of blasphemy, and at our homes, we fear that our daughters could be
kidnapped and converted to Islam.”
Last year, at least 84 people were accused of breaking
Pakistan’s blasphemy laws, and three people suspected of doing so were killed
by mobs, according to the Center for Social Justice, a Lahore-based
organization that campaigns for the rights of minority groups.
The Aurat marchers have claimed victories. They
campaigned against the physically intrusive “virginity tests” often inflicted
on women who bring accusations of rape, and a court in the northern city of
Lahore banned them last year. The government has also passed a measure allowing
the chemical castration of convicted rapists, another demand of the marchers.
But the increasingly aggressive opposition has left
some march organizers fearing for their lives. Many have deactivated their
social media accounts. Still, they are undaunted.
“We were and are scared, but we know that without
putting ourselves in such a dangerous situation we cannot bring change,” Ms.
Kermani said.
Source: New York Times
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/06/world/asia/pakistan-aurat-march-women.html
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Indonesian envoy urges to promote ‘Women Economic
Empowerment’ in Islamic world
March 7, 2022
Ambassador of Indonesia in Pakistan, Adam M. Tugio
here on Sunday stressed the need for promoting ‘Women Economic empowerment in
Islamic World by participating in business and economic activities, For women’s
economic empowerment, they need to pave the way for inclusion in the national
economy and women in Islamic countries are second to none in their abilities,
the Ambassador said.
The event was part of series of discussions to share
best practices of women’s breakthrough leadership in socio-economic affairs,
politics and policy making in the Islamic world.—APP
Source: Pak Observer
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International Women’s Day: Condition of Pakistani
women continues to decline, says report
6 March, 2022
Islamabad [Pakistan], March 6 (ANI): While the world
celebrates International Women’s Day on March 8, women in Pakistan are still
caught in the trap of a feudal conservative patriarchal society, where women’s
day celebrations are condemned and seen against the ‘Islamic’ values, local
media reported.
According to the last year’s ‘Global Gender Gap Report
2021’, Pakistan ranked 153 out of 156 countries on the gender parity index,
that is, among the last four. It ranked seventh among eight countries in South
Asia, only better than Afghanistan. Pakistan’s gender gap has even widened by
0.7 per cent points in 2021 compared to 2020.
Notably, since the Imran Khan government came to power
in August 2018, Pakistan’s Global Gender Gap Index has worsened over time. In
2017, Pakistan ranked 143, slipping to 148 in 2018.
The report indicates that Pakistan needs 136 years to
close the gender gap, with its existing performance rate. These statistics show
that overall progress in reducing the gender gap is stagnant in Pakistan in
four areas: economic participation and opportunity; education attainment;
health and survival, and political empowerment.
In other words, women in Pakistan are faring badly to
men in these four dimensions of the gender index. The report also pointed out
that women in Pakistan do not have equal access to justice, ownership of land
and non-financial assets or inheritance rights.
In addition to the debilitating gender index, Pakistan
is infamous for brazen cases of “honour killings” and domestic violence against
women. According to Human Rights Watch, almost 1,000 women are murdered
annually in Pakistan in the name of honour.
The high profile “honour killing” of Qandeel Baloch in
2016, a social media personality in Pakistan, by her brother Muhammad Waseem is
a case in point, where the perpetrator (her brother) openly confessed his crime
without a sign of remorse. Waseem had received a life-imprisonment sentence in
2019 for the killing. But after serving less than six years in prison, he is
set to walk free on the grounds of a “family settlement and lack of evidence.”
In another case of violence against women, Noor
Mukadam, daughter of former Pakistani diplomat Shaukat Mukadam, was brutally
raped and then killed in Islamabad in July 2021. The case grabbed global
attention because of the victim’s ‘high-profile’ family background. However, a
majority of women in Pakistan who are also victims of similar violence are
among the country’s poor and middle classes, and their deaths are often not
reported or, when they are, ignored in most cases.
Furthermore, women belonging to minority communities
face ‘double’ marginalisation. Besides the usual patriarchal subjugations, they
are also the victims of forced conversions, marriages, abduction and rapes as
well as regular targets of false blasphemy charges. More importantly, they are
deprived of any justice because of their ‘non-Muslim’ status.
In November last year, the United Kingdom’s All-Party
Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Pakistani Minorities had published a report
which revealed that around 1,000 girls (Hindus and Christians) between the ages
of 12-25 are forcibly converted to Islam every year and married to their
abductors. The report described this situation as a “human-rights catastrophe”.
Crimes against women in Pakistan cut across classes
and is driven by various factors such as religious conservatism, loopholes in
women-centric laws, lack of employment and educational opportunities, blatant
misogyny against women by political leaders, among others. The misogynist
attitude prevails right from the top levels of the government.
In an interview last year, Imran Khan had blamed women
wearing “very few clothes” for rising sexual violence. In an earlier interview,
he had criticised Pakistanis for adopting what he called the “immoral
mannerisms” of the West. Khan in fact has attempted to belittle the women’s day
by declaring March 8 as the ‘International Hijab Day’, the Dawn newspaper
reported.
These instances show that the misogynistic attitudes
of Pakistan’s democratically-elected leadership align with the religious
conservatives who demand implementation of the ‘Sharia Law’.
The rights of women in Pakistan have been a
longstanding issue of public debate and international interest. As the world is
moving forward and women are getting equal status in the fields of education or
employment opportunities, Pakistan is witnessing a backsliding as far as
women’s rights are concerned. The country has become more conservative since
Imran Khan came to power. Islamist parties such as Tehreek-i-Labbaik and
Jamaat-e-Islami, among others, are feeling emboldened and have gained more
popularity across the country in the last three years, spreading harsher
version of Islam, especially targeting women and minorities.
In addition, the Taliban’s forceful takeover of
Afghanistan last year and the subsequent increase in violence against women
under the Sharia Law has further exacerbated fears among women in Pakistan.
For Imran Khan, issues related to women do not feature
in his top policy priorities. Moreover, he dreams of turning Pakistan into the
Riyasat-i-Medina, which suggests more repressive rules and regulations for
women under the Islamic laws. Therefore, the future of women’s freedom in
Pakistan looks bleak, especially for girls and women from minority communities,
as cases of domestic violence, honour killings, intimidation and discrimination
are expected to rise unless there are serious judicial reforms in the existing
laws discriminating against women in Pakistan. (ANI)
Source: The Print
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URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/nobel-prize-laureate-malala-burqa-bikini/d/126524