In A First, Saudi Arabia Set To Be Represented By Rumy Alqahtani In Miss Universe Pageant
New Age Islam News Bureau
28 March 2024
·
In A First, Saudi Arabia Set To
Participate In Miss Universe Pageant
·
Pakistani Actress Ayeza Khan
Honoured With UAE’s Golden Visa
·
Iran Court Sentences 11 Women's
Rights Advocates to Jail
·
Afghan Universities Still Closed
to Girls After Over 450 Days
·
France’s PM Stands With Teachers
After School Chief Quits In Hijab Row
·
In Senegal, Mariam Sonko Is
Championing Women's Rights And Agricultural Sustainability
·
Women’s Authority In Amran
Organizes Event On National Steadfastness Day
·
UN Supports 40 Afghan Women And
Girls In Sewing
Compiled
by New Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/saudi-arabia-pageant-rumy-alqahtani/d/132024
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In a first, Saudi Arabia set to be represented by Rumy
Alqahtani in Miss Universe Pageant
Rumy Alqahtani, a beauty
pageant veteran and an influencer, will be representing the kingdom at the
pageant. (Photo: Instagram/@rumy_alqahtani)
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March 27, 2024
In a historic first, Saudi Arabia is set to be
represented by 27-year-old Rumy Alqahtani at the Miss Universe 2024 pageant,
signaling a significant milestone in a country considered conservative
throughout its history.
Alqahtani, a and content creator hailing from Riyadh,
took to Instagram to express excitement at the opportunity while also
highlighting the significance of the country’s landmark debut at the beauty
pageant.
With this announcement, Alqahtani follows in the
footsteps of Lujane Yacoub, who represented Bahrain in the previous year’s Miss
Universe pageant, marking the first appearance of a contestant from the Gulf
region.
The upcoming Miss Universe competition will take place
in Mexico on September 18 and will also witness Iran’s debut.
Alqahtani holds a Bachelor’s degree in dentistry and
is proficient in multiple languages, including English, French, and Arabic, The
Independent reported. She has been crowned Miss Saudi Arabia, Miss Middle East
(Saudi Arabia), Miss Arab World Peace 2021 and Miss Woman (Saudi Arabia). She
has also participated in numerous global pageants, with the most recent one
being Miss and Mrs Global Asian in Malaysia in February.
The Miss Universe pageant 2023 featured a few notable
inclusions, including two transgender contestants and the first plus-size
contestant to reach the semi-finals. Sheynnis Palacios of Nicaragua made
history by winning the title of Miss Universe 2023, marking Nicaragua’s inaugural
victory in the pageant.
Source: indianexpress.com
https://indianexpress.com/article/world/saudi-arabia-rumy-alqahtani-miss-universe-pageant-9236534/
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Pakistani Actress Ayeza Khan Honoured With UAE’s Golden
Visa
Pakistani actress Ayesa Khan
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28th March 2024
Sakina Fatima
Abu Dhabi: Renowned Pakistani television actress Ayeza
Khan is the latest celebrity to be honoured with the United Arab Emirates (UAE)
10-year golden visa.
The thirty-three-year-old actress was handed over the
visa by officials from the Federal Authority for Identity and Citizenship
(ICA).
Taking to Instagram on Wednesday, March 27, Ayeza
expressed her gratitude to the Dubai government for awarding her the golden
visa.
“The unforgettable memories I’ve created in Dubai, be
it while vacationing or at work, are unparalleled to any other experiences
around the globe,” Khan wrote in a post.
“Dubai consistently provides a sense of belonging,
making it feel like home every time I return. I like to thank the government of
UAE for allowing me yet another reason to constantly visit this city. Thank you
bro Muhammad Moazzam Qureshi,” she added.
Pakistani singer and actor Fakhr-e-Alam was the first
Pakistani to receive the golden visa in June 2022, with subsequent recipients
including Javed Sheikh, Wasim Akram, Shoaib Malik, Humayun Saeed, Sana Javed,
Umair Jaswal, Junaid Khan, Ayesha Omer, Imran Abbas, Iqra Aziz and Yasir
Hussain, Laiba Khan, Maya Ali, Saba Qamar and more.
UAE’s golden visa
The golden visa was created by the UAE government in
2019 which allows foreigners to live, work and study in the country without the
need for a national sponsor and with 100 percent ownership of their business on
the UAE mainland. These visas are issued for 5 or 10 years and are
automatically renewed.
The visa is open to investors, entrepreneurs,
extraordinary talents and researchers in many disciplines of technology and
knowledge, as well as extraordinary students.
On January 25, UAE scrapped the minimum down payment
of Dirhams one million for individuals seeking a golden visa through real
estate investment.
Source: siasat.com
https://www.siasat.com/pakistani-actress-ayeza-khan-honoured-with-uaes-golden-visa-2999899/
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Iran Court Sentences 11 Women's Rights Advocates to
Jail
MARCH 28, 2024
An Iranian Revolutionary Court in northern Rasht has
handed down severe sentences to 11 women's rights advocates, amounting to a
cumulative prison term of over 60 years and six months.
Judge Mehdi Rasekhi, who presided over the trial,
sentenced Zohreh Dadras to nine years, six months, and two days in prison.
Her alleged offense was "forming a group to act
against national security."
Ten other activists, including Forough Saminia, Sara
Jahani, Yasamin Hashdari, Shiva Shah Sia, Negin Rezaie, Azadeh Chavoshian,
Matin Yazdani, Hooman Taheri, and Jelveh Javaheri, were each sentenced to six
years and 47 days in prison for "assembly and collusion to act against
national security."
Additionally, Taheri and Javaheri each received
one-year sentences for "propaganda against the Islamic Republic."
The trial had started on February 29.
The activists were arrested on August 16 last year
when security forces raided their homes in the cities of Rasht, Anzali,
Lahijan, and Fuman.
They were later released on bail from Lakan Prison in
Rasht while awaiting the outcome of their legal case.
In September, approximately 300 political and civil
rights activists signed a joint statement calling for their "unconditional
release."
Source: iranwire.com
https://iranwire.com/en/women/126763-iran-court-sentences-11-womens-rights-advocates-to-jail/
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Afghan Universities Still Closed
to Girls After Over 450 Days
[28/March/2024]
More than 450 days have passed, yet there is still no
news of universities reopening for girls.
Some female students said that they are nearly fifteen
months behind in their studies and request the Islamic Emirate to reopen
universities for them this year.
Khadijah, a student, said, "If girls are educated
and literate, it means the whole family is literate. If girls are uneducated
and illiterate, it means the entire family is uneducated and illiterate."
Another student, Narow, said, "Our request is
that they please open the doors of schools and universities to girls so they
can study and we can have a strong and advanced society."
Some university professors also believe that the
continued closure of university to girls will cause the country to fall behind.
Zakiullah Mohammadi, a university professor, said,
"When we want to govern as a ruling government and as a responsible
government in society, we must grant all our citizens their basic rights."
Former President Hamid Karzai, in a meeting with the
Norwegian chargé d'affaires, also regarded the reopening of schools and
universities for girls as a necessity.
The Islamic Emirate has said nothing new about reopening
schools and universities for girls; however, it has previously stated that the
caretaker government has not denied girls' right to education.
After the Islamic Emirate's return to power, the gates
of schools were closed to girls above the sixth grade, and more than a year
later, the gates of universities were also closed to female students.
Source: tolonews.com
https://tolonews.com/afghanistan-188034
---
France’s PM Stands With Teachers
After School Chief Quits In Hijab Row
March 28, 2024
PARIS: Prime Minister Gabriel Attal on Wednesday
defended French secularism following the resignation of a Paris school
principal who received death threats after asking a student to remove her
Muslim veil on the premises.
Attal, a former education minister, said the state
would be filing a complaint against the student over falsely accusing the
headmaster of mistreatment during the incident in late February.
“The state... will always stand with these officials,
those who are on the frontline faced with these breaches of secularism, these
attempts of Islamist entryism in our education establishments,” he said during
the evening news on the TF1 television channel.
Secularism and religion are hot-button issues in
France, which is home to Europe’s largest Muslim community.
In 2004, authorities banned school children from
wearing “signs or outfits by which students ostensibly show a religious
affiliation” such as headscarves, turbans or kippas on the basis of the
country’s secular laws which are meant to guarantee neutrality in state
institutions.
The government last year said it was also banning the
abaya — a garment worn by Muslim women that covers the body from the neck to
the feet — in schools.
The headmaster’s departure comes amid deep tensions in
the country following a series of incidents including the killing of a teacher
by an Islamist former pupil last year.
The principal at the Maurice-Ravel lycee in eastern
Paris quit after receiving death threats online following an altercation with a
student last month, officials told AFP on Tuesday.
On February 28, he had asked three students to remove
their Islamic headscarves on school premises, but one of them — an adult who
was at the school for vocational training — refused and an altercation ensued,
according to prosecutors. The principal later received death threats online.
In a message addressed to the school’s staff, quoted
by French communist daily L’Humanite, the principal said that he had taken the
decision to leave for his “safety and that of the school.”
Education officials said he had taken “early
retirement.”
Attal told TF1 the headmaster had been supposed to
retire in June, and decided to leave a little earlier.
The student had lodged a complaint against the
principal, accusing him of mistreating her during the incident.
She told French daily Le Parisien that she had been
“hit hard on the arm” by the headmaster.
But the Paris prosecutor’s office on Wednesday told
AFP that her complaint had been dismissed.
An investigation has been opened into cyber-harassment
following the death threats against the headmaster.
Politicians from across the spectrum on Wednesday said
they were shocked by the resignation.
“It’s a disgrace,” Bruno Retailleau, the head of the
right-wing Republicans faction in the Senate upper house, said on X (former
Twitter).
Boris Vallaud, the head of the Socialist deputies in
the National Assembly lower house, told television broadcaster France 2 the
incident was “a collective failure.”
Marion Marechal, the granddaughter of far-right
patriarch Jean-Marie Le Pen and a far-right politician herself, spoke on Sud
Radio of a “defeat of the state” in the face of “the Islamist gangrene.”
Maud Bregeon, a lawmaker with President Emmanuel
Macron’s Renaissance party, also took aim at “an Islamist movement.”
“Authority lies with school heads and teachers, and we
have a duty to support this educational community,” Bregeon said.
Socialist Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo called the
principal to “assure him of her total support and solidarity,” said her office,
adding she was “appalled and dismayed.”
The education ministry earlier said that the
principal’s decision to leave his post was “understandable given the
seriousness of the attacks against him.”
Education Minister Nicole Belloubet had visited the
school in early March and deplored the “unacceptable attacks.”
A 26-year-old man has been arrested for making death
threats against the principal on the Internet. He is due to stand trial in
April.
The uproar comes as dozens of French schools have
received attack threats in recent weeks.
Attal has pledged to “hunt down” the people
responsible for sending them.
Around 50 schools in Paris received new bomb threats
on Wednesday, some including a “very violent video,” education authorities
said. The mayor’s office said classes were briefly interrupted for security
checks.
The prime minister pledged to increase security,
including near schools, after the Islamic State jihadist group claimed
responsibility for the killing of 137 people at a Moscow concert on Friday.
Source: arabnews.com
https://www.arabnews.com/node/2484026/world
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In Senegal, Mariam Sonko is championing women's rights
and agricultural Sustainability
March 27, 2024
When Mariam Sonko’s father died when she was a young
child, her mother struggled to take care of her and her siblings. As is the
case across Senegal and West Africa generally, women are not entitled to land
ownership as it is expected that when they marry, they will leave their
community.
After moving to her husband’s town, Sonko and a group
of women convinced a landowner to rent to them a small plot of land in return
for part of their harvest. They planted fruit trees and started a market
garden. Five years later, when the trees were full of papayas and grapefruit,
the owner kicked them off.
Sonko is now the president of a 115,000-strong rural
women’s rights movement in West Africa called We Are the Solution.
She works on training female farmers who traditionally
have no access to education, explaining their rights and financing women-led
agricultural projects.
Sonko’s training center now employs over 20 people,
with support from small organizations like the Agroecology Fund and CLIMA fund.
In one week, Sonko and her team trained over 100 women from Senegal,
Guinea-Bissau and Gambia in agroforestry and micro gardening.
After she started to earn money, people noticed that
she made investments in her children’s schooling and clothes.
Now another challenge has emerged affecting women and
men alike: climate change.
In Senegal and the surrounding region, temperatures
are rising 50% more than the global average, according to the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change, and the UN Environment Program says rainfall could
drop by 38% in the coming decades.
Where Sonko lives, the rainy season has become shorter
and less predictable. Saltwater is invading her rice paddies, caused by rising
sea levels. Some farmers have even abandoned their rice fields.
Sonko is now trying to set up seven new training
centers across southern Senegal. “There’s too much demand,” she said. Glancing
back at the circle of women studying in the fading light, she said: “My great
fight in the movement is to make humanity understand the importance of women.”
Source: africanews.com
https://www.africanews.com/2024/03/27/in-senegal-mariam-sonko-is-championing-womens-rights-and-agricultural-sustainability/
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Women’s Authority in Amran organizes event on National
steadfastness Day
[28/March/2024]
AMRAN March 28. 2024 (Saba) - The Women's Authority in
al-Madan district in Amran province has organized an event on the anniversary
of the National Steadfastness Day in solidarity with the Palestinian people and
sent a convoy in support of the naval and missile forces.
Participants raised the Palestinian and Yemeni flags
as an emphasis on continuing to support the Palestinian cause.
The participants’ speeches praised the operations of
the Yemeni armed forces and the prevention of Israeli ships from crossing the
Red and Arab Seas until the aggression is stopped and the siege on the Gaza
Strip is lifted.
They denounced the crimes of the Zionist entity
against women and children in Gaza and the silence of the Arab and Muslim
rulers regarding those crimes.
The participants called for the importance of
boycotting American and Israeli goods as a religious and moral position to
support the Palestinian people, stressing the necessity of supporting and
encouraging local products to achieve self-sufficiency.
Source: saba.ye
https://www.saba.ye/en/news3316651.htm
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UN supports 40 Afghan women and girls in sewing
Fidel Rahmati
March 27, 2024
The United Nations Children’s Fund in Afghanistan
(UNICEF) says that with the financial support of the European Union, they have
created job opportunities and sewing vocational training for 40 young women and
girls.
On Monday, March 25, UNICEF tweeted that these women
and girls can contribute to their families’ expenses through financial support
from the European Union Embassy in Afghanistan.
The European Union Delegation in Afghanistan also
stated in a message that hundreds of women and girls are acquiring skills and
opportunities for a “better” future.
UN relief agencies have increasingly focused their
assistance on women’s empowerment and employment over the past two years, as
emphasized by the UN Deputy Office in its recent 2023 reports, stating that
women’s decision-making power in families has decreased alongside the loss of
their jobs.
Most of these women emphasized international aid and
support for women in UNAMA assessments.
One woman, benefiting from the European Union’s
support, said without mentioning her name that she can now financially support
her family through sewing.
UNICEF’s office in Afghanistan also wrote, “Hundreds
of young girls, boys, and their family members will benefit from income
generation and livelihoods, including vocational training.”
Sewing and handicrafts remain the only options that
make Afghan women hopeful to engage in this field. UNAMA noted an increased
interest among girls in sewing and handicrafts after the closure of educational
opportunities.
Meanwhile, the World Food Program had earlier
announced the launch of sewing training programs across Afghanistan to promote
women’s self-sufficiency.
On Monday, the organization reported the goal of
launching these programs as “women’s self-sufficiency in Afghanistan.”
The World Food Program continued to emphasize that
this decision was made simultaneously with reducing “economic opportunities”
for women in Afghanistan.
Source: khaama.com
https://www.khaama.com/un-supports-40-afghan-women-and-girls-in-sewing/
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URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/saudi-arabia-pageant-rumy-alqahtani/d/132024