Constitutional awareness for female civil servants
13 July, 2005 - (IRIN) A series of workshops have been held in Iraqi ministries for female employees, aimed at raising awareness of the new constitution, so that they are able to make an informed choice when voting on it in October.

Insurgents Impose Curbs on Women
July 5, 2005 - (IWPR) Those who put on makeup or choose not to wear the veil fall victim to militants.

IRAQ: Acid attacks on "immodest" women on the rise
July 4, 2005 - (IRIN) For Sumeya Abdullah, a 34-year-old primary school teacher in the capital Baghdad, life will never be the same again. In late June she had her legs burned by corrosive acid in a street attack because, she believes, she was not wearing her veil and the traditional 'abaya' covering common in many Middle Eastern countries.

The US Occupation and rising religious extremism: the double threat to women in Iraq
June 25, 2005 - (WLUML) It draws attention to the problematic tendency of many progressives in the West to romanticize the Islamic insurgency in Iraq and Islamic fundamentalist movements in their own countries while ignoring their negative impact on women.

Unveiling Iraq's teenage prostitutes
June 24, 2005 - (SALON) Fleeing their war-torn homes, Iraqi girls are selling their bodies in Syria to support their families.

Iraq: We've only just begun ...
June 22, 2005 - (WLUML) A 2003 'blog' (weblog) entry by a young Iraqi woman about life under occupation, many aspects of which remain the daily reality for Iraqi women in 2005.

CHILD ABUSE ALARM
June 8, 2005 (IWPR) Violence around the country is spilling over into the home - but there's concern that child abuse cases are being neglected. An investigator at al-Karkh criminal court said he recently walked into his office to find a 5-year-old girl and her younger brother waiting for him.

SECRET DIVORCES UNDERLINE WOMEN'S POWERLESSNESS: MEN ARE ILLEGALLY DIVORCNG THEIR WIVES WITHOUT THEM KNOWING
June 2, 2005 - (Institute for War and Peace Reporting) Life for 38 year old Lana has no meaning since her husband of 18 years informed her that he'd divorced her five months earlier. Lana lived with her husband during those months, so she is shocked to hear the news.

KILLING FOR HONOUR
May 17, 2005 - (IWPR'S Iraqi Crisis Report No. 125) Faeq Ameen Bakr, director general of Baghdad's Institute of Forensic Medicine in Baghdad, often writes "killed to wash away her disgrace" in the many autopsy reports and investigations that cross his desk.

BRIDES-TO-BE RISK THEIR HEALTH
May 10, 2005 - (IWPR) The elderly woman with grey hair and wrinkled hands is surrounded by the tools of her trade - a rag splattered with blood, a scalpel, scissors, and some pieces of cotton.

Iraq's Violence Sweeps Away All the Norms
May 6, 2005 - (NYTimes) The gardenias are blooming in Baghdad, but Hala is not allowed out in the garden to cut them. A 16-year-old high school student, Hala was kidnapped for a day in the middle of April and has not set foot outside her house since.

WOMEN’S RIGHTS UNDER SCRUTINY
May 3, 2005 - (IWPR) When Shanaz Osman was asked to be a witness for a friend’s marriage, the judge asked her to find another woman to be a co-witness or stand down and allow a man to perform the role instead.

Women part of Iraq's new cabinet
April 28, 2005 - (London Free Press) Iraq's new prime minister said yesterday he submitted a slate of 36 cabinet members, including seven women, a critical step before the National Assembly votes on a new government drawing in main ethnic and religious groups and ending a three-month stalemate. The announcement came hours after gunmen killed a Shiite Muslim legislator in her home, the first elected official slain since the country's landmark vote for parliament on Jan. 30

Slain Iraqi Legislator Knew the Risks She Was Taking
April 27, 2005 - (NYTimes) Three men with pistols shot to death an Iraqi legislator today at the front gate of her home here in a brazen daylight attack that marked the first assassination of any of the 275 members of the parliamentary body elected on Jan. 30, the Iraqi police and the victim's neighbors and family said.

X-RATED FILM BOOM
April 27, 2005 - (IWPR) With the end of Saddam-era censorship, many cinemas look to profit from demand for porn movies. Twenty-five-year-old Nawzad was looking at a poster advertising a racy Turkish film.

The Girl Blogger from Iraq
April 20, 2005 - (Alternet) On Aug. 17, 2003, Riverbend posted the first entry of her blog, where she introduced herself to her readers: "I'm female, Iraqi and 24. I survived the war. That's all you need to know. It's all that matters these days anyway."

In Post-Election Iraq, Women's Hope Restrained
April 17, 2005 - (Wenews) Female politicians and a secular Iraqi Kurd as interim president do not necessarily translate into more women's rights in Iraq. At a women's shelter in Irbil, for instance, residents aren't expecting new protections from domestic violence.

FEMALE CIRCUMCISION WRECKING LIVES
April 13, 2005 - (IWPR) Much criticised by human rights groups, the practice is said to leave girls vulnerable to infection, haemorrhaging and long-term health and sexual problems. Forty years have passed since Sairan Muhammed was circumcised, but she still remembers the event vividly.

In Jeans or Veils, Iraqi Women Are Split on New Political Power
April 12, 2005 - (NY Times) One morning last week, three dozen women in Western-style business suits crowded into the office of the man who would soon be Iraq's prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari. Most were members of the newly elected National Assembly, and they had a list of demands.

SUFFERING FOR THEIR ART
April 1, 2005 - (IWPR) Women artists, marginalised under the previous regime, get boost with opening of new gallery dedicated to exhibiting their work. Malak Jamil considers herself neither single nor married. Her husband, an Iraqi soldier, went missing twenty years ago. Painting has helped Jamil to relive memories of their short time together, and inspired her to open a new gallery for female artists in Baghdad.

March 2005

Iraq's women of power who tolerate wife-beating and promote polygamy
March 31, 2005 - (Times Online) Enan Al-Ubaedey peers over her half-moon glasses, waving her black-gloved hands between repeated tugs on her long, flowing abaya to pull it closer around her face. If you say to a man he cannot use force against a woman, you are asking the impossible, she explains. So we say a husband can beat his wife, but he cannot leave a mark. If he does that, he will be punished.

SECRET DIVORCES UNDERLINE WOMEN'S POWERLESSNESS
March 25, 2005 - (IWPR) Men are illegally divorcing their wives without them knowing. Life for 38 year old Lana has no meaning since her husband of 18 years informed her that he'd divorced her five months earlier. Lana lived with her husband during those months, so she is shocked to hear the news.

GIRLS' EDUCATION PLEA
March 25, 2005 - (IWPR) Village girls want to continue their studies at high school, but are disadvantaged by their parents' traditional way of thinking. "I'll never forgive my mother for not allowing me to keep studying outside our village," said Shno Najeeb, a 21-year-old from the Sulaimaniyah district village of Chamrga.

Iraqi women's rights at risk
March 24, 2005 - (NYTimes) As the Shiite religious parties and Kurdish leaders, both big winners in the January Iraqi election, begin to shape the country, some parts of the population, including women, are at risk of losing rights, the New York Times writes in this editorial.

Focus on threats against progressive women
March 21, 2005 - (IRIN) Pharmacist Zeena Qushtiny was dressed in the latest Western fashion and wearing a sparkling diamond necklace when she was taken at gunpoint from her pharmacy in Baghdad by insurgents. Her body was found 10 days later with two bullet holes close to her eyes.

DESPERATE WOMEN SET THEMSELVES ALIGHT
March 17, 2005 - (IWPR) Self-immolation is the last resort for women trapped in unbearable lives, and it seems to be on the increase. Whenever 23-year-old Suhair starts to speak, she pulls a veil over her face to cover the disfiguring burns.

Women of Islam
March 14, 2005 - (Washington Post) They met the new secretary of state, spoke to women's organizations and conferred with the U.S. Agency for International Development. But the delegations of Afghan and Iraqi women -- led by Massouda Jalal, Afghanistan's minister of women's affairs, and Narmin Othman, her counterpart in Iraq -- were not in Washington last week merely to make courtesy calls. They were here to stress that women's issues, in the new democracies of Iraq and Afghanistan, are not peripheral. How these two countries resolve them may determine whether they remain democratic societies, or even open societies.

Message of SRSG for Iraq, Ashraf Qazi, to Iraqi Women on the occasion of International Women’s Day
March 8, 2005 - (UN News) It is with great pleasure that I offer congratulations today to the women of Iraq on the occasion of the International Women's Day and the many achievements they have accomplished over the past year. Today, citizens from around the world will honour women's rights and international peace, continuing a tradition adopted by the UN Security Council in 1977 establishing 8 March as International Women's Day.

Focus on women's rights
March 8, 2005 (IRIN) - If there is something that Iraqi women want most right now, it is recognition and respect in a country where for years they have suffered discrimination and humiliation, either from the government, or at the hands of conservative Arabic society, experts say.

Iraqi women eye Islamic law
February 25, 2005 - (CS Monitor) Covered in layers of flowing black fabric that extend to the tips of her gloved hands, Jenan al-Ubaedy knows her first priority as one of some 90 women who will sit in the national assembly: implementing Islamic law. She is quick to tick off what sharia will mean for married women. "[The husband] can beat his wife but not in a forceful way, leaving no mark. If he should leave a mark, he will pay," she says of a system she supports. "He can beat her when she is not obeying him in his rights. We want her to be educated enough that she will not force him to beat her, and if he beats her with no right, we want her to be strong enough to go to the police."

The Veil of Freedom
February 25, 2005 - (Alternet) Two years after the invasion of Iraq and just weeks before the country's first free election, "Amina" began wearing a headscarf for the first time in her life. Her father insisted upon it. "I don't like this and I don't see the danger. No one ever bothered me before," Amina says, sitting in her office located in the predominantly Shiite neighborhood of Khadimiya, her long brown hair streaming down her back. At first the 27-year-old professor at the engineering college resisted, arguing that her students will lose respect for her for caving in to the fundamentalists. But her father would not be moved: Amina didn't have a choice; the extremists were far too dangerous to be defied.

The Unheralded Revolution: Can the Gains Made by Iraq's Women Be Echoed Elsewhere?
February 24, 2005 - (Washington Post) Look beyond the jockeying for jobs in Iraq's embryonic transitional government. Focus instead on the final results in that Arab country's matrix-breaking election. They reveal a little-publicized result that President Bush, feminist organizations and democracy advocates should be shouting from the rooftops.

Iraqi women - the need for protective measures
February 22, 2004 - (Amnesty) Iraqi women must have an active role in shaping the future of their country, a new report by Amnesty International said today. Iraqi authorities must take effective measures to protect women and to change discriminatory legislation that encourages violence against them. Women and girls in Iraq live in fear of violence. The current lack of security has forced many women out of public life and constitutes a major obstacle to the advancement of their rights.

After election, Iraqi women face more uncertain future
February 18, 2005 - (Boston Globe) In every story about the aftermath of the Iraqi election there seems to be the same sentence punctuated by the same question mark. What does the victory of a Shiite Muslim alliance mean? Will the new constitution be written according to religious laws? Will the clergy determine the rights or the lack of rights for women?

Women's rights in a Shi'ite Iraq
February 17, 2005 - (Boston Globe) In every story about the aftermath of the Iraqi election there seems to be the same sentence punctuated by the same question mark. What does the victory of a Shi'ite Muslim alliance mean? Will the new constitution be written according to religious laws? Will the clergy determine the rights or the lack of rights for women?

Iraqi Women Feel the Heat
February 11, 2005 - (Alternet) On Jan. 30, 2005 a woman in Iraq gave birth to a baby girl. "We named her 'Elections' because she came at the same time as the elections," the mother told Abu Dhabi TV, referring to Iraq's first historic, democratic and free elections.

Sop to Iraqi Clerics?
February 8, 2005 - (CS Monitor) In the power struggle for religious influence in Iraq's new government, a compromise being contemplated by some of Iraq's influential clerics would be detrimental to women's rights in that country.

January 2005

Leaders Say Vote Decides Equality for Iraqi Women
January 30, 2005 - (WeNews) The fate of Iraqi women's rights will rest significantly on the outcome of Sunday's historic election, say two female leaders. Zainab Al-Suwaij and Ala Talabani say the vote will decide whether women will really become equal citizens or lose their voices.

In Culture Dominated by Men, Questions About Women's Vote
January 29, 2005 - (NY Times) The great unknown in Iraq is what women will do when they step behind the cardboard voting booths in a rare moment away from the immediate influence of husbands, sheiks and other clerics. In the south, at least, where many expect a landslide victory by the Shiite clerical parties that could tip the national tally, interviews with a range of women suggest that their potential half of the vote is actually in considerable doubt.

Iraqi Woman Defies Threats, Bullets to Seek Election
January 27, 2005 - (Reuters) Salama al-Khafaji's son was killed by Iraqi gunmen last year and she herself has survived several assassination attempts. This month she was shot at in Baghdad and only this week militants sent a note to her sister threatening to hack off the heads of her children if Khafaji continued to stand as a candidate in Iraq's first postwar election on Sunday.

Women make pitch to Iraqi voters
January 27, 2005 - (CS Monitor) In Najaf, women and tribal leaders work the streets, promising progress and getting out the vote. Making grandiose promises like any seasoned Western politician, the women candidates of southern Iraq are learning quickly about turning rhetoric into votes before Sunday's landmark election.

Fear, violence mar election hopes for Iraqi women
January 26, 2005 - (Reuters) Doctor Samira stopped driving her car to the clinic months ago. Each time she steps onto the streets of Baghdad to see patients, she covers her hair with a scarf to avoid abuse or even violence.

Without Veil
January 24, 2004 - (Guardian) A workman is pinning a banner to the wall as a chill draft swirls through the near-empty ballroom at the Palestine hotel. "An equal, secular constitution is the first step to total fairness," the sign says in Arabic. This is supposed to be one in a series of pioneering public meetings to address the growing inequalities of women in the new Iraq. A year ago, in the weeks after the invasion, hundreds of women marched in the streets outside this hotel in central Baghdad. The women were optimistic, most walked without veils and they made forceful speeches in front of the TV cameras.

Women's Rights Hinge on Vote
January 19, 2005 -(Knight Ridder News Service) On Baghdad's college campuses, the poster woman promoting the parliamentary elections Jan. 30 is a pretty student with a swinging ponytail and bare arms.

First Post-War Survey of Iraqi Women Shows Women Want Legal Rights; Dispels Notions That Women Believe Tradition, Culture Should Limit Their Participation in Government
January 18, 2005 - (WHRNet) Despite Violence, More than 90% of Iraqi Women Optimistic About The Future, But New Government Could Open or Close Windows of Opportunity, Women for Women International Warns

When the Price for Speaking Out Is Death
January 16, 2005 - (NYT) Wijdan al-Khuzai would not give in. The threats came usually by cellphone, a sinister voice promising a terrible end if Ms. Khuzai pursued a seat in Iraq's national assembly.

Women for Women International Warns That Low Participation of Women in Iraq Election, Government Threaten Democracy
January 13, 2005 - (PR Newswire) Today, Women for Women International (WWI), one of the few non-governmental organizations remaining in Baghdad, warned that low participation of women in the Iraqi election and government will hurt the country. The warning came after WWI released their report, "Windows of Opportunity: The Pursuit of Gender Equality in Post-War Iraq," the first survey of Iraqi women since the outbreak of the war.

Survey suggests widespread female circumcision in north
January 6, 2005 - (IRIN) - A ground-breaking survey done by a German NGO of 40 villages in the rural Germian region of Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq has revealed that nearly 60 percent of the area's women have undergone circumcision (also known as female genital mutilation, FGM).

DECEMBER 2004

Head Scarves Now a Protective Accessory in Iraq
December 30, 2004 - (Washington Post) Fearing for Their Safety, Muslim and Christian Women Alike Cover Up Before They Go Out. They want to be invisible, these young women at Baghdad University explained. They were sitting in a small group -- five students with pale head scarves pulled tightly around their somber faces

NGO prepares to publish major survey of Kurdish women
December 9, 2004 - (IRIN) Looking at Kurdish society in northern Iraq, it's not hard to see that women very much take the back seat: in the ministries they're the secretaries and cleaners; in the villages you're lucky if you see them at all.

Event to highlight violence and terrorism against women
December 6, 2004 (IRIN) - Women spoke out against the violence in Iraq on Friday in Baghdad at an event organised to honour aid worker Margaret Hassan and government official A'amal Ma'amalachi, two victims of killings in the last year and a half.

NOVEMBER 2004

BAGHDAD PROSTITUTES FALL ON HARD TIMES
November 29, 2004 – (IWPR) After decades of semi-official tolerance, prostitutes are under attack from local residents’ groups and religious extremists. The disappearance of the protection that prostitutes once enjoyed under Saddam Hussein’s regime has led to a vigilante campaign against on the world’s oldest profession.

Few women working in armed forces
November 23, 2004 - (IRIN) Iraqi army Sgt Ismin Norhan is the first person a mother and her little boy see when they walk up to the heavily fortified "green zone" checkpoint in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, which has been car bombed at least once and is now behind high cement barriers and razor wire.

Despite Attacks and Threats, Iraqi Women Push For Rights
November 16, 2004 - (Ms. Magazine) Iraqi women continue to be targets of Islamic extremism. According to the Washington Times, women have been threatened and in some cases killed for working outside of the home and for refusing to cover themselves with the black abaya. Heather Coyne of the United States Institute of Peace reports that she knows of cases where female leaders were abducted from their homes and others threatened with death for wearing Western clothing.

Activists push for women's rights in Iraq
November 9, 2004 - (IRIN) Salam Smeisim, an economist, wears a head scarf and long skirt; her boss, Narmin Othman, Minister of State for Women, wears a black trouser suit with no scarf. Their choice of dress might seem innocuous to the outsider, but clothing is a big symbol in a country where around 90 percent of women are covered head to toe in abayas (black gowns) or wear head scarves pinned around their chins.

OCTOBER 2004

Iraq death toll 'soared post-war'
October 29, 2004 - (BBC) Poor planning, air strikes by coalition forces and a "climate of violence" have led to more than 100,000 extra deaths in Iraq, scientists claim.

Rebel-Held Falluja Emptied of Women and Children
October 26, 2004 - (Reuters) If U.S.-led forces carry out a threatened full-scale assault on the Iraqi city of Falluja, they will find the rebel stronghold virtually deserted. Thousands of women and children have long since fled almost daily bombardment of the city by U.S. warplanes.

Interview with Yanar Mohammed, Chair of the Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq
October 2004 –- (WHRnet) Born in 1960 in Baghdad, Yanar Mohammed came of age in turbulent political times. Yanar remains a key speaker on behalf of Iraqi women and also works as editor in chief of a newspaper called Equality (Al-Mousawat). After only three issues, Yanar received a court summons for writing a story rejecting compulsory veils for women in Baghdad. Right now, Yanar says the situation facing women in Iraq is dire.

Women empowered by NGO project
October 15, 2004 - (IRIN) Women in Iraq are being given the confidence to tackle everyday problems head on without having to face bribes or fear repercussions, thanks to an international NGO running classes promoting women's rights and vocational training.

Anti-feminists for Iraqi Women
October 14, 2004 (Alternet) The State Department announced this week that the Independent Women's Forum is one of the recipients of $10 million in grants to "train Iraqi women in the skills and practices of democratic public life."

SHIELDING WOMEN FROM A RENEWAL OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE
October 14, 2004 –- (NY Times) A sampling of the smashed lives in this city's first shelter for battered women shows just how much work its founder, Yanar Mohamed, has before her.

IRAQI WOMEN RUN FOR LEGISLATURE
October 14, 2004 - (AP) Salama al-Khafaji, a deeply religious woman in an all-enveloping black robe, says that if elected, she'll bring ``bright Islamic thoughts'' to Iraq's legislature.

SEPTEMBER 2004

After Abu Ghraib
September 20, 2004 - (The Guardian) It began with a phone call. In November last year 39-year-old Huda Alazawi, a wealthy Baghdad businesswoman, received a demand from an Iraqi informant. He was working for the Americans in Adhamiya, a Sunni district of Baghdad well known for its hostility towards the US occupation. His demand was simple: Madame Huda, as her friends and family know her, had to give him $10,000. If she failed to pay up, he would write a report claiming that she and her family were working for the Iraqi resistance. He would pass it to the US military and they would arrest her.

Fern Holland's War
September 19, 2004 - (NYT Magazine) Late one night this past March in the Babylon Hotel, on the banks of the Euphrates River, Fern Holland sat alone in her office writing e-mail -- unwinding, she wrote to a friend, with a glass of Johnnie Walker and listening to Michelle Branch singing ''All You Wanted.'' She had many things on her mind, and among them was figuring out where she could get a bulldozer so she could help two Iraqi women get their land back.

Female Aid Workers in Iraq Growing More Fearful
September 17, 2004 - (WeNews) In the hallway of an elegant old house on the Tigris River that serves as the Iraq headquarters for Women for Women International, Amena Lazim Benwan, 34, pulls out a photograph of her American sponsor.

VOICES FROM IRAQ
September 8, 2004 – (BBC) BBCArabic.com spoke to six Iraqi women about their lives in the country following the war and their hopes for the future.

TWO ITALIAN WOMEN ABDUCTED IN BAGHDAD
September 7, 2004 - (AP) An Italian aid organization said Tuesday that two Italian women were kidnapped from its office in Baghdad, Iraq.

“NO BLOOD ON OUR HEADSCARF”
September 6, 2004 – (NYT) France knew no parties and no religious controversy, only republicans and patriots. As in times of war, this otherwise highly divided nation, with its many social, ethnic and religious fractures, came together last week in a frequently-invoked "holy unity."

AUGUST 2004

FRENCH JOURNALISTS KIDNAPPED IN BATTLE TO END HEADSCARF LAW
August 29, 2004 – (The Observer) An Iraqi militant group has kidnapped two French journalists and given the French government 48 hours to end a ban on schoolgirls wearing Muslim headscarves.

WEARY OF WAR, IRAQIS IN NAJAF BLAME 2 SIDES
August 23, 2004 - (New York Times) It was just about lunchtime when the sound of tank and gun fire tore through the quiet, just blocks from Amal Juad's house.

CHAOS AND FARCE AS IRAQ CHOOSES FIRST ASSEMBLY
August 19, 2004 - (The Guardian) Iraq's national conference finally chose the country's first post-Saddam assembly last night.

DEATH ON A BUSY BAGHDAD STRIP: NO MATTER WHAT THE TARGET, CILIVIANS ARE OFTEN VICTIMS
August 18, 2004 - (Washington Post ) He was a barber named Jabbar. His customers could count on finding him in his simple shop on Rasheed Street, a bustling commercial strip in the center of the city.

IRAQ'S NATIONAL CONFERENCE, FIRST STEPS IN TENSE TIMES
August 17, 2004 - (AFP) ‘I am thankful that America liberated us from Saddam, but I resent how it has been dealing with Iraqis since then.’ Black-turbaned sheiks, women activists, former dissidents, royalty and even a partisan of radical cleric Moqtada Sadr rubbed shoulders in what has been billed as Iraq’s first step toward democracy.

'THIS IS NOT THE END OF THE ROAD. IT IS THE FIRST STEP'
August 16, 2004 - (The Guardian) A downpour had been expected in Baghdad, and it arrived right on cue. The predictions had been for mortar bombs, of course, not rain, but the thud of shells exploding so close to Baghdad's convention centre caused scarcely a blink among the delegates to the much-anticipated national conference gathered inside.

US-LED ASSAULT ON IRAQ INSURGENCY KILLS DOZENS, OIL PIPELINE SHUT
August 14, 2004 - (AFP) US forces claimed to have killed 50 Sunni Muslim insurgents in air raids on the northern Iraqi city of Samarra, and more died in clashes involving Shiite militia south of the capital, despite a truce with Shiite cleric Moqtada holding out in the city of Najaf.

US BOMBING: 75 DEAD
August 12, 2004 - (SA) Heavy overnight American bombardment of Kut has killed 75 people and wounded about 150, one day after clashes between police and Shiite Muslim militiamen in the southern Iraqi city, a senior medic said on Thursday.

GENITAL MUTILATION IS TRADITIONAL IN IRAQ'S KURDISTAN
August 1, 2004 - (WOMENSENEWS) With her six children and her fine-boned face aged beyond her 39 years, Amina Khidir seems a fairly ordinary Kurdish farmer's wife. Unlike most, though, she also has a job. She circumcises girls.

JULY 2004

IRAQ'S EXCLUDED WOMEN
July/August 2004 - (Foreign Policy Magazine) Building democracy in Iraq will prove impossible without immediate leadership from the country’s forsaken majority: its women. But while the Bush administration trumpets women’s rights in the Middle East, it neglects to back words with action. The failure to empower women would condemn Iraq to the fate of its Arab neighbors—autocracy, economic stagnation, and social malaise.

THREE DAYS OF EXTRAORDINARY BLOODSHED SHAKE IRAQ
July 29, 2004 - (The NewStandard) At least 68 civilians murdered Wednesday morning when a suicide car bomb detonated 35 miles northeast of Baghdad are among the latest casualties in three days of mayhem throughout Iraq that have left well over 100 people dead.

FUNDING DELAYS OPENING OF WOMEN'S LIBRARY IN NORTH
July 28, 2004 - (IRIN) It's been nearly four months since the US-based Counterpart NGO agreed to donate six lorry containers it had used to bring emergency humanitarian aid into Iraq last year to the Kurdistan Women's Union (KWU) for conversion into a women's library.

GUNMEN KILL TWO IRAQI WOMEN
July 27, 2004 - (The Guardian) Gunmen killed two Iraqi women and seriously injured two others yesterday as they waited to travel to work as cleaners at the British military base in Basra airport.

MARKED WOMEN
July 26, 2004 - (Time Magazine) Shaima is running for her life. Her delicate face peeks out of a black head scarf as she nervously scans the sidewalk outside a Baghdad cafe. A 24-year-old prostitute, Shaima (not her real name) lives in fear of a man who is determined to kill her. The tormentor is her younger brother, who has been delegated by his parents to murder his sister and reclaim the family's honor.

ABDUCTED, BEATEN AND SOLD INTO PROSTITUTION: TWO WOMEN'S STORIES FROM AN IRAQ IN TURMOIL
July 24, 2004 - (The Independent) When the gunmen came to the gate of their Baghdad home, the lives of the sisters-in-law Huda, 16, and Sajeeda, 24 - the names they wish to be known by - were about to change for ever. It was 17 September 2003. "We were cleaning the front porch when five armed men came in, seized us and put a cloth over our mouths," recalls Huda.

IRAQI WOMAN RECALLS ABU GHRAIB RAPE ORDEAL
July 21, 2004 - (IslamOnline.net) The rape ordeal she suffered at the hands of US soldiers, both males and females, in the notorious Abu Gharib prison will continue to haunt Nadia for the rest of her life.

IRAQ MUST WORK TO PROTECT AND PROMOTE WOMEN'S RIGHTS, UN EXPERT PANEL SAYS
July 22, 2004 - (UN News) The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women is preparing a statement urging the new Iraqi authorities to ensure gender equality throughout the process of political transition and reconstruction, its chairperson said today at United Nations Headquarters in New York.

TRADITIONAL SONGS ACQUIRE NATIONALIST FLAVOUR
July 20, 2004 - (ICWR) The ceremony began in the traditional fashion for Um Ahmed al-Duriya, a 66-year-old mula, or singer, who specialises in performing for women gathered to commemorate births, deaths, weddings and other occasions.

SADDAM'S WARS SCAR A GENERATION OF WOMEN
July 18, 2004 - (New York Times) When Saddam Hussein's regime executed Nawal's brother, it also destroyed her future. For more than 20 years, Nawal was shunned by potential suitors, fearful that any association with her family would put them in danger.

BRING JUSTICE TO THOUSANDS STILLL ILLEGALLY DETAINED IN IRAQ
July 17, 2004 - (Amnesty International) Thousands of men, women and children are still held without charge or trial in detention facilities in Iraq, including Abu Ghraib, after the official end of the occupation on 28 June 2004. Some detainees are housed in tents, and are suffering under the intense heat of Iraq's summer.

WIDOWS' MICRO-FINANCING PROJECT GOING STRONG
July 14, 2004 - (IRIN) With no network of local banks offering loans to families and small businesses, more than 150 widows living to the west of the northern Iraqi Kurdish city of Sulaymaniyah have turned in recent months to a humanitarian-sponsored micro-finance scheme.

THE HAPPIEST PLACE IN IRAQ: BAGHDAD'S MARRIAGE BUREAU
July 7, 2004 – (The Christian Science Monitor) For 14 months, Kamal and Maha courted each other through bombings, uprisings, and assassinations. They delayed their marriage at first, hoping things would improve. But in the end, they rushed to tie the knot on June 24, just four days before Iraq's transfer of power.

HER MISSION: RE-ESTABLISHING IRAQ'S VOICE IN WASHINGTON
July 5, 2004 — (New York Times) Everything seemed to be in order — guest list, caterer, speeches — for a reception for Iraq's president-designate, Sheik Ghazi Ajil al-Yawar, at the graceful but dilapidated Iraqi Embassy here on June 11.

WOMEN IN IRAQ SEIZE POLITICAL OPPORTUNITIES
July 4, 2004 - (WOMENSENEWS) Fourteen women gathered at the Kadhimiya Advisory Council to listen to a crash course in the democratic election process.

WIELDING GUNS AND HANDCUFFS, WOMEN JOIN IRAQ POLICE
July 3, 2004 - (Reuters) hipping out her handgun and slamming a magazine into the grip, 20-year-old Hadeel Alwan can't wait to start catching criminals.

JUNE 2004

ARAB WOMEN MAKING "TREMENDOUS PROGRESS"
June 8, 2004 - (Interview with NILE TV) Charlotte Ponticelli, Senior Coordinator for International Women's Issues at the State Department

IRAQ: FOCUS ON CREATING A CULTURE OF HUMAN RIGHTS
June 7, 2004 - (IRIN) Iraq's new human rights minister welcomed a report by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR), calling for independent monitoring, but said much more needed to be done in order to protect human rights.

PATTERN EMERGES OF SEXUAL ASSAULT AGAINST WOMEN HELD BY U.S. FORCES
June 6th, 2004 – (The New Standard News) Well publicized images of US soldiers torturing and humiliating male Iraqi prisoners may be overshadowing evidence gathered by several human rights groups and Pentagon investigators indicating US military personnel have raped and sexually abused Iraqi women held at Abu Ghraib prison and other detention facilities.

REMAKING IRAQ WITHOUT GUNS
June 5, 2004 – (NYT Op-Ed) When the heads of the world's leading industrialized nations meet in Georgia next week, they can do something unexpectedly positive for the Middle East, Muslim women, economic freedom and even democracy -- if they take seriously a small but powerful idea on their agenda: microlending in Iraq.

ONLY SIX WOMEN APPOINTED TO IRAQI INTERIM GOVERNMENT
June 3, 2004 - (Feminist Daily News Wire) Iraq's newly appointed Prime Minister, Iyad Allawi, earlier this week announced the names of the US-backed interim government that will begin June 30. The new government includes 33 ministers, of whom only six are women, making up 18 percent of Iraq’s caretaker government. Iraq’s Transitional Administration Law (TAL), however, has established a target of 25 percent of the seats for women in the interim assembly after extensive efforts made by Iraqi women, who mobilized and spearheaded a national drive to have at least 40 percent representation in decision-making bodies in Iraq.

SHELTER IN NORTH HELPS VULNERABLE WOMEN
June 3, 2004 - (IRIN) "In Middle Eastern societies, women are always in the wrong," said Thomas von der Osten-Sacken, founder of German NGO, Wadi. To see just how many forms that can take, visit the Nawa Centre, opened by Wadi in December 1999 in the northern city of Sulaimaniyah and now run by the local Kurdish authorities.

UNDERREPORTED ABUSE OF IRAQI FEMALE PRISONERS COMING TO LIGHT
June 1, 2004 – (ENAWA) Since the Iraqi "prison abuse scandal" publicly broke in the press at the end of April, images of the abuse and humiliation of Iraqi prisoners and "security detainees" have been published around the world.

IRAQ: RIGHTS GROUPS - MIXED REACTION TO NEW GOVERNMENT
June 1, 2004 - (IRIN) After weeks of wrangling, a new government has been sworn in to serve as an interim authority to take over sovereignty from US-led administrators on 30 June. Workers at an Iraqi human rights group and a women's group expressed cautious support for the new government, which will serve until general elections scheduled for January, but called on it to be independent of US-led coalition forces.

MAY 2004

HUMAN RIGHTS GROUPS: IRAQI WOMEN RAPED AT ABU GHRAIB JAIL
May 29, 2004 – (Middle East Online) Iraqi women who were held at Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad have complained of rape by both US and Iraqi jailers, according to human rights groups citing alleged victims.

NEW PARAMILITARY FORCE SEEKS WOMEN TO TAKE ON SECURITY ROLE
May 27, 2004 - (Agence France-Presse) The first time the women at the paramilitary training camp here went for shooting practice most were nervous, some started crying and others did not want to pick up the guns.

FOCUS SHIFTS TO JAIL ABUSE OF WOMEN
May 12, 2004 – (Guardian) For Huda Shaker, the humiliation began at a checkpoint on the outskirts of Baghdad. The American soldiers demanded to search her handbag. When she refused one of the soldiers pointed his gun towards her chest.

A DOUBLE ORDEAL FOR FEMALE PRISONERS
May 11, 2004 – (LA Times) One woman told her attorney she was forced to disrobe in front of male prison guards. After much coaxing, another woman described how she was raped by U.S. soldiers. Then she fainted.

EQUAL RIGHTS NOW – ISSUES 13 & 14
May 10, 2004 - (Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq – Issues #13 & 14) The most recent issue of Equal Rights Now!, the official paper of the Organization for Women’s Freedom in Iraq, includes a report on the International Women’s Day events in Iraq as well as of the OWFI branches abroad, an article about the increasing cases of violence against women, and an emergency motion to defend feminist activists in Iraq.

APRIL 2004

CARPET WEAVING PROVIDES VITAL INCOME FOR WOMEN
April 26, 2004 – (IRIN) At first sight, this large room in the town of Barzan in the northern Iraqi governorate of Arbil could pass for a primitive gymnasium. There's the same air of hushed concentration, the cautious precision. And then there are the tall metal frames, lined in pairs like parallel bars.

Schoolgirl Sees All Her Friends Perish in Blast
April 22, 2004 - (Guardian Unlimited) There wasn't much left yesterday of the school minibus that had been waiting outside Basra's white-coloured Saudia police station. Inside the incinerated vehicle were the remains of a couple of charred textbooks and a burned schoolbag.

FEMALE HARASSMENT FROM RELIGIOUS CONSERVATIVES
April 14, 2004 – (IRIN) Many women in the southern Iraqi city of Basra say they have been forced to wear a headscarf or restrict their movements in fear of harassment from men.

IRAQI WOMEN REALIZE NEW RIGHTS AMID SECURITY CONCERNS
April 9, 2004 – (WeNews) Exceptional women in Iraq are pursuing newfound rights and freedoms and even getting husbands to help out with housework. But despite legal gains and new advocacy organizations, many women remain limited by poverty, tradition and security concerns.

VIEWPOINTS: IRAQ ONE YEAR ON - "LIFE IN IRAQ TODAY IS A CONSTANT STRUGGLE FOR WOMEN"
April 8, 2004 – (BBC) A nationwide opinion poll commissioned by the BBC to mark the anniversary of the US-led invasion of Iraq indicated that most Iraqis felt their lives had improved since the days of Saddam Hussein.

IRAQ: FOCUS ON MATERNAL AND INFANT HEALTHCARE IN BAGHDAD
April 5, 2004 – (IRIN) As paediatrician Tala al-Awqati stands in the middle of a hospital room of incubators filled with premature and low birth-weight babies, it’s obvious that she is passionate about her work.

IRAQ: WOMEN AFRAID TO SEEK HEALTHCARE IN SOUTH (IRIN)
April 5, 2004 – (IRIN) - One year after the US-led war to topple Iraq's former leader Saddam Hussein, lack of security continues to prevent progress in health care, particularly among women too scared to leave their homes.

IRAQI FEMALE MINISTER ESCAPES ASSASSINATION
April 2, 2004 - (Feminist Daly News Wire) Earlier this week, Iraq’s only female interim minister, Nasreen Barwari, escaped an assassination attempt near Mosul. Barawari’s three bodyguards were killed when gunmen opened fire on her convoy. According to Amnesty International, women and girls not wearing the hijab in Basra have been threatened and are afraid to go outside for fear of rape, abduction, and other violence.

AFTER AN ADVOCATE'S KILLING, IRAQI WOMEN TRY TO STAY COURSE
April 01, 2004 – (Christian Monitor) For their new women's center, the women of Karbala chose the name of a warrior: Zainab al-Hawraa. Sister of the Shiite martyr Imam Hussein, Zainab fought alongside him in 680, saving his young son and his legacy for future generations.

REPORTERS ON THE JOB
April 1, 2004 – (Christian Monitor) When Annia Ciezadlo visited the women's center in Karbala, Iraq, she was told that the Iraqi women there were getting death threats. Annia went to several mosques in town to see what people were saying about the center.

MARCH 2004

VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN INCREASES SHARPLY
March 31, 2004 - (Amnesty International) The assassination attempt against the only female member in the Iraqi cabinet, Nisreen Mustafa al- Burwari, earlier this week, shows the urgent need for security in Iraq. The attack is the second directed at a female political leader -- in September 2003 'Aquila al-Hashimi was killed. She was one of only three female members in the Iraqi Governing Council (IGC). Violence against women and girls has sharply increased in Iraq compared to the time before last year's war.

IRAQ: WIDOWS START NEW ENTERPRISE IN HILLA
March 31, 2004 (IRIN) - When you first walk into the room full of women clad in black abayas (cloak covering from head to toe) sewing colourful dresses, their work doesn't seem particularly courageous at the Independent Women's Association cooperative in Hilla, 120 km south of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad.

FUNDAMENTALISTS RUSH IN
March 30, 2004 – (Christian Monitor) After Saddam Hussein's overthrow, university president Taher al-Bakaa gathered his staff, and promised them a university free from oppression and fear. But recently a dispute between a Sunni professor and a group of Shiite students turned into a demonstration that closed the campus for three days. Now, Dr. Bakaa says, religious factions are hijacking the university, and he fears for his life.

WOMEN'S RIGHTS GROUPS IN IRAQ THREATENED
March 26, 2004 – (Feminist Daily News Wire) Threats against women's rights leaders and organizations have been increasing in Iraq over the past few weeks. According to IRIN News, women working for Women for Women International have received a series of threats that have kept half the staff at home for two days because of poor security. The other half went to Amman Jordan for safety. According to Anissa Badaoudi of the National NGO Support Working Group, other women’s organizations have been threatened as well, reports IRIN News.

SHOUTING TO BE HEARD IN NEW IRAQ
March 25, 2004 – (BBC) "Our centre must be for all the women," declares Ghaida al-Sahai. Under the old regime, not only would the $145,000 centre just for women not have been possible, neither would Dr Sahai be able to decide who should use it.

IRAQ: WOMEN'S GROUPS UNDER THREAT IN THE NEW IRAQ
March 24, 2004 (IRIN News) Threats against women's rights groups in Iraq appear to be on the rise, with the environment becoming increasingly unsafe over the past weeks, activists say.

WOMEN'S GROUPS GRADE BUSH ADMINISTRATION RECORD ON WOMEN'S ISSUES
March 15, 2004 –(Feminist Daily News Wire) Leading women's groups released the third in a series of scorecards rating the Bush Administration on key issues affecting women internationally. The issues covered in this report card include women and the emergency AIDS relief plan and women's rights in Afghanistan and Iraq.

IRAQ'S SHIITE MOSQUES REACH OUT TO WOMEN
March 12, 2004 – (WeNews) Women's religious education classes in Shiite mosques are gaining momentum and new students in Iraq. But activists there question whether newfound Shiite freedoms in the country will serve to empower women.

FEMINISTS PAY TRIBUTE TO WOMEN'S RIGHTS ACTIVIST FERN HOLLAND KILLED IN IRAQ
March 12, 2004 – (Feminist Daily News Wire) “Women's Rights Activist Fern L. Holland was killed in Iraq on Tuesday night. Holland, who worked tirelessly in Iraq to help Iraqi women achieve their rights, became one of the first American civilian employees of the Coalition Provisional Authority to be killed in Iraq.

CONSTITUTION MARKS NEW START FOR IRAQI WOMEN, MINISTER SAYS
March 10, 2004 – (Coalition Provisional Authority Press Releases) The signing of an Iraqi interim constitution March 8 marks the beginning of a new role for women in the country, according to the only woman member of Iraq's cabinet.

IRAQ MINISTER CALLS CONSTITUTION A TRIUMPH FOR WOMEN
March 9, 2004 – (UNWire) The Iraqi interim constitution is a victory for women both because of its language and the political activism among females its drafting has inspired, Iraqi Minister for Municipalities and Public Works Nasreen Barwari said yesterday during a luncheon in Washington marking International Women's Day.

AN EMPTY SORT OF FREEDOM
March 8, 2004 – (The Guardian) Women in Iraq endured untold hardships and difficulties during the past three decades of the Ba'ath regime. Although some basic rights for women, such as the right to education, employment, divorce in civil courts and custody over kids, were endorsed in the Personal Status Code, some of these legal rights were routinely violated.

MANSOUR WOMEN’S CENTER OPENS IN BAGHDAD ON INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY
March 8, 2004 – (CPA Press Releases) Ambassador L. Paul Bremer celebrated International Women’s Day with a group of Iraqi women at a breakfast at the new Mansour Women’s Center in Baghdad. Bremer congratulated the group on the opening of the first women’s center in Baghdad and encouraged them to utilize the new Baghdad women’s centers to access the many resources and services available and to voice their thoughts and ideas.

POWELL ANNOUNCES TWO NEW PROGRAMS FOR IRAQI WOMEN
March 8, 2004 – (Coalition Provisional Authority Press Releases) Two new programs for Iraqi women were announced by Secretary of State Colin Powell March 8 in a statement issued in celebration of International Women's Day.

LITTLE TO CELEBRATE
March 8, 2004 – (AlterNet) On March 8, international women's day, Iraqi women had little to celebrate. They were living under the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein, the weight of onerous UN sanctions, and living in fear of impending war. This year, Saddam Hussein is gone and sanctions have been lifted. But Iraqi women face a brand new set of burdens.

IRAQI DOMESTIC VIOLENCE VICTIMS FIND SHELTER
March 8, 2004 - (IRIN) A young Iraqi woman who told workers she was sexually assaulted in a refugee camp is the latest person to be helped by a safehouse run by the Jordanian Women's Union.

NGO WORKS TO BOOST WOMEN'S LITERACY IN NORTH
March 8, 2004 - (IRIN) It's easy to see why her teachers consider Runak Alimuhamed their ideal student. Sitting at the front of her class in Tawela, in the remote, mountainous Hawraman region of northern Iraq, her copybook is spotless and her enthusiasm unquenchable.

AS U.S. DETAINS IRAQIS, FAMILIES PLEAD FOR NEWS
March 7, 2004 – (NYT) Sabrea Kudi cannot find her son. He was taken by American soldiers nearly nine months ago, and there has been no trace of him since.

INTERIM CONSTITUTION SHORTCHANGES WOMEN
March 5, 2004 – (HRW) Iraq’s proposed interim constitution fails to give adequate protection to women’s human rights, Human Rights Watch said today. The Iraqi Governing Council is expected to sign the interim constitution in the coming days.

IRAQ: FOCUS ON PLIGHT OF WIDOWS IN NORTH
March 3, 2004 – (IRIN) Until 1988, Amina Mohamad had never strayed further than 10 miles from Zerd-i Qadir, a tiny hamlet nestling in a stony valley on the barren Germian plain at the southeastern edge of the Iraqi Kurdish region.
IRAQ: SHARIAT LAW PROVES CONTENTIOUS ISSUE AS COUNTRY MOVES TO SELF-RULE
March 1, 2004 – (IRIN) Nada Jabber Hussein wants to divorce her husband. But instead of going to a civil court in her hometown of Najaf in southern Iraq, she chose the head sheikh at Najaf's shariat (Islamic) court to provide a final judgment on her case.

FEBRUARY 2004

RAPES REPORTED BY SERVICEWOMEN IN THE PERSIAN GULF AND ELSEWHERE
February 26, 2004 – (NYTimes) The United States military is facing the gravest accusations of sexual misconduct in years, with dozens of servicewomen in the Persian Gulf area and elsewhere saying they were sexually assaulted or raped by fellow troops, lawmakers and victims advocates said on Wednesday.

IRAQI WOMEN'S WINDOW OF OPPORTUNITY FOR POLITICAL GAINS IS CLOSING
February 26, 2004 – (NYTimes) Emboldened by the fall of Saddam Hussein, Iraqi women are pushing for political freedoms many of them have never enjoyed. But as they do, a rising tide of religious zeal threatens even the small victories they have won.

IRAQI WOMEN JOIN HIGH-RISK SECURITY EFFORT
February 24, 2004 – (WeNews) The female contingent of the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps is turning heads in the country and putting a female face on the struggle to stabilize Iraq.

IRAQI GOVERNING COUNCIL MAY BE EXPANDED, WOMEN DEMAND MORE VOICE
February 23, 2004 – (Feminist Daily News Wire) Several members of the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council stated that they are discussing plans to double the size of the current Governing Council in order to make it more legitimate. According to the New York Times, members of the Council want to reach out to more groups so the Iraqi people are more represented. The Governing Council has 25 members, of which only three are women. In addition, none of the 24 constitutional committee members are women.

WHY IRAQI WOMEN AREN'T COMPLAINING
February 19, 2004 – (The Guardian) Iraqi family law is the most progressive in the Middle East. Divorce cases are heard only in the civil courts (effectively outlawing the "repudiation" religious divorce); polygamy is outlawed unless the first wife welcomes it (and very few do); and women divorcees have an equal right to custody of their children.

STUDENT SNAPS WAR REBELS IN IRAQ
February 18, 2004 – (BBC) A student photographer has travelled with a group of guerrilla female fighters in northern Iraq to capture images of war for her degree course.

IRAQI WOMEN DEMAND EQUAL RIGHTS
February 18, 2004 – (AFP) Groups of women took to the streets around Iraq on Wednesday to demand at least a 40 percent share of the country's new political power as females make up more than half of the population.

RECONSTRUCTION: U.S. ENVOY PROMOTES ROLE OF IRAQI WOMEN
February 17, 2004 – (NYT) L. Paul Bremer III, the chief American administrator in Iraq, dropped into this holy city on Monday to give the revolution a gentle nudge.

STRONG, SMART & FEMALE IN IRAQ
February 16, 2004 - (CBS) In Iraq, U.S. administrator Paul Bremer indicated to an Iraqi women's group he will block any attempt to make Islam the main source of law in the country's new constitution.

WOMEN CALL FOR EQUAL REPRESENTATION IN IRAQ
February 6, 2004 – (WeNews) Maysoon al-Damluji is a member of an elite club, but one that's trying hard to become a lot less exclusive. As Iraq's Deputy Minister of Culture, al-Damluji is one of a small handful of Iraqi women entrusted with real political power in the country today.

NEW FAMILY LAW ON HOLD
February 4, 2004 – (IRIN Report) Women's groups in Iraq have cautiously welcomed a decision by the Iraqi Governing Council (IGC) to shelve a proposal for a new family law, which would have discriminated against women, critics say.

IRAQ: U.S. LAWMAKERS SAY COUNCIL'S PLAN CURBS WOMEN'S RIGHTS
February 3, 2004 - (GlobalInfo) Iraq's governing council has quietly approved a plan to replace some existing legal rights of women with Islamic law or "Shariah", according to 44 U.S. lawmakers, who warn Washington of a "brewing women's right's crisis" in the U.S.-occupied country.

FEMALE US CABINET OFFICIAL MEETS IRAQI WOMEN FEARFUL FOR THEIR FUTURES
February 2, 2004 - (IPPF News) Under Sadam Hussein Iraqi Women did enjoy a modicum of rights; however there are fears that they will be lost in the post war regime. A visit from a female US Cabinet Official has done little to assuage their fears.

IRAQ DRAFT CONSTITUTION CALLS FOR 40 PERCENT WOMEN IN ASSEMBLY
February 2, 2004 - (Feminist Daily News Wire) Members of the United States-appointed Iraqi Governing Council started debating a proposed constitution for Iraq's interim government. According to the Washington Post, the plan calls for a three-member presidency and for at least 40 percent of the assembly and constitutional convention to be women.


JANUARY 2004

VIOLENCE, HOPE IN IRAQ ROAD TO DEMOCRACY
January 28, 2004 - (AP) It was barely light when a suicide bomber struck the Shaheen Hotel. By lunchtime, women, sheiks and clerics had gathered in another hotel not far away to discuss the political future of their nation.

RAPE, ABDUCTIONS ON RISE IN BAGHDAD
January 27, 2004 – (WeNews) Amid surging crime in postwar Baghdad, sexual violence and abductions of women appear to be increasing. But with police stations focused on bombing threats, no one is counting the women being attacked or sold into prostitution.

IRAQ: ANNULMENT OF 1959 MARITAL STATUS LAW DRAWS CRITICISM
January 26, 2004 - (IPS/GIN) The sudden decision taken by the U.S.-picked Interim Governing Council to annul the Iraqi Unified Marital Status Law of 1959 and refer lawsuits pertaining to family relations to religious scholars of each sect to be settled according to its doctrine, has attracted sharp criticism in Iraqi political and human rights circles.

SHIITE WOMEN KNOCK AT MOSQUE DOOR
January 20, 2004 – (CSM) Inside a mosque in the Shiite slum of Hurriya, protected from male eyes by a ragged curtain, females ages 4 to 54 are absorbing the fundamentals of Islamic feminism.

IRAQI WOMEN REJECT DECISION NUMBER 137 PASSED BY THE IRAQI GOVERNING COUNCIL ON 29/12/2003
January 20, 2004 – (Iraqi Women’s League) We would like to express our horror at the Iraqi Governing Council's Act 137 dated 29/12/2003 that replaces Iraqi civil law concerning family law with Sharia law.

IRAQ'S GOVERNING COUNCIL PUTS FAMILY LAW UNDER ISLAMIC LAW
January 16, 2004 – (Feminist Daily News Wire) The US-backed Iraqi Governing Council has outraged Iraqi women because of its recent vote to cancel current family laws and to place family law under the jurisdiction of Islamic (sharia) law. According to the Washington Post, Iraqi women denounced the decision at various protests and conferences. At one conference, entitled "The Importance of Women in Society," only three Iraqi male lawmakers met over 150 women concerned about the Governing Council's recent decision to not back their legal rights.

KIRKUK APPOINTS ARABS, WOMEN COUNCILLORS TO CALM TENSIONS IN NORTHERN IRAQ
January 15, 2004 - (AFP) Six Arabs and three women were Thursday granted municipal council seats in the northern oil centre of Kirkuk in a move by the US-led coalition to defuse ethnic tensions in the city. The appointments, which bring the number of Arabs nearer to that of ethnic Kurds and marks the first-ever introduction of women, were made as the council was also granted extra powers over the police and local authorities.

IRAQI WOMEN PROTESTING ABROGATION OF FORMER IRAQI FAMILY CODE
January 14, 2004 - (FEN/WIB) About one hundred Iraqi women, including a government Minister, gathered yesterday in Baghdad to protest a government Council decision to abrogate the Family Code instituted in 1959 and enforced since then. The code, a legislative instrument, was considered as one of the most progressive Family Codes of the Muslim countries.

IRAQIS GET A TASTE OF DEMOCRACY AT A LIVELY TOWN HALL MEETING
January 13, 2004 – (NYT) If many Iraqis complain that the foreigners who run their country have given them little so far, they at least can now grab, shout out, dissect, swear by and see in action a word that had meant nothing before: demokratiya, or democracy.

WOMEN'S RIGHTS CENTER OPENS IN DIWANIYAH: DR. CONDOLEEZZA RICE SENDS TAPED MESSAGE TO THE WOMEN
January 9, 2004 – (CPA) The Diwaniyah Women's Rights Center opened today. The purpose of the Center is to assist widowed, impoverished, and vulnerable women as they improve their lives and those of their children. The Center will help enable the women to participate in a free, democratic Iraq.

IRAQI WOMEN COUNCIL MEMBERS AND OFFICERS FACE DISCRIMINATION
January 8, 2004 – (Feminist Daily News Wire) Iraqi women continue to face discrimination in the aftermath of the US invasion of Iraq. Only three Iraqi women were appointed to Iraq's Governing Council and none serve on the constitutional committee. Dr. Raja Khuzai, a female member of the Governing Council, states that men avert their eyes when she talks and the leaders ignore her reports. They even wait until the female council members have left the room to make important votes, reports the Rocky Mountain News. In addition, one of the three female members of the council who was a champion of women's rights was killed this past fall. She was replaced when the two remaining female members were out of the country. The replacement, Salama Khufaji, is described by Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) as being "ultra-conservative," angering women's rights advocates.

IRAQI WOMEN'S GROUP SEEKS TO EMPOWER WOMEN IN NEW IRAQ - GROUP IN MOSUL OFFERS TRAINING AND SOCIAL SUPPORT
January 6, 2004 – (US Department of State) A group of Iraqi women in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul are seizing the opportunity offered by the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime to address gender issues and work towards creating a new role for women in the future of Iraq.

MEN RUE LIFTING OF FEMALE TRAVEL BAN
January 6, 2004 – (IWPR’s Iraqi Crisis Report No. 42) A new era of freedom for Iraqi women has arrived with the collapse of the Saddam Hussein regime - at least in theory.

IRAQ WOMEN ALONE, DISTRAUGHT AS U.S. ROUNDS UP MEN
January 2, 2004 - (Reuters) Khadija's eldest son Ahmad was killed in battle during the war that toppled Saddam Hussein. Now U.S. troops have rounded up her husband and four other sons, leaving the impoverished Iraqi woman to fend for herself.

For 2003 archived news, click here.

 

Iraq News Resources

Equal Rights Now! is a fortnightly newspaper of the Iraqi Women’s Rights Coalition (IWRC), based in the UK but connected to the Organization for Women’s Freedom in Iraq (OWFI), that reports on the situation of women in Iraq today, their suffering under the CPA and growing influence of Islamic fundamentalists and their efforts to organize themselves.To-date the IWRC have released the following issues of Equal Rights Now! : 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9 & 10, 11

To receive the fortnightly newspaper by email, contact Houzan Mahmoud, editor, at: equalrightsnow@hotmail.com.

Here are a few useful news services:

The Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR) Iraqi Crisis Report
To receive this report by email, click here
Or visit the IWPR's Iraqi Crisis Report online

IRIN Iraq Crisis Service
IRIN is providing a limited news service, focussing on the regional and humanitarian dimensions of the Iraq crisis. To receive this service by email, visit IRIN and follow the instructions. Or send an email to: subs@irinnews.org
You can also view the stories online.

ReliefWeb Iraq news page
ReliefWeb (a project of OCHA) provides the latest news on Iraq, compiled from UN and NGO sources. Click on Iraq on the ReliefWeb homepage.

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The opinions expressed in the articles carried by this site are those of the authors and are not necessarily shared by the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, PeaceWomen Project.