The Southern African Gender Protocol Alliance has called on gender ministers to craft a strong rights-based approach to gender equality for the region post 2015. Speaking at the annual meeting of gender ministers in Malawi ahead of the Heads of State (HOS) summit in Zimbabwe mid-August, Alliance Chair Emma Kaliya stressed that: “We are counting down to 2015. We must not let up the momentum.

Colombia's former minister of justice emphasized the need for the country's judges to familiarize themselves with international judicial norms and Colombia's international obligations at a Medellin seminar on justice for women on Thursday.

According to Colombia's former minister of justice, Ruth Stella Correa, judges in Colombia need to study and be able to implement and interpret international norms regarding women's rights.

Everywhere I go there is a palpable sense of anger and sadness at the recent spate of abuse and killing of women and children in our country. The shocking incidents in Reiger Park and Westbury where children were killed have no place in our society. Government is saddened by these deaths and I convey my deepest condolences to the families and friends who lost their loved ones.

Aug. 26 is Women's Equality Day, which this year celebrates the 94th anniversary of the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote.

American women won this right in 1920 after a decades-long struggle that began in 1848 when Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott organized the first women's rights convention in our country's history.