A proper democracy cannot be established without the participation of women. Such is the message of Syrian women's rights activists who concluded a two-day conference in Geneva on Monday to demand equal involvement in their country's peace-building process, which has so far mostly included men.

When Kim*'s husband was diagnosed with HIV, he began to subject his wife to unrelenting emotional and physical abuse.
“When he tested positive, life became more difficult; he did not want me to go anywhere or even talk to anyone. I was forced to stay in the house sleeping. I became a slave and I was left without any option but to stay with him. He threatened to kill me if I ran away.”

ZAHLEH, LEBANON — Fear, confusion and a lack of information are preventing many Syrian refugees in Lebanon from knowing where to turn for aid.

With a constant surge of refugees now fighting the bitter winter cold, humanitarian organizations are struggling to find ways to reach them with the information they need to survive — and are recruiting some refugees to help out.

Aside from ushering in hitherto unprecedented changes, the Arab Spring also brought to the fore an unsaid aspect — that the situation of women in Arab countries is more or less the same. In Tunisia, Egypt and Syria, or in some other countries that saw revolutions, the women do not differ from each other.

GENEVA - Syrian activists said Monday that the voice of women from the war-ravaged nation must not be sidelined at peace talks due to start next week in Switzerland.

"We have to take part in the whole process, from A to Z," Syrian Women's League member Sabah Alhallak told reporters in Geneva.

Afghanistan has its first female police chief after appointing an officer with 25 years experience to head a district of the capital Kabul.
Officials said Colonel Jamila Bayaz would run one of the city's most important police stations in a move that they hope will pave the way for more women to rise through the ranks.

With El Salvador's gang truce teetering on the brink, it's high time to get women involved in any peace negotiations between rival gangs - a move that could help the truce last and protect women's rights, experts say.

El Salvador's two most infamous street gangs - the Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, and rival Barrio 18 signed a truce in March 2012, which helped to lower murder rates in one of the world's most violent countries.

Next month in Geneva, rebels will sit down to talk to representatives of President Bashar al-Assad's government about a peace plan to end Syria's civil war -- a conflict that has killed over 100,000 people since 2011 and driven a third of the population from their homes. In the room alongside the rebels and government officials will be a whole slew of negotiators from various Western countries and Russia.

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Conference of Syrian women, convened by UN Women and Netherlands, ends with strong recommendations for upcoming peace talks

Violence against women in Afghanistan reached record levels in 2013, according to the Independent Human Rights Commission of Afghanistan (AIHRC). Figures released last month show that the six-month period between March and September 2013 witnessed a 25 percent increase in recorded attacks.