The rising number of women being murdered in Central America is highlighted in a recently released grim report, thanks to the support of a Northumberland charity.

"It shows a strong increase in the number of women being killed," said Bill Fairbairn, Horizons of Friendship's Mesoamerican coordinator. "I was shocked. You want to know why women are being targeted."

UNITED NATIONS SYSTEM IN GUATEMALA CONDEMNS THREATS AGAINST NORMA CRUZ, DIRECTOR OF ‘SURVIVORS FOUNDATION'

Cases of serious sexual violence, including the recent rape of at least one woman by soldiers on an invaded farm, are being investigated, as members of the armed forces continue their illegal seizure of the land.

2009 is a significant year in the African women's rights calendar. The assembly of the African Union declared 2010-2020 the African Women's Decade. The summit called on member states, AU organs and regional economic communities to support the implementation of Decade activities.

In honoring Zimbabwe's tenacious women protesters at the White House on Monday, President Obama gave his sharpest critique yet of President Robert Mugabe, the octogenarian who has ruled the southern African country with repressive zeal since 1980.

Born in a squatter camp in Orlando East and raised by a single mother; working in a factory while completing secondary school by correspondence; arrested and banned by the apartheid government: South Africa's ambassador to Italy is an example of the long road her country has travelled.

Gender activists foresee a drop in female parliamentarians after Namibia's general and presidential elections on November 27 and 28. It's a trend that jeopardises the region's goal of 50 percent female representation in politics by 2015.

"When the tenth man finished raping me they said they were going to rape my daughter. I cried out but I could not even stand up at this time...they raped my daughter (while) I was there and I couldn't do anything to stop them. My daughter was five years old..."

Why are you raping us and raping kids? If you cannot propose, come to us women, we will connect you. Mr Speaker Sir, real men do not rape women. Mathew 7: verse 7 says: 'Ask and you shall be given. Kumbira muchapiwa. Celani lizaphiwa," Bulawayo East legislator, Thabitha Khu-malo, told Parliament recently while debating a motion to ratify the Southern African Develo-pment Community (SADC) protocol on Gender and Development.

Deputy Prime Minister Thokozani Khupe has challenged policymakers to recognise women's role in economic development and move away from the patriarchal habit of looking at them as mere housewives.

Speaking at the end of the two-day National Constitutional Conference on Women and Land in Harare yesterday, DPM Khupe said women owned only 1 percent of assets in Africa despite their economic contributions.