Participation

Women of Muslim countries should join hands to explore avenues for their empowerment and welfare, said Pakistan's Minister for Information and Broadcasting Firdous Ashiq Awan on Sunday.

“It's encouraging to see Saudi women engaged in economic activities and decision making, while observing the Islamic tenets and values,” she said while addressing a meeting at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI).

Nothing is more telling about a society than its views of itself especially those of its youth who carry the burden of the nation's immediate future.

During informal interviews with Iranian teenage girls in and around schoolyards, one can learn many things about the character, bravery, thoughts, and worldliness of these young ladies, including their current place in society as opposed to what they would like it to be.

With just four days left before a potential constitutional meltdown, Nepal's communist-Maoist government Tuesday clamped prohibitions near the parliament building, banning all protests and rallies within a 50m radius.

Completing its fourth day of the resumed 2011 session, the Committee on Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) today recommended special consultative status for 25 entities to the Economic and Social Council, and postponed consideration of 26 additional groups until the Committee receive answers to its outstanding questions.

The number of women on political scene of Serbia, especially at influential posts, has been significantly dropping each year. Some of them are leaving because the politics directed by men became ugly for women, some because they could not realize what they wanted and some are simply forced out of politics by their political parties. Unofficially politicians claim that there is no quality female staff.

Women supporters of the Iranian Green Movement - June 2009

While the Iranian authorities have effectively quashed all overt political organization for women's rights, today women are the most dynamic group in Iranian opposition politics.

Papua New Guinea's new opposition leader, Belden Namah says his group will support a bill to have more women elected to parliament.

The bill proposing 22 reserved seats for women is now before Parliament for debate and approval.

Mr Namah told Radio Australia's Pacific Beat program he supports the bill.

A group of 12 women from Ivory Coast, Guinea and Uganda reduced members of an African Union panel to tears as they told their personal stories of rape and police brutality.

"I can tell you those ambassadors in Addis (Ababa in Ethiopia) were crying," said Bineta Diop, who organised the meeting about a month ago with the AU peace and security council to highlight the plight of women on the continent.

Sat in the front row in army fatigues and desert boots and patiently listening to children giving their presentation, Lieutenant Colonel Ivette Galarza stands out. Not just because of the way she is dressed, or because she is American, but particularly because she is female.

May 17 will be a historic day in the annals of Sri Lanka's legal sphere when Supreme Court Judge Dr. Shirani Bandaranayake will become Sri Lanka's first woman chief justice.