A large stretch of Amazon forest in a region where uncontacted Indians are thought to be living, has reportedly been destroyed illegally with chemical defoliant sprayed from an airplane.
Brazil’s environment agency, IBAMA, discovered a 178 hectare patch of dead trees during a recent overflight of an area of the western Brazilian Amazon.
You can read more here.
Uttar Pradesh – a state in Northern India – is seeing an increasing number of extremely brutal attacks on women. In the latest case, a sixteen year-old woman was assaulted with knives and axes before being gang raped. The woman and her family are too scared to stay in their village. They have abandoned their home and land to stay with relatives. This is just one of hundreds of rapes and attempted rapes that have happened this year in Uttar Pradesh. The attacks are a tragic example of the intersection between gender, class, and poverty. Women are accorded very low status in the region. Moreover, many of those attacked are Dalits – members of India’s lowest caste, which used to be known as ‘untouchables’. An analysis of rape figures carried out by the People’s Union for Civil Liberties in Uttar Pradesh found that 90% of the victims were Dalits. Poverty makes things worse, as people are unable to afford sanitation in their homes, forcing them to go out into their fields at night to go to the toilet. Many women are attacked whilst performing their ablutions. Campaigners say that most of the rapists are people with money and political power. Roop Rekha Verma of Sajhi Duniya (Shared World), an organisation based in Lucknow that works with women says, ‘It’s a very difficult situation here… There is a lot of violence: Crimes are escalating; gender problems are increasing; girls are being attacked, both in rural and urban areas… These cases are so brutal that we wouldn’t have believed that they could happen – we thought such things could happen only in novels and films’. You can read more here.
The UK Government is currently debating the Legal Aid Bill, which seeks, amongst other things, to remove legal aid from immigration and some asylum-support cases. This Bill is bad news for a number of different people, but immigration and women’s rights groups have particular concerns about the way this will affect women. An example is the proposal to remove legal aid from women whose visa is linked to that of their partner (who has indefinite leave to remain), but who is being subjected to domestic violence by that partner, and so wishes to end the relationship. A woman in such a situation can apply for indefinite leave to remain under the domestic violence rule. But immigration law is complex and women in abusive relationships are often traumatised. Legal advice is essential in such cases, otherwise there is a real risk that women will be trapped in abusive relationships for fear of jeopardising their immigration status. A small victory has been won by rights groups, as the Government has realised this, and decided to allow legal aid in such cases. You can read more here.
I’m sure readers will be aware of the crisis situation in the Horn of Africa, and that today the UN identified the situation in two regions of Somalia as reaching famine status. The DEC appeal page is here. (If readers know of organisations you’d recommend donations to, please do share this in comments.)
The life of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani remains in the balance
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“A year after public attention was cast upon Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani’s plight, her life appears to remain in the balance.
Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, a 43-year-old woman from Iran’s Azerbaijani minority, was sentenced in 2006 to be stoned to death for “adultery while married”. She was also sentenced to 10 years imprisonment for her role in her husband’s murder which, according to her lawyer, was reduced to five years’ imprisonment for complicity in the murder. She remains in prison in Tabriz. In a letter sent by the Iranian Embassy in Spain to Amnesty International Spain on 8 July 2011, the Iranian authorities reiterated that she was sentenced to death by stoning and to 10 years’ imprisonment for murder…”
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for more, click here
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also, Fears grow for lawyer of woman in Iran stoning case
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Lawyer still in prison after speaking to foreign media about case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani
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for more, click here
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Interested readers might also wish to check out:
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What do Iran and the U.S. have in common?
and
Urgent petition to save Sakineh
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The news is all awash today with the story of Amina, writer of A Gay Girl in Damascus. It appears she may not be real.
But let’s not forget, amidst all this hoo-hah, that there are other journalists and bloggers – real others – being held in communicado by the Syrian authorities, where they are at risk of torture and ill-treatment.
It is believed that the following journalists are currently detained:
Dorothy Parvaz: Aljazeera.net correspondent, arrested on 29 April 2011.
Mahmoud Issa: Journalist and writer, arrested on 19 April 2011.
Khaled Sid Mohand, freelance journalist for a number of news outlets including Le Monde, arrested on 12 April 2011.
Zaid Mastu, Al-Arabiya net correspondent, arrested on 12 April 2011.
Mohamed Dibo: Journalist and writer, arrested on 12 April 2011.
More information, including what you can do, is available here.
Amnesty International has information about the ongoing situation in Syria here.
Here is a seemingly important article on “Iran’s women footballers banned from Olympics because of Islamic strip“. (It seems The Guardian has taken down all links/urls/copies of this article. Anyone with additional info, please share it in the comments.)
This [Iran-women-Olympic-strip] article/news story involves a very important matter as regards individual Islamic women (or teams of them) who cannot do something such as play a sport because of how they choose to dress, especially if that dress is something as important to them as their understanding of their religion. Perhaps some significant percentage of the women do not choose this form of dress, as Iran requires something like it. We do not know because the article appears not to say or to address this issue of choice. (Even oppressed women who have internalized sexist norms in a great many cases nonetheless have substantial autonomy and agentic skills.)
I regret that this news story is cast in terms of a focus on Iran. Perhaps a focus on Iran is required for the story to use the Olympics as a main example. The problem with that use, however, is that Islamic women in many places suffer discrimination for using this kind of dress in all kinds of sports venues besides the Olympics – I can think of many unfortunate cases of female high school athletes in the U.S., for instance.
Of course, I wish more people would read and understand Irshad Manji on such matters. One might think that my two paragraphs above are not sufficiently feminist because of how sexist the Islamic religion is. However, all forms of western monotheism are incredibly sexist (among other bad things) and I really do not see Islam as particularly bad for western religions as regards feminist concerns.
Ideally, if I were writing newspaper stories/articles I would write about how Iran massively oppresses women. I would also write about the oppression of women with regard to discrimination against them in the field of sports.
What I would NEVER do is write a story/article about Iranian athletes that does not even seem to mention, let alone strongly emphasize, how badly the Iran state treats women. (People go to jail all the time in Iran just for signing a peaceful petition saying that they support democratic reforms! And the lawyers in Iran who represent people who go to jail in Iran for doing something like signing a peaceful petition in support of democratic reforms are themselves sent to jail or worse.) It pains me to read the article with which this post began given the concern expressed in this paragraph and in the context of this entire post.
For related comments threads to two posts that document Iran state oppression of women, see:
What Do Iran And The U.S. Have In Common?
interested readers might especially want to check out comments numbered 12 through 20 at the post above
and
Urgent Petition To Save Sakineh
interested readers might want especially to check out comments numbered 5, 6, 8, 18, 19, 39, 45, 46, and 49 at the post above
…blogs about the Revolution. She is currently in hiding, as she is being pursued by security forces. Her family have all left their home. Please have a look.
Westminster Council wants to ban soup-runs and rough sleeping in the area surrounding Westminster Cathedral. Apparently, Westminster Council has been trying to ban soup-runs for a decade, on the grounds that they encourage rough sleepers. You can read more from the Guardian here. There’s a rant from Johann Hari here.
Video footage from the All African Women’s Group of women asylum-seekers. The accounts talk about the violence and horror they endured back home and their fight for justice here.
From the Press Release:
It is a testimony to women’s strength and courage, that despite great trauma, we find ways of overcoming silence and invisibility. Many of those interviewed have survived rape and other forms of torture, seen their loved ones killed, been driven from their home by wars, endured years of separation from their children, suffered violent and abusive relationships, been imprisoned/detained . . . yet have refused to give up. Some have won safety and protection, but for countless others, the daily battle for survival and justice continues, made harder in a climate where the services and resources we all need are being cut to the bone.
We hope you will: watch, listen, comment, and want to work with us to stop the injustices which are exposed in these extraordinary interviews.
