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April 2002 - Snapshots of Home and Elsewhere - Middle East/Arab World
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Promoting equalityTunisian women organized, among other things, for girls' equal access to education as a means of achieving freedom. Moroccan women called for the creation of family planning centres in rural areas. "We want education and equality," they chanted, during their march on March 12, 2000. Jordanian women demanded measures to support women's entrepreneurship. "We need funding for projects that enable women to participate in economic life, strengthen women-led economic initiatives . . . and assist the development of peasant women," add Yemeni women, who carried out numerous public awareness-raising activities. They organized seminars, workshops and symposia and won the support of certain lawyers. In Jordan also, groups organizing for human rights held training sessions. They continued these activities during 2001. Reforms and gainsIn some countries, 2000 and 2001 were years in which women achieved certain advances. "We obtained concrete results, like the creation of a hotline and a family division within the Ministry of the Interior to protect battered women..." report the Jordanian delegation. Changes to the civil code raised the age of marriage to 18 for both sexes, paved the way for legal recourse for women in terms of divorce and placed restrictions on the practice of polygamy. In Morocco and Lebanon, the civil code reform process is still underway. The struggle to defend the Palestinian people and the right to freedom of expression, meanwhile, continues to be an arduous one. Egyptian women mobilized in 2001 to defend the lawyer Nawal el-Saadawi when religious fundamentalists called for her execution on the grounds of heresy. |
Illustrations : Defending women's situation: the Yemeni publication Our rights, organ of the HRITC, devoted its March 1999 issue to this question. |
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Last modified 2006-03-23 03:09 PM This item is available in Français, English, Español |
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