News

The WLUML network is saddened to learn of the passing of friend, ally and inspirational feminist human rights lawyer Rhonda Copeland, who died on 6 May 2010 after a long battle with cancer.  She was a professor at the CUNY School of Law, a practicing human rights attorney with and Vice-President of the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) who broke new ground opening U.S. federal courts and international tribunals to gender-based violence and international human rights violations. She worked closely with the WLUML network around issues of having women’s rights recognized as human rights by the United Nations, and around a groundbreaking lawsuit on behalf of nine individuals and the Rassemblement Algerien des Femmes Democrates (RAFD) against the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) of Algeria and its leader. The case charged the FIS with war crimes and crimes against humanity, including assassination, rape and torture. 

In 1994, a frightened 17 year old girl boarded a plane to flee an impending forced marriage to a much older man with three other wives. In a small room waiting for the groom, in Togo, West Africa, Fauziya Kassindja was also warned that a woman would soon arrive to excise her clitoris and other parts of her genitalia in preparation for her impending nuptials. From time immemorial, women in her community needed to be "clean" for their husbands and to gain acceptance into society. In honor of her father who had protected her until his sudden death, Fauziya refused that day to undergo the harmful practice of female genital mutilation, or FGM, and escaped.

The sudden execution of five Iranian political prisoners today appears to signal a government policy of relying on politically-motivated executions to strengthen its position vis-à-vis its opposition through terror and intimidation, the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran said. The Campaign condemned the execution of five political prisoners, including Farzad Kamangar, a 34-year-old teacher and social worker, who was charged with Moharebeh (taking up arms against God),  convicted and sentenced to death in February 2008, after a seven-minute long  trial in which “zero evidence” was presented. Four others also executed included Shirin Alam Holi, Ali Heidarian, Farhad Vakili and Mehdi Eslamian.

Last week, three Pakistani sisters, age 20, 16, and 14, had their lives irrevocably changed. As they walked from Kalat city to Pandarani village in the Baluchistan province, two motorcyclists threw acid on them, causing severe burns over their faces and bodies. Two weeks earlier, two sisters in the same province suffered the same attack—and they are only 11 and 13 years old. Their crimes? Not wearing hijabs and traveling unaccompanied by men. The Baloch Ghaeratmand Group, which was until recently unknown in the province, circulated a pamphlet in April that warned, “Acid will be thrown on the faces of women and girls who step out of their houses without covering their faces… People who fail to comply with these orders will themselves be responsible for the consequences.”