Iraq: Women demand equality, end to violence

Scores of women rallied outside a Baghdad hotel on Saturday demanding an end to violence and equal social status with men as part of the observations of International Women's Day.

"Stop neglecting women. Stop killing women. Stop creating widows," read a large banner that the women, from various ethnic and religious backgrounds, held at the Babylon Hotel in Baghdad's central Karada neighbourhood.

After the rally the protesters joined a much larger group that included men and children at a hotel conference room to hear from various speakers.

One of the speakers was Nariman Mahmoud Othman, minister for women's rights, who led a delegation of women to the office of the head of Iraq's parliament, Mahmoud Mashhadani, with a list of issues concerning women's rights they wanted to discuss.

Orbia Tawfiq, a professor at Baghdad's Collge of Arts, said "we demand that women be given their rights. They should not be oppressed and they should be treated like human beings. Women must not be treated as commodities. They must be granted freedom in choosing their husbands and careers," she said.

Mohar Abdel Hamid, 38, said that the needs of widows like herself must be addressed."I hope the government listens to us because women have always suffered in Iraq," she told AFP.

A recent report by US-based Women For Women International said the state of Iraqi women since the March 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq has become a "national crisis."

According to the report, released Thursday, 64 percent of the women surveyed said violence against them had increased since the war.

-- Agence France-Presse