The Yemen Partners for Health Reform (YPHR) funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) held the First Defining Conference for the Role of Women Associations Network in Community Development on Sunday in Taj Sheba Hotel. It was sponsored by Dr. Abdul-Karim Yahya Ras’a, Minster of Health and Population and Dr. Amah al-Razaq Hummad, Minister of Social Affairs and Labors.
The conference was held to address health system constraints to increase use of population, health and nutrition service and to strengthen health system stewardship and health information system, routine immunization strengthening, community awareness and strengthen the role of midwives.
"The overall objective of our meeting is to define the existence of the Women's Network and what has been done in the provinces of Al-Jawf and Amran," said Abdul-Sallam al-Kohlani, manager of YPHR project. "Thus, there is the possibility of interaction with these organizations and donors who are interested in community work," he added.
Al-Kohlani stated in his speech during the conference that it is no secret to everyone the tremendous efforts undertaken by the Ministry of Health and Population in disease control and eradication of epidemics and the dissemination of health awareness. "But our country has population clusters in remote areas distinguished by its geographical nature of high mountains, arduous passage valleys and wide deserts," which he argued created obstacles for the ministry in getting help to raise awareness for everyone.
Illiteracy rate associated with educational and health awareness makes the task of the health ministry almost impossible, said al-Kohlani. "So to hear the importance of such non-governmental organizations plays a supplemental role to the efforts of the government, which is the guarantor of the effectiveness and continuity of those efforts," he clarified.
He wishes that everyone should join hands together to support the efforts of these women's organizations to grow and to play the role entrusted to them. The head of Women's Network, Amah al-Sallam al-Babli said that this network has been formed to spread awareness in the community to change their incorrect perceptions and to avoid dangers arising from misunderstanding and ignorance.
"Civil society organizations are the main source supplementing the role and efforts of the government. They are the closest to the community, providing services, information and skills which anyone can use to live a better life," she said. "This network was established to unify efforts and strengthen the role of organizations in voluntary work by involving the community, especially women volunteers, for awareness. These volunteers are called Social Activists.
The Social Activists have covered 12,475 homes so far in 8 months as well as literacy centers and women gathering places and schools. They passed out health awareness information every place they got a chance.
"This great success is the role of social awareness activists and the assistance of USAID and the YPHR project for their cooperation in the formation of the network and arrangement of this conference. It is a giant step in defining the network and for its continuity and to make further efforts to serve the largest segment of society," al-Babli said appreciatively.
Dr. Jamilah al-Ra'ei, deputy of Health and Population Ministry, confirmed that USAID provided this project in the health sectors besides several other health projects to ease its continuance with women and society and promotion of voluntary work. "As we know, women have a big role in volunteer work that is still understandably difficult in Yemen," she added.
"The government cannot do all the work, so it resorts to involve civil society organizations to complement these actions," she said. "It has a strong presence in the governorates."
"I hope that the Women's Network has a plan on how to continue and how it can be expanded in other governorates," she said hopefully.
There was a special focus on hearing and speech-disabled children through the Women's Network activities, given their status as an entrenched underclass in society.
During the conference, some beneficiaries presented how the health awareness improved their knowledge of health, one of whom was a 12-year-old child named Mohammed Musa'd from the Hearing and Speech-Disabled Association in Amran province. He explained to the attendees how the network helped him in his understanding of health issues and other areas like first aid awareness.
"We were ignorant of these important things in our lives because we are marginalized in the society, so the network comes and makes us aware of the issues," Musa'ed said. "We really appreciate their work."
Yousra Ahmad, another beneficiary from Amran also told her story of how the network gave her a new sense of health awareness that she did not know before. "I used to refuse every vaccination because there were rumors said that it gives diseases and makes you ill, but after I examined my thoughts, I believe what I was thinking was incorrect thanks to the social awareness activists," she said.
The Social Awareness Network is essentially a group of private associations working together, voluntarily, to raise the health levels of individuals in the community. It intends to reach a large number of women and to use their efforts and resource for voluntary awareness work.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Monday, August 18, 2008
Saudi Arabia: An Olympic Door Opens for Saudi Woman
Arwa Mutabagani, here with Saudi rider Faisal al-Shaalan in Hong Kong, is the first woman in a Saudi Olympic delegation.
By Faiza Saleh Ambah
JIDDAH, Saudi Arabia -- The first female member of a Saudi Olympic delegation is spending her days with the equestrian team in Hong Kong, checking on horses, encouraging riders, planning training schedules and meeting with officials.
Arwa Mutabagani, 38, a professional show jumper, became a member of the Saudi Olympic Committee after her appointment in April to the government body in charge of sports in Saudi Arabia, another first for a woman.
Saudi Arabia has long been criticized for being one of a few countries that ban female athletes at the Olympics, but Mutabagani said her role is a sign that Saudi Arabia is trying to open the way for women in sports.
"The door has been opened. I want to work hard and prove I'm not just a token woman or figurehead," she said.
Some female activists say the government is not moving fast enough.
"We have been asking for years via the media and academics and education experts and officials to be allowed the right to practice sports," said Manal al-Sharif, head of the women's section of al-Madina newspaper. "There is nothing in the religion that bans this. It's only our tradition and culture that are driving this ban until now."
Saudi Arabia, a deeply patriarchal and predominantly tribal society, remains a traditional kingdom in which puritan clerics wield a great deal of influence.
Women are not allowed to drive or travel without the permission of a male guardian. The country bans sports and physical education classes in state-run girls' schools, and there are no public sports complexes for women. On their own, women have discreetly formed a few sports teams, but the level of competition is nowhere near Olympic caliber.
Activist Wajeha al-Huwaider posted a video on YouTube to coincide with the start of the Olympics, demanding the right for Saudi women to participate and an end to the official ban on women's sports. The video showed five young women sitting on a soccer field, their bodies and faces covered in the traditional black abaya and head scarf, but their hands and feet symbolically shackled by tape.
Huwaider said she was surprised and touched by photos on the Internet of European women at the 2004 Olympics holding up signs that said "Where are our Saudi sisters?"
"I posted this video because I wanted people to know that there are Saudi women as well asking for this right," said Huwaider, 46, an educational analyst at an oil company.
But women's sports is a controversial subject in Saudi Arabia, where clerics preach against the encroachment of "Western values" and the dangers and sin of women trying to imitate men.
Saudi cleric Mohammad al-Munajid told the Saudi-owned Iqra channel this month that the revealing dress of women at the "Bikini," not Beijing, Olympics, was a source of pleasure to the devil. "What women are wearing in the Olympic Games are among the worst clothes possible. Women have never gotten naked for sports like they do in the Olympics."
The Saudi Shura Council, a government-appointed body that serves as a toothless parliament, has discussed the subject of women's sports several times, and, with few in favor and many against, has not come up with any resolutions.
"What's frustrating is that they discuss it like it's a luxury, a vanity. But the right to exercise is a basic right, it's a health issue," said activist Hatoon al-Fassi, an assistant professor of history at King Saud University. "Even in schools and universities, girls are obliged to wear skirts and not allowed to wear pants because they reveal women's curves."
The activists cited government statistics showing that more than two-thirds of Saudi women suffer from obesity and many are developing high blood pressure and diabetes.
Mutabagani, a single mother who has competed in many show-jumping events in Italy and is a qualified judge, said Saudi sports officials were considering appointing a woman to the board of each sports federation but were meeting resistance from the public.
At her first public event after her appointment, just one man out of more than 1,000 from Saudi Arabia's more than 35 sports federations congratulated her, she said. "People on the outside don't realize how difficult the position of Saudi sports officials is. They are going against a very conservative society, against generations and decades of one way of thinking. It has to be done gradually."
Mutabagani, who dreams of actually competing in the Olympics, said it was premature to predict whether Saudi women would participate in the 2012 London Games.
"Definitely they're trying to make an effort for women to participate," she said "I don't know if it will be that soon. I want to be optimistic, and I will do my best. But it takes two hands to clap."
---Washington Post
Friday, August 15, 2008
Saudi Arabia: IDB to Honor Women Involved in Development Work
IDB to Honor Women Involved in Development Work
JEDDAH, 24 May 2006 — The Islamic Development Bank (IDB) has established an annual “Contribution of Women in Development” prize. The first woman to receive the honor will be awarded by the end of this month.
The award is to encourage the participation of women and to increase opportunities for them to make their contributions to society. The prize will be awarded to the highest achieving women, women groups or women organizations in IDB member countries or Muslim communities in non-member countries.
During the IDB’s 13th annual symposium titled “Women in poverty alleviation: better access to education and micro finance” held at Burkina Faso in 2002, a recommendation was made to establish an IDB Advisory Panel of Eminent Women for assisting the bank in promoting the role of women in poverty reduction and socio-economic development process. This was followed by the appointment of a dozen women members to the advisory panel. They met in Sharjah, UAE, in March 2005 and issued ten recommendations for the institution of the prize for women and for NGOs serving women.
“The panel is of experts who advise the bank on strategy on women work. We met for the first time in Sharjah to develop the criteria, the scoring and grading for the women nominees to the prize,” Saleha Abedin, one of the advisory panel members and director of general education, academic advancement and international institutional relations at Dar Al-Hekma College, told Arab News.
There were 150 nominations from the state members. For two weeks a group of ten professors met at Dar Al-Hekma to review the nominees and name the top five finalists.
The award will be presented to the winner during the annual meeting of the bank’s board of governors in Kuwait. Abedin would not name the winner, but hinted that the woman is the head of a Jordanian NGO.
There are two awards, one is for an individual or group of individuals; the prize is $50,000. The other prize, for $100,000, is for an NGO or women organization. The fields for 2006 awards in the two categories are: Women Entrepreneurs and Their Role in Sustainable Development, and the Role of Training and Advocacy Programs in Women’s Socio-Economic Development.
The graphic design department at Dar Al-Hekma was assigned to create and design the award and the trophy.
“The graphic designs students made 36 designs of the award, the IDB president then chose the design out of the top five,” said Abedin.
The students also designed the trophy and Sarah Al-Sabbagh, the student with the winning design, will be going to Kuwait to receive an award for her design.
---Arab News
Source: http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=82657&d=24&m=5&y=2006
JEDDAH, 24 May 2006 — The Islamic Development Bank (IDB) has established an annual “Contribution of Women in Development” prize. The first woman to receive the honor will be awarded by the end of this month.
The award is to encourage the participation of women and to increase opportunities for them to make their contributions to society. The prize will be awarded to the highest achieving women, women groups or women organizations in IDB member countries or Muslim communities in non-member countries.
During the IDB’s 13th annual symposium titled “Women in poverty alleviation: better access to education and micro finance” held at Burkina Faso in 2002, a recommendation was made to establish an IDB Advisory Panel of Eminent Women for assisting the bank in promoting the role of women in poverty reduction and socio-economic development process. This was followed by the appointment of a dozen women members to the advisory panel. They met in Sharjah, UAE, in March 2005 and issued ten recommendations for the institution of the prize for women and for NGOs serving women.
“The panel is of experts who advise the bank on strategy on women work. We met for the first time in Sharjah to develop the criteria, the scoring and grading for the women nominees to the prize,” Saleha Abedin, one of the advisory panel members and director of general education, academic advancement and international institutional relations at Dar Al-Hekma College, told Arab News.
There were 150 nominations from the state members. For two weeks a group of ten professors met at Dar Al-Hekma to review the nominees and name the top five finalists.
The award will be presented to the winner during the annual meeting of the bank’s board of governors in Kuwait. Abedin would not name the winner, but hinted that the woman is the head of a Jordanian NGO.
There are two awards, one is for an individual or group of individuals; the prize is $50,000. The other prize, for $100,000, is for an NGO or women organization. The fields for 2006 awards in the two categories are: Women Entrepreneurs and Their Role in Sustainable Development, and the Role of Training and Advocacy Programs in Women’s Socio-Economic Development.
The graphic design department at Dar Al-Hekma was assigned to create and design the award and the trophy.
“The graphic designs students made 36 designs of the award, the IDB president then chose the design out of the top five,” said Abedin.
The students also designed the trophy and Sarah Al-Sabbagh, the student with the winning design, will be going to Kuwait to receive an award for her design.
---Arab News
Source: http://www.arabnews.com/?page=1§ion=0&article=82657&d=24&m=5&y=2006
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Saudi Arabia: Saudi Arabia's First Female CFO
In a Country Where Only 6 Percent of Women Work, Meet a Rising Star
By LARA SETRAKIAN
RSS From her smartly appointed office in Riyadh, Samira Al Kuwaiz, 44, helps manage Osool Capital, an independent investment firm in Saudi Arabia that holds 2.2 percent of the country's traded shares. Al Kuwaiz is from one of Saudi Arabia's tribal families, the equivalent of blue blood in that society. After earning a master's degree in accounting and teaching at King Saud University, she became the first female chief financial officer in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Samira Al Kuwaiz helps manage Osool Capital, an independent investment firm in Saudi Arabia. She is the first female CFO in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
(ABC)The World Economic Forum ranked Saudi Arabia the lowest out of 128 countries on women's participation in the workforce. Women make up roughly 6 percent of the workforce in Saudi Arabia, according to the Labor Ministry -- among the lowest in the world, but a jump up from nearly nothing a generation ago. Al Kuwaiz is part of an emerging set of women executives in the Kingdom.
Lara Setrakian: How did you get your start at Osool Capital?
Samira Al Kuwaiz: Initially, I was heading the marketing team for ladies, because the shareholders saw the prospect of women's funds in Saudi Arabia. People who own that money now in Saudi Arabia are the second generation of the people that initially made it, so we see a lot of women who have inherited money. Women own up to $60 billion in deposits, term deposits, which are not being utilized in the market. And the partners wanted to tap into this market. So I headed the finance department from the beginning. We started it form zero. I built up a team and now I'm heading the marketing for ladies and the finance department. I'm CFO of the company.
---ABC News
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Kuwait: MP proposes naturalizing children of Kuwaiti women
KUWAIT: MP Saleh Ashour on Monday submitted to the National Assembly a draft law that calls for granting children born to Kuwaiti mothers and non-Kuwaiti fathers the Kuwaiti citizenship, in response to calls of gender equality by a relatively large number of woman and human rights activists.
In his bill, Ashour said that children of Kuwaiti women should be granted the right to choose between their mothers'' and fathers'' nationality.
He stressed that Kuwaiti women should be treated equally with men, as the Kuwaiti law automatically grants children born to Kuwaiti fathers citizenship.
The draft law suggests that once a child of a Kuwaiti woman reaches the legal age he/she should be given the right to choose his father''s nationality if they wish so.
In an explanatory memo, which was attached to the bill, Ashour said that Kuwaiti women who are married to nonـKuwaitis and give birth to a child face many problems since their children are considered foreigners as per the nationality of their fathers.
"Such a suffering emerges once these children reach the school age or in the even they require health care or if they were looking for a job.
"Marrying a foreigner is allowed in the Islamic Sharia and Kuwaiti women should not be punished because of such a marriage," the MP added.
The bill amends the Second Article of the Kuwaiti Citizenship Law and cancels a paragraph in the Fifth Article of the same law.
---Al Watan, Herald Tribune
In his bill, Ashour said that children of Kuwaiti women should be granted the right to choose between their mothers'' and fathers'' nationality.
He stressed that Kuwaiti women should be treated equally with men, as the Kuwaiti law automatically grants children born to Kuwaiti fathers citizenship.
The draft law suggests that once a child of a Kuwaiti woman reaches the legal age he/she should be given the right to choose his father''s nationality if they wish so.
In an explanatory memo, which was attached to the bill, Ashour said that Kuwaiti women who are married to nonـKuwaitis and give birth to a child face many problems since their children are considered foreigners as per the nationality of their fathers.
"Such a suffering emerges once these children reach the school age or in the even they require health care or if they were looking for a job.
"Marrying a foreigner is allowed in the Islamic Sharia and Kuwaiti women should not be punished because of such a marriage," the MP added.
The bill amends the Second Article of the Kuwaiti Citizenship Law and cancels a paragraph in the Fifth Article of the same law.
---Al Watan, Herald Tribune
Yemen: Yemeni female political activists fight back
Leaderships of the Women National Committee discussing with other political activists and journalists during the meeting held at the WNC center in Sana’a.
A large group of women reunited on Monday, August 11, around a table at the Women National Committee (WNC) offices in Sana’a, the technical committee of the government’s Supreme Council for Women Affairs. Their objectives were to discuss a common strategy to defend their demand to reserve 15 percent of Parliament seats for women (“women’s quota”) and to approve a communiqué on the issue of women’s political participation, to serve as a response to the fatwa recently issued by the Vice and Virtue Committee (VVC) against the women’s quota, which they plan to send to all major political figures of the country in the coming days.
Women members of certain political parties, such as the Joint Meeting Parties (JMP), the Yemen Socialist Party (YSP) and al-Haqq party, as well as female representatives from various Ministries (e.g. Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Endowment and Guidance), together with women who work in the media, discussed the proposed “three political axes” for the WNC’s platform, which later extended to a further debate. These three points relate to the need to activate and coordinate support for women’s political participation in the 2009 Parliamentary elections, the need for implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW)—especially Article Four, which recommends temporary affirmative action for women’s political participation until actual gender equality is achieved, and the importance of the role of civil society organizations and media in supporting women’s presence in the political arena.
Hooria Mashoor, deputy chairperson of the WNC, stressed during the meeting that the “media is not paying enough attention to the quota issue and newspapers, together with television news channels, should address the issue of the women’s quota as a major issue that affects all Yemeni women and not one that is directed to one specific candidate or another.” She also called on all women politicians to ignore their party affiliations and fight for the implementation of the quota as individuals.
On July 15, the efforts made by these and other women for the implementation of the women’s quota were attacked by an non-governmental authority established to “fight against vice and defend virtue,” (VVC), which issued a fatwa (a legal pronouncement) against the women’s quota and women’s political participation in general, which they determined as haram (forbidden), or against Islam. Immediately, another women’s organization, the Yemen Women Union (YWU), responded with a note to the Parliament that cited passages from the Qur’an in order to prove that the fatwa was not in accordance with the principles of Islam.
The WNC for its part discussed with women hailing from various political institutions how to best respond to this issue, since “now is the right moment to do so because the government is currently in the process of amending laws, which happens every four years, and now is when we need to make the government include our demand for a quota for women in the upcoming parliamentary elections,” Mashoor stated. With regard to the fatwa, the WNC raised the question of whether it was legitimate for the Vice and Virtue Committee to issue a legal pronouncement of this kind in the first place. In its opinion, such a decision should be issued by the national religious authority formed by the ‘ulama, a group of religious leaders and scholars, and not by an organization that the WNC considers as political and not religious.
Zafraan Ali Almahana, a journalist and activist at Saudi-funded Middle East Research Center for Human Rights in Sana’a, stressed at the WNC meeting the necessity to address the lack of information that the religious leaders have about women’s political participation and its coherence with Islam. The other members present agreed on the necessity to talk to prominent sheikhs and religious leaders in order to explain to them what the quota is and why it does not contradict Islam. They also decided to send a letter to the president, the speaker of the Parliament, the prime minister, and the official body of the ‘ulama regarding this issue. The correspondence will also deal with women’s conditions in Yemen with regard to terms of education and participation in the labor force as well as contain a reminder about Yemen’s commitment to the CEDAW. The convention was ratified by the former southern People Democratic Republic of Yemen (PDRY) in 1984 with reservations on arbitration. Given that the laws from unified Yemen were not amended to conform to the standards of the CEDAW, this is another demand now made by the WNC.
A reading of the final draft of the letter concluded the meeting, with unanimous approval to send the text as is, without changes.
---Yemen Observer
Egypt: Spotlight on Egypt's marriage crisis
By Magdi Abdelhadi
"I want to get married" is a perfectly normal thing to say for a young Egyptian man. But when a girl says it in such a conservative society - let alone writes a book with that title - she is making a political statement.
"Girls are not supposed to be actively seeking something, a girl simply exists for someone to marry or divorce her," says the author of the top-selling book, Ghada Abdelaal. "To say she wants something is seen as impolite."
The book started as a blog, before it was spotted by an Egyptian publisher and printed as a series of comic sketches in which flawed and failed suitors knocking at her parents' door.
A paranoid policeman, a hirsute fundamentalist, a pathological liar and other hilarious caricatures portrayed in sparkling Egyptian vernacular.
Marriage anxiety
The veiled, softly-spoken Abdelaal is a sharp and witty observer of social incongruity in Egypt, a feisty spirit trying to tear up stifling tradition.
They ask young girls here when they are three or four, who would you marry… they implant the idea your only purpose in life is to get married
Ghada Abdelaal
She says her target is not Egyptian men but a tradition known as "gawwaz el-salonat" (living room marriage), where a stranger is brought to the family home and the daughter must decide whether to marry him on the basis of this brief encounter.
"People who go for a picnic need to know each other a little longer than that - let alone make a lifelong commitment."
The book's popularity - it is in its third print run with a sitcom in the offing - reflects a widespread anxiety in Egyptian society. More and more young people cannot afford to get married.
Although the book focuses on finding Mr Right, she acknowledges finding an affordable flat remains an almost insurmountable obstacle. Many young people stay engaged for years before they can save up enough money.
"By the time they actually get to live together, they are already tired of each other," says women's rights activist Nihad Abou El Qoumsan. This causes the unusually high rate of divorce among the newlyweds in Egypt, she says.
Such is the impact of property prices on the marriage crisis, a popular talk show has invited engaged couples to join a draw to win a flat.
A new apartment will be given away by a wealthy businessman every day of the fasting and holiday month of Ramadan, in September. Huge numbers have registered.
Sexual frustration
Some describe it as a social time bomb. Religious customs mean there is no sex before marriage. So how do young people react to this situation?
I don't think people who harass women on the street are necessarily single, or necessarily sexually frustrated
Anthropologist Hania Sholkamy
Sociologist Madeeha al-Safty of the American University in Cairo believes one consequence is sexual harassment of women and rape reaching unprecedented levels in Egypt.
"If you are frustrated, there is the possibility that you take it out [through] violence.
"Some people choose the safer way in moving towards a more religious attitude - not necessarily extremism, but it might reach the point of extremism," she adds.
But anthropologist Hania Sholkamy hesitates to link the problems of sexual harassment and rape to the marriage crisis.
"I don't think people who harass women on the street are necessarily single, or necessarily sexually frustrated. There are many millions of people who are extremely frustrated, but they do not harass women.
"I think the issue is one of violence and gender disparities, pure and simple."
Gender disparities is a theme running throughout Abdelaal's book, from the provocative title questioning the women's passive role in a traditional society to the way children are brought up.
"They ask young girls here when they are three or four, who would you marry… they implant the idea your only purpose in life is to get married.
"Even after she goes to school they tell her that a girl's only future is in her husband's home. So what happens when a girl for any reason cannot get married. Should she set fire to herself?"
---BBC NEWS
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/middle_east/7554892.stm
"I want to get married" is a perfectly normal thing to say for a young Egyptian man. But when a girl says it in such a conservative society - let alone writes a book with that title - she is making a political statement.
"Girls are not supposed to be actively seeking something, a girl simply exists for someone to marry or divorce her," says the author of the top-selling book, Ghada Abdelaal. "To say she wants something is seen as impolite."
The book started as a blog, before it was spotted by an Egyptian publisher and printed as a series of comic sketches in which flawed and failed suitors knocking at her parents' door.
A paranoid policeman, a hirsute fundamentalist, a pathological liar and other hilarious caricatures portrayed in sparkling Egyptian vernacular.
Marriage anxiety
The veiled, softly-spoken Abdelaal is a sharp and witty observer of social incongruity in Egypt, a feisty spirit trying to tear up stifling tradition.
They ask young girls here when they are three or four, who would you marry… they implant the idea your only purpose in life is to get married
Ghada Abdelaal
She says her target is not Egyptian men but a tradition known as "gawwaz el-salonat" (living room marriage), where a stranger is brought to the family home and the daughter must decide whether to marry him on the basis of this brief encounter.
"People who go for a picnic need to know each other a little longer than that - let alone make a lifelong commitment."
The book's popularity - it is in its third print run with a sitcom in the offing - reflects a widespread anxiety in Egyptian society. More and more young people cannot afford to get married.
Although the book focuses on finding Mr Right, she acknowledges finding an affordable flat remains an almost insurmountable obstacle. Many young people stay engaged for years before they can save up enough money.
"By the time they actually get to live together, they are already tired of each other," says women's rights activist Nihad Abou El Qoumsan. This causes the unusually high rate of divorce among the newlyweds in Egypt, she says.
Such is the impact of property prices on the marriage crisis, a popular talk show has invited engaged couples to join a draw to win a flat.
A new apartment will be given away by a wealthy businessman every day of the fasting and holiday month of Ramadan, in September. Huge numbers have registered.
Sexual frustration
Some describe it as a social time bomb. Religious customs mean there is no sex before marriage. So how do young people react to this situation?
I don't think people who harass women on the street are necessarily single, or necessarily sexually frustrated
Anthropologist Hania Sholkamy
Sociologist Madeeha al-Safty of the American University in Cairo believes one consequence is sexual harassment of women and rape reaching unprecedented levels in Egypt.
"If you are frustrated, there is the possibility that you take it out [through] violence.
"Some people choose the safer way in moving towards a more religious attitude - not necessarily extremism, but it might reach the point of extremism," she adds.
But anthropologist Hania Sholkamy hesitates to link the problems of sexual harassment and rape to the marriage crisis.
"I don't think people who harass women on the street are necessarily single, or necessarily sexually frustrated. There are many millions of people who are extremely frustrated, but they do not harass women.
"I think the issue is one of violence and gender disparities, pure and simple."
Gender disparities is a theme running throughout Abdelaal's book, from the provocative title questioning the women's passive role in a traditional society to the way children are brought up.
"They ask young girls here when they are three or four, who would you marry… they implant the idea your only purpose in life is to get married.
"Even after she goes to school they tell her that a girl's only future is in her husband's home. So what happens when a girl for any reason cannot get married. Should she set fire to herself?"
---BBC NEWS
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/middle_east/7554892.stm
Monday, August 11, 2008
Yemen: Yemeni female political activists fight back
Leaderships of the Women National Committee discussing with other political activists and journalists during the meeting held at the WNC center in Sana’a. A large group of women reunited on Monday, August 11, around a table at the Women National Committee (WNC) offices in Sana’a, the technical committee of the government’s Supreme Council for Women Affairs. Their objectives were to discuss a common strategy to defend their demand to reserve 15 percent of Parliament seats for women (“women’s quota”) and to approve a communiqué on the issue of women’s political participation, to serve as a response to the fatwa recently issued by the Vice and Virtue Committee (VVC) against the women’s quota, which they plan to send to all major political figures of the country in the coming days.
---Yemen Observer
---Yemen Observer
Saturday, August 9, 2008
Yemen: Detainees' families continue sit-in outside presidency palace
SANA'A
Dozens of Yemeni women continued their sit-in Saturday morning outside the Presidency Palace demanding the release of their relatives detained in the aftermath of conflict between the government and rebels in Sa'ada, north of Yemen.
Families asked in a letter to President Saleh for an immediate release of detainees who "have been arbitrarily disappeared over events in Sa'ada."
Demonstrators decided to continue their sit-in until their requests are met, accusing the Presidency's security of not delivering their letters to the president.
---NewsYemen
Dozens of Yemeni women continued their sit-in Saturday morning outside the Presidency Palace demanding the release of their relatives detained in the aftermath of conflict between the government and rebels in Sa'ada, north of Yemen.
Families asked in a letter to President Saleh for an immediate release of detainees who "have been arbitrarily disappeared over events in Sa'ada."
Demonstrators decided to continue their sit-in until their requests are met, accusing the Presidency's security of not delivering their letters to the president.
---NewsYemen
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Saudi Arabia: Commerce Ministry sets up panel to oversee RCCI vote
RIYADH: The Ministry of Commerce and Industry set up a special committee to guarantee a free and fair election for the new board of directors of the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce and Industry (RCCI). Businessmen and businesswomen will compete to grab 10 seats in the election scheduled on Oct. 15.
“Minister of Commerce and Industry Abdullah Zainal Alireza ordered the constitution of a supervising committee under Ibrahim Al-Harbi with Saeed Al-Otaiby and Abdullah Al-Nasyan as members,” said Abdul Malik Al-Sinani, acting deputy secretary-general of the RCCI.
“All the technical and operational preparations for the election to the RCCI’s board of directors are in place,” said Al-Sinani.
Another technical team set up by the Council of Saudi Chambers of Commerce will review the arrangements for the smooth conduct of the election.
Al-Sinani said that the technical team tested the safety of electronic voting machines that were successfully used in the last election.
“Businesswomen contesting for seats on the board is a special feature of the election this year,” he said.
“A special section would be prepared for the voting of women members,” he said. “The entry of women into the fray, which ought to be encouraged as it is a natural development after their entry to the business world, will be a rich experience.”
Following elections in Jeddah and the Eastern Province, this will be the third time that Saudi women will be able to run for office at a Saudi chamber.
Two Saudi businesswomen swept to an unprecedented victory in elections to the board of the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry in the first polls in which women stood as candidates in the Kingdom in November 2005.
---Arab News
“Minister of Commerce and Industry Abdullah Zainal Alireza ordered the constitution of a supervising committee under Ibrahim Al-Harbi with Saeed Al-Otaiby and Abdullah Al-Nasyan as members,” said Abdul Malik Al-Sinani, acting deputy secretary-general of the RCCI.
“All the technical and operational preparations for the election to the RCCI’s board of directors are in place,” said Al-Sinani.
Another technical team set up by the Council of Saudi Chambers of Commerce will review the arrangements for the smooth conduct of the election.
Al-Sinani said that the technical team tested the safety of electronic voting machines that were successfully used in the last election.
“Businesswomen contesting for seats on the board is a special feature of the election this year,” he said.
“A special section would be prepared for the voting of women members,” he said. “The entry of women into the fray, which ought to be encouraged as it is a natural development after their entry to the business world, will be a rich experience.”
Following elections in Jeddah and the Eastern Province, this will be the third time that Saudi women will be able to run for office at a Saudi chamber.
Two Saudi businesswomen swept to an unprecedented victory in elections to the board of the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry in the first polls in which women stood as candidates in the Kingdom in November 2005.
---Arab News
Wednesday, August 6, 2008
Bahrain: Municipal Council to highlight women’s achievements
The contribution of women to Bahrain's culture and democratic process will be the focus of the first Women Forum to be organised by the Northern Municipal Council.
The two-day event, scheduled to be held from October 18, will also discuss the impact of low standards of living on women.
It will be attended by officials from the UN, ministries, women's organisations and Northern Governorate charities.
A competition is being held leading up to the event, with more than 40 applicants registering so far, said the council's women's committee public relations head Majida Al Asfoor.
Competitors have to carry out research work focusing on the forum's three main topics, she added.
Ms Al Asfoor said that on the first day of the conference, the three topics will be discussed and the top three winners in the competition will be awarded as well as pioneering women in various fields.
The event will also feature an exhibition highlighting Bahrain's heritage.
In addition, the forum will honor distinctive women in various fields in Bahrain. A workshop will be organised on the second day by the council's women's committee head Mariam Al Haikee.
Ms Al Asfoor said that the committee recently held two workshops, conducted by political and social activist Fatima Fairooz as part of preparations for the forum.
---Gulf Daily News
The two-day event, scheduled to be held from October 18, will also discuss the impact of low standards of living on women.
It will be attended by officials from the UN, ministries, women's organisations and Northern Governorate charities.
A competition is being held leading up to the event, with more than 40 applicants registering so far, said the council's women's committee public relations head Majida Al Asfoor.
Competitors have to carry out research work focusing on the forum's three main topics, she added.
Ms Al Asfoor said that on the first day of the conference, the three topics will be discussed and the top three winners in the competition will be awarded as well as pioneering women in various fields.
The event will also feature an exhibition highlighting Bahrain's heritage.
In addition, the forum will honor distinctive women in various fields in Bahrain. A workshop will be organised on the second day by the council's women's committee head Mariam Al Haikee.
Ms Al Asfoor said that the committee recently held two workshops, conducted by political and social activist Fatima Fairooz as part of preparations for the forum.
---Gulf Daily News
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Jordan: Jordan's first woman party leader nabbed for fraud
AMMAN (AFP) — The first woman to lead a Jordanian political party has been arrested over claims she manufactured and sold unlicenced medicine, a security official said on Tuesday.
"(Mona Hussein Abu Bakr) was arrested on Monday night over fraud and violation of the food and drugs law after a complaint that she had manufactured and sold unlicenced medicine," the official told AFP on condition of anonymity.
"Three Jordanians and a man from an Arab country have filed an official fraud complaint against Hussein," he said.
A source close to Abu Bakr, who was born in 1957 and set up the centrist National Jordanian Party in 2007, said police took her to a government hospital in Amman on Monday after she suffered a "nervous breakdown".
He said she was under police guard in the hospital and that a petition by Abu Bakr's lawyer to release her on bail had been rejected, without providing further details.
---AFP
"(Mona Hussein Abu Bakr) was arrested on Monday night over fraud and violation of the food and drugs law after a complaint that she had manufactured and sold unlicenced medicine," the official told AFP on condition of anonymity.
"Three Jordanians and a man from an Arab country have filed an official fraud complaint against Hussein," he said.
A source close to Abu Bakr, who was born in 1957 and set up the centrist National Jordanian Party in 2007, said police took her to a government hospital in Amman on Monday after she suffered a "nervous breakdown".
He said she was under police guard in the hospital and that a petition by Abu Bakr's lawyer to release her on bail had been rejected, without providing further details.
---AFP
Saudi Arabia: Calls for end to Saudi child marriages
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia—An 11-year-old boy gave out invitations to his classmates for a big event his family was planning this summer -- and it wasn't his birthday party.
It was his wedding to a 10-year-old cousin.
Muhammad al-Rashidi's marriage was eventually put on hold, his father said, after pressure from the governor of the northern province of Hail, who considered the elementary school student too young to marry.
The case is among a recent spate of marriages involving the very young reported in the media and by Saudi human rights groups. They have been widely denounced by activists, clerics and others who say such unions are harmful to the children and trivialize the institution of marriage.
Saudi Arabia is already rocked by a high divorce rate that has jumped from 25 percent to 60 percent over the past 20 years, according to Noura al-Shamlan, head of the research department at the Center of University Studies for Girls.
"We are studying this issue so we can put an end to this phenomenon," said Zuhair al-Harithi, board member of the Human Rights Commission, a Saudi government-run rights group. "These marriages violate international agreements the kingdom has signed."
Al-Harithi's group recently succeeded in delaying the consummation of the marriage of a 10-year-old girl after getting reports from medical centers in Hail that she and a man in his 60s had showed up for the mandatory prenuptial medical tests.
He said the commission wrote to the province's governor and head of Islamic courts urging them to stop the marriage.
But there are other marriages involving children that have gone ahead.
One involved a 15-year-old girl whose father, Muhammad Ali al-Zahrani, a death-row inmate, married her off to a cell mate who also was sentenced to death. The father's sentence was carried out July 21, when he was beheaded for killing another man.
Pictures of the wedding, held in the prison in Taif for the men, appeared in several newspapers. Media reports said inmates recited poems and delivered speeches in the presence of prison officials. The teenage bride and other women, as is the custom here, held a separate reception outside the jail.
The groom, Awad al-Harbi, and his bride were allowed to spend two nights together in a special prison quarters after the wedding, according to Al-Watan. Al-Harbi told another newspaper, Al-Madina, recently that his wife was pregnant.
There are no laws in Saudi Arabia defining the minimum age for marriage. Though a woman's consent is legally required, some marriage officials do not seek it. For example, a father can marry off a 1-year-old girl as long as sex is delayed until she reaches puberty, said one marriage official, Ahmad al-Muabi.
Known as "ma'thoons," these officials have legal authority to preside over marriage contract ceremonies. They ask the groom and the woman's guardian if they approve of the marriage and then give them the marriage papers to sign.Continued...
There are no statistics to show how many marriages involving children are performed every year. And it's also not clear whether these unions are on the rise or whether people are hearing about them more now because of the prevalence of media outlets and easy access to the Internet.
But the phenomenon is not new, said Sheik Muhammad al-Nujaimi, a strong opponent of the marriages. He and other clerics, activists and writers have urged the government to pass legislation setting the minimum age for marriage and to resolve differences among the kingdom's religious authorities over the issue.
"There are different (religious) opinions regarding the marriages which is why we need the government to settle the issue through legislation," said al-Nujaimi.
Such marriages occur not only in Saudi Arabia. In April, an 8-year-old Yemeni girl sought out a judge to file for divorce from a man nearly four times her age. Her lawyer said she was one of thousands of underaged girls who have been forced into marriages in Yemen, an impoverished tribal country at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula.
Activists say the numbers in Saudi Arabia are not so high. They say the girls are given away in return for hefty dowries or as a result of long-standing custom in which a father promises his infant daughters and sons to cousins out of a belief that marriage will protect them from illicit relationships.
Denouncing the custom, Sheik Abdul-Aziz Al Sheik, the kingdom's grand mufti and top religious authority, said recently a guardian should not impose his will on his children or promise them to their cousins.
"Islam has stipulated that both parties agree to the marriage contract," he said, according to Al-Madina newspaper. "The woman must express real consent to the suitor, and a guardian must not impose his choice of husband on her ... or force his son to marry someone he doesn't want."
Al-Muabi, the marriage official, told Lebanese-run LBC TV that because marriage in Islam takes place in two stages -- a marriage contract can be signed months or even years before a woman moves in with her husband -- that means a 1-year-old girl can be married off.
A man "can enter a marriage contract with a 1-year-old girl, not to mention 9 years, 7 years or 8 years," said al-Muabi. "This is just a contract indicating consent, and the guardian in this case must be the father."
Al-Muabi maintained such unions make sense in some cases, such as when a man is the sole guardian of many daughters.
"Isn't it better to marry his daughter to a man with whom she can stay and who can protect her and support her, and when she reaches the proper age, have sex with her? Who says all men are ferocious wolves?" said al-Muabi.
However, Sheik Abdul-Mohsen al-Obeikan, a legal adviser at the Justice Ministry, said a girl's consent is crucial.
"A marriage official should not conclude a marriage contract without the woman's agreement and without her signature," al-Obeikan, who is also a member of the appointed Consultative Council that acts like a Parliament, told Al-Madina. "Officials who ignore such instructions expose themselves to punishment."
Until laws are put in place to protect children, Saudi human rights groups have been speaking out against the practice.
"When girls are married off at a young age they will be deprived of education and of enjoying their childhood," said Suhaila Hammad of the National Society for Human Rights, a private Saudi group. "Their bodies won't be able to tolerate pregnancy and delivering children."
But there's only so much the groups can do.
Muraiziq al-Rashidi, the 11-year-old boy's father, told The Associated Press he will delay his son's marriage only by a year.
"God willing, we will hold the wedding next year," he said.
There are no statistics to show how many marriages involving children are performed every year. And it's also not clear whether these unions are on the rise or whether people are hearing about them more now because of the prevalence of media outlets and easy access to the Internet.
But the phenomenon is not new, said Sheik Muhammad al-Nujaimi, a strong opponent of the marriages. He and other clerics, activists and writers have urged the government to pass legislation setting the minimum age for marriage and to resolve differences among the kingdom's religious authorities over the issue.
"There are different (religious) opinions regarding the marriages which is why we need the government to settle the issue through legislation," said al-Nujaimi.
Such marriages occur not only in Saudi Arabia. In April, an 8-year-old Yemeni girl sought out a judge to file for divorce from a man nearly four times her age. Her lawyer said she was one of thousands of underaged girls who have been forced into marriages in Yemen, an impoverished tribal country at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula.
Activists say the numbers in Saudi Arabia are not so high. They say the girls are given away in return for hefty dowries or as a result of long-standing custom in which a father promises his infant daughters and sons to cousins out of a belief that marriage will protect them from illicit relationships.
Denouncing the custom, Sheik Abdul-Aziz Al Sheik, the kingdom's grand mufti and top religious authority, said recently a guardian should not impose his will on his children or promise them to their cousins.
"Islam has stipulated that both parties agree to the marriage contract," he said, according to Al-Madina newspaper. "The woman must express real consent to the suitor, and a guardian must not impose his choice of husband on her ... or force his son to marry someone he doesn't want."
Al-Muabi, the marriage official, told Lebanese-run LBC TV that because marriage in Islam takes place in two stages -- a marriage contract can be signed months or even years before a woman moves in with her husband -- that means a 1-year-old girl can be married off.
A man "can enter a marriage contract with a 1-year-old girl, not to mention 9 years, 7 years or 8 years," said al-Muabi. "This is just a contract indicating consent, and the guardian in this case must be the father."
Al-Muabi maintained such unions make sense in some cases, such as when a man is the sole guardian of many daughters.
"Isn't it better to marry his daughter to a man with whom she can stay and who can protect her and support her, and when she reaches the proper age, have sex with her? Who says all men are ferocious wolves?" said al-Muabi.
However, Sheik Abdul-Mohsen al-Obeikan, a legal adviser at the Justice Ministry, said a girl's consent is crucial.
"A marriage official should not conclude a marriage contract without the woman's agreement and without her signature," al-Obeikan, who is also a member of the appointed Consultative Council that acts like a Parliament, told Al-Madina. "Officials who ignore such instructions expose themselves to punishment."
Until laws are put in place to protect children, Saudi human rights groups have been speaking out against the practice.
"When girls are married off at a young age they will be deprived of education and of enjoying their childhood," said Suhaila Hammad of the National Society for Human Rights, a private Saudi group. "Their bodies won't be able to tolerate pregnancy and delivering children."
But there's only so much the groups can do.
Muraiziq al-Rashidi, the 11-year-old boy's father, told The Associated Press he will delay his son's marriage only by a year.
"God willing, we will hold the wedding next year," he said.
---Boston Globe
It was his wedding to a 10-year-old cousin.
Muhammad al-Rashidi's marriage was eventually put on hold, his father said, after pressure from the governor of the northern province of Hail, who considered the elementary school student too young to marry.
The case is among a recent spate of marriages involving the very young reported in the media and by Saudi human rights groups. They have been widely denounced by activists, clerics and others who say such unions are harmful to the children and trivialize the institution of marriage.
Saudi Arabia is already rocked by a high divorce rate that has jumped from 25 percent to 60 percent over the past 20 years, according to Noura al-Shamlan, head of the research department at the Center of University Studies for Girls.
"We are studying this issue so we can put an end to this phenomenon," said Zuhair al-Harithi, board member of the Human Rights Commission, a Saudi government-run rights group. "These marriages violate international agreements the kingdom has signed."
Al-Harithi's group recently succeeded in delaying the consummation of the marriage of a 10-year-old girl after getting reports from medical centers in Hail that she and a man in his 60s had showed up for the mandatory prenuptial medical tests.
He said the commission wrote to the province's governor and head of Islamic courts urging them to stop the marriage.
But there are other marriages involving children that have gone ahead.
One involved a 15-year-old girl whose father, Muhammad Ali al-Zahrani, a death-row inmate, married her off to a cell mate who also was sentenced to death. The father's sentence was carried out July 21, when he was beheaded for killing another man.
Pictures of the wedding, held in the prison in Taif for the men, appeared in several newspapers. Media reports said inmates recited poems and delivered speeches in the presence of prison officials. The teenage bride and other women, as is the custom here, held a separate reception outside the jail.
The groom, Awad al-Harbi, and his bride were allowed to spend two nights together in a special prison quarters after the wedding, according to Al-Watan. Al-Harbi told another newspaper, Al-Madina, recently that his wife was pregnant.
There are no laws in Saudi Arabia defining the minimum age for marriage. Though a woman's consent is legally required, some marriage officials do not seek it. For example, a father can marry off a 1-year-old girl as long as sex is delayed until she reaches puberty, said one marriage official, Ahmad al-Muabi.
Known as "ma'thoons," these officials have legal authority to preside over marriage contract ceremonies. They ask the groom and the woman's guardian if they approve of the marriage and then give them the marriage papers to sign.Continued...
There are no statistics to show how many marriages involving children are performed every year. And it's also not clear whether these unions are on the rise or whether people are hearing about them more now because of the prevalence of media outlets and easy access to the Internet.
But the phenomenon is not new, said Sheik Muhammad al-Nujaimi, a strong opponent of the marriages. He and other clerics, activists and writers have urged the government to pass legislation setting the minimum age for marriage and to resolve differences among the kingdom's religious authorities over the issue.
"There are different (religious) opinions regarding the marriages which is why we need the government to settle the issue through legislation," said al-Nujaimi.
Such marriages occur not only in Saudi Arabia. In April, an 8-year-old Yemeni girl sought out a judge to file for divorce from a man nearly four times her age. Her lawyer said she was one of thousands of underaged girls who have been forced into marriages in Yemen, an impoverished tribal country at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula.
Activists say the numbers in Saudi Arabia are not so high. They say the girls are given away in return for hefty dowries or as a result of long-standing custom in which a father promises his infant daughters and sons to cousins out of a belief that marriage will protect them from illicit relationships.
Denouncing the custom, Sheik Abdul-Aziz Al Sheik, the kingdom's grand mufti and top religious authority, said recently a guardian should not impose his will on his children or promise them to their cousins.
"Islam has stipulated that both parties agree to the marriage contract," he said, according to Al-Madina newspaper. "The woman must express real consent to the suitor, and a guardian must not impose his choice of husband on her ... or force his son to marry someone he doesn't want."
Al-Muabi, the marriage official, told Lebanese-run LBC TV that because marriage in Islam takes place in two stages -- a marriage contract can be signed months or even years before a woman moves in with her husband -- that means a 1-year-old girl can be married off.
A man "can enter a marriage contract with a 1-year-old girl, not to mention 9 years, 7 years or 8 years," said al-Muabi. "This is just a contract indicating consent, and the guardian in this case must be the father."
Al-Muabi maintained such unions make sense in some cases, such as when a man is the sole guardian of many daughters.
"Isn't it better to marry his daughter to a man with whom she can stay and who can protect her and support her, and when she reaches the proper age, have sex with her? Who says all men are ferocious wolves?" said al-Muabi.
However, Sheik Abdul-Mohsen al-Obeikan, a legal adviser at the Justice Ministry, said a girl's consent is crucial.
"A marriage official should not conclude a marriage contract without the woman's agreement and without her signature," al-Obeikan, who is also a member of the appointed Consultative Council that acts like a Parliament, told Al-Madina. "Officials who ignore such instructions expose themselves to punishment."
Until laws are put in place to protect children, Saudi human rights groups have been speaking out against the practice.
"When girls are married off at a young age they will be deprived of education and of enjoying their childhood," said Suhaila Hammad of the National Society for Human Rights, a private Saudi group. "Their bodies won't be able to tolerate pregnancy and delivering children."
But there's only so much the groups can do.
Muraiziq al-Rashidi, the 11-year-old boy's father, told The Associated Press he will delay his son's marriage only by a year.
"God willing, we will hold the wedding next year," he said.
There are no statistics to show how many marriages involving children are performed every year. And it's also not clear whether these unions are on the rise or whether people are hearing about them more now because of the prevalence of media outlets and easy access to the Internet.
But the phenomenon is not new, said Sheik Muhammad al-Nujaimi, a strong opponent of the marriages. He and other clerics, activists and writers have urged the government to pass legislation setting the minimum age for marriage and to resolve differences among the kingdom's religious authorities over the issue.
"There are different (religious) opinions regarding the marriages which is why we need the government to settle the issue through legislation," said al-Nujaimi.
Such marriages occur not only in Saudi Arabia. In April, an 8-year-old Yemeni girl sought out a judge to file for divorce from a man nearly four times her age. Her lawyer said she was one of thousands of underaged girls who have been forced into marriages in Yemen, an impoverished tribal country at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula.
Activists say the numbers in Saudi Arabia are not so high. They say the girls are given away in return for hefty dowries or as a result of long-standing custom in which a father promises his infant daughters and sons to cousins out of a belief that marriage will protect them from illicit relationships.
Denouncing the custom, Sheik Abdul-Aziz Al Sheik, the kingdom's grand mufti and top religious authority, said recently a guardian should not impose his will on his children or promise them to their cousins.
"Islam has stipulated that both parties agree to the marriage contract," he said, according to Al-Madina newspaper. "The woman must express real consent to the suitor, and a guardian must not impose his choice of husband on her ... or force his son to marry someone he doesn't want."
Al-Muabi, the marriage official, told Lebanese-run LBC TV that because marriage in Islam takes place in two stages -- a marriage contract can be signed months or even years before a woman moves in with her husband -- that means a 1-year-old girl can be married off.
A man "can enter a marriage contract with a 1-year-old girl, not to mention 9 years, 7 years or 8 years," said al-Muabi. "This is just a contract indicating consent, and the guardian in this case must be the father."
Al-Muabi maintained such unions make sense in some cases, such as when a man is the sole guardian of many daughters.
"Isn't it better to marry his daughter to a man with whom she can stay and who can protect her and support her, and when she reaches the proper age, have sex with her? Who says all men are ferocious wolves?" said al-Muabi.
However, Sheik Abdul-Mohsen al-Obeikan, a legal adviser at the Justice Ministry, said a girl's consent is crucial.
"A marriage official should not conclude a marriage contract without the woman's agreement and without her signature," al-Obeikan, who is also a member of the appointed Consultative Council that acts like a Parliament, told Al-Madina. "Officials who ignore such instructions expose themselves to punishment."
Until laws are put in place to protect children, Saudi human rights groups have been speaking out against the practice.
"When girls are married off at a young age they will be deprived of education and of enjoying their childhood," said Suhaila Hammad of the National Society for Human Rights, a private Saudi group. "Their bodies won't be able to tolerate pregnancy and delivering children."
But there's only so much the groups can do.
Muraiziq al-Rashidi, the 11-year-old boy's father, told The Associated Press he will delay his son's marriage only by a year.
"God willing, we will hold the wedding next year," he said.
---Boston Globe
Egypt: Grass-roots effort in Egypt fights 'cutting' girls
By ANNA JOHNSON
SULTAN ZAWYIT, Egypt (AP) — In this small Nile River farming village, Maha Mohammed has started to doubt whether she should circumcise her two daughters.
A year ago, she had few qualms about female genital mutilation, the practice of cutting a girl's clitoris and sometimes other genitalia. She herself was cut two decades ago, and she fears her daughters will not find husbands otherwise.
But Mohammed also has heard that circumcision can be medically risky and emotionally painful. And a strong-willed neighbor, another woman, has been dropping by her house regularly to persuade her to say no.
"I hear that girls suffer not just physically but psychologically," the 31-year-old Mohammed said. "But I am afraid. I don't want my daughters to have uncontrollable demands for sex."
Such doubts are significant. With vigorous grass-roots campaigns and the passage of tough laws against circumcision, Egypt seems to be making a dent in this deeply ingrained practice, thousands of years old. The number of young girls circumcised is now steadily declining in a country where an estimated 96 percent of married Egyptian women have had their genitals cut.
The most recent comprehensive study predicts about 63 percent of Egyptian girls 9 years old and under will be circumcised over the next decade. The numbers are lower in urban areas like Cairo — about 40 percent — but higher for rural areas in the south — about 78 percent, the government's 2005 demographic and health survey predicts.
The lower circumcision rate in urban areas is attributed to higher income and education levels and greater access to information. But in the villages along the Nile, where the rate is highest, a grass-roots effort is under way to bring information straight to people's homes.
The door-to-door campaign to end female genital mutilation is slow and time-consuming. It publicly plays down any outside help or connections to Western aid groups.
Instead, local activists focus on convincing Egyptians, one woman, one family and one village at a time. Often they reach out to women who have turned against the practice on their own, appealing to them to approach neighbors whose daughters are between ages 8 and 11.
Fatma Mohammed Ali is one.
The 35-year-old woman suffered intense complications after being circumcised at age 13, including severe pain during childbirth. Now she regularly visits her neighbor — Mohammed — gently discouraging her from the practice and using her own family as an example.
Neither of Ali's daughters was circumcised. Both are physically "normal" and one attends university — a high achievement for a woman from this village, Ali says.
"I don't care what everyone thinks. I was really harmed, and I didn't want this for my daughters," said Ali, a proud woman who often sits with her arms crossed against her chest. "When I talk about my experience, many become convinced. They also see how my daughters are good and religious."
It's difficult to encourage village women to go public with their views on the subject, said Nevine Saad Fouad, the project manager for child protection with a group called the Better Life Association for Comprehensive Development in the nearby city of Minya.
But when village women do go public, the results are astonishing.
Of some 3,000 families targeted over the past few years in several nearby villages, more than half say they have abandoned the practice, nearly 800 are undecided and fewer than 500 say they will continue to circumcise their daughters.
The key is convincing villages that stopping circumcision is an Egyptian idea — not one imported by international aid groups or Western governments, Fouad said. The group also promotes homegrown activities such as community plays, discussions with local doctors and religious debates.
Along with local groups taking action, Egypt's government has also been discouraging the practice in recent years. The National Council for Childhood and Motherhood has developed programs to help villages declare themselves against the cutting and sponsored an influential campaign of TV commercials and billboards featuring a young Egyptian girl.
Last year, the Ministry of Health prohibited licensed medical professionals from performing the procedure, and Egypt's parliament voted in June to ban it as part of a law protecting children. But activists stress that laws alone aren't enough.
"There is a wave of change right now," said Mona Amin of the childhood and motherhood council. "But we must keep this momentum, this intensity."
The pressure to uphold the tradition in this conservative, socially close-knit nation of 80 million people remains strong.
Many women fear potential husbands will reject daughters as impure or immoral. Medical rumors — including that circumcision is the only way to control a girl's sexual desires — are rampant. Others believe that abandoning the practice is caving to Western pressures to change their society.
Female genital mutilation is practiced in Africa and the Middle East by Muslims as well as Christians
In Egypt, leaders of both religions have spoken against it, including Coptic Christian Pope Shenouda III and Egypt's Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa, who issued a fatwa against it in 2007. But others, especially some local Muslim leaders, continue to give their blessing.
Egyptians also receive mixed messages from midwives and some doctors, Fouad said. Some doctors, midwives and even barbers make home visits, giving circumcision sales pitches — just to make money off the $10 for an operation, Fouad believes.
For now, for every mother who agrees not to circumcise her daughters, many others still go ahead, activists say — women like Samia Ali Taha, who lives in the same village as Ali and Mohammed.
Taha is convinced she must circumcise her daughter a year from now, in the summer after the girl finishes sixth grade. She feels that way despite visits from another woman neighbor who has told her that the medical rumors — including that a woman's clitoris will grow if not cut — are false.
"It's not an option. We can't have it otherwise," said Taha, 32. "It is something we have grown up with and our ancestors have done."
But at a nearby house, sitting with a 6-year-old daughter cradled in her lap, Mohammed says she is slowly being convinced the other way.
"Maybe I am 70 percent for not doing it. Part of my change of heart is talking with Fatma and others," Mohammed said.
The young mother hesitates. "But I am still confused," she says.
---Associated Press
SULTAN ZAWYIT, Egypt (AP) — In this small Nile River farming village, Maha Mohammed has started to doubt whether she should circumcise her two daughters.
A year ago, she had few qualms about female genital mutilation, the practice of cutting a girl's clitoris and sometimes other genitalia. She herself was cut two decades ago, and she fears her daughters will not find husbands otherwise.
But Mohammed also has heard that circumcision can be medically risky and emotionally painful. And a strong-willed neighbor, another woman, has been dropping by her house regularly to persuade her to say no.
"I hear that girls suffer not just physically but psychologically," the 31-year-old Mohammed said. "But I am afraid. I don't want my daughters to have uncontrollable demands for sex."
Such doubts are significant. With vigorous grass-roots campaigns and the passage of tough laws against circumcision, Egypt seems to be making a dent in this deeply ingrained practice, thousands of years old. The number of young girls circumcised is now steadily declining in a country where an estimated 96 percent of married Egyptian women have had their genitals cut.
The most recent comprehensive study predicts about 63 percent of Egyptian girls 9 years old and under will be circumcised over the next decade. The numbers are lower in urban areas like Cairo — about 40 percent — but higher for rural areas in the south — about 78 percent, the government's 2005 demographic and health survey predicts.
The lower circumcision rate in urban areas is attributed to higher income and education levels and greater access to information. But in the villages along the Nile, where the rate is highest, a grass-roots effort is under way to bring information straight to people's homes.
The door-to-door campaign to end female genital mutilation is slow and time-consuming. It publicly plays down any outside help or connections to Western aid groups.
Instead, local activists focus on convincing Egyptians, one woman, one family and one village at a time. Often they reach out to women who have turned against the practice on their own, appealing to them to approach neighbors whose daughters are between ages 8 and 11.
Fatma Mohammed Ali is one.
The 35-year-old woman suffered intense complications after being circumcised at age 13, including severe pain during childbirth. Now she regularly visits her neighbor — Mohammed — gently discouraging her from the practice and using her own family as an example.
Neither of Ali's daughters was circumcised. Both are physically "normal" and one attends university — a high achievement for a woman from this village, Ali says.
"I don't care what everyone thinks. I was really harmed, and I didn't want this for my daughters," said Ali, a proud woman who often sits with her arms crossed against her chest. "When I talk about my experience, many become convinced. They also see how my daughters are good and religious."
It's difficult to encourage village women to go public with their views on the subject, said Nevine Saad Fouad, the project manager for child protection with a group called the Better Life Association for Comprehensive Development in the nearby city of Minya.
But when village women do go public, the results are astonishing.
Of some 3,000 families targeted over the past few years in several nearby villages, more than half say they have abandoned the practice, nearly 800 are undecided and fewer than 500 say they will continue to circumcise their daughters.
The key is convincing villages that stopping circumcision is an Egyptian idea — not one imported by international aid groups or Western governments, Fouad said. The group also promotes homegrown activities such as community plays, discussions with local doctors and religious debates.
Along with local groups taking action, Egypt's government has also been discouraging the practice in recent years. The National Council for Childhood and Motherhood has developed programs to help villages declare themselves against the cutting and sponsored an influential campaign of TV commercials and billboards featuring a young Egyptian girl.
Last year, the Ministry of Health prohibited licensed medical professionals from performing the procedure, and Egypt's parliament voted in June to ban it as part of a law protecting children. But activists stress that laws alone aren't enough.
"There is a wave of change right now," said Mona Amin of the childhood and motherhood council. "But we must keep this momentum, this intensity."
The pressure to uphold the tradition in this conservative, socially close-knit nation of 80 million people remains strong.
Many women fear potential husbands will reject daughters as impure or immoral. Medical rumors — including that circumcision is the only way to control a girl's sexual desires — are rampant. Others believe that abandoning the practice is caving to Western pressures to change their society.
Female genital mutilation is practiced in Africa and the Middle East by Muslims as well as Christians
In Egypt, leaders of both religions have spoken against it, including Coptic Christian Pope Shenouda III and Egypt's Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa, who issued a fatwa against it in 2007. But others, especially some local Muslim leaders, continue to give their blessing.
Egyptians also receive mixed messages from midwives and some doctors, Fouad said. Some doctors, midwives and even barbers make home visits, giving circumcision sales pitches — just to make money off the $10 for an operation, Fouad believes.
For now, for every mother who agrees not to circumcise her daughters, many others still go ahead, activists say — women like Samia Ali Taha, who lives in the same village as Ali and Mohammed.
Taha is convinced she must circumcise her daughter a year from now, in the summer after the girl finishes sixth grade. She feels that way despite visits from another woman neighbor who has told her that the medical rumors — including that a woman's clitoris will grow if not cut — are false.
"It's not an option. We can't have it otherwise," said Taha, 32. "It is something we have grown up with and our ancestors have done."
But at a nearby house, sitting with a 6-year-old daughter cradled in her lap, Mohammed says she is slowly being convinced the other way.
"Maybe I am 70 percent for not doing it. Part of my change of heart is talking with Fatma and others," Mohammed said.
The young mother hesitates. "But I am still confused," she says.
---Associated Press
Saturday, August 2, 2008
Saudi Arabia: Women can issue Fatwas, be Muftis: Sheikh Abdullah Al-Manea
A senior member of the Board of Senior Ulemas has said women are allowed to join the board in order to break the monopoly held by men.
Sheikh Abdullah Al-Manea said women have the same Shariah obligations in creating religious edicts or ‘Fatwas.’
“I don’t see anything in Shariah law which prevents women from becoming a scholar, mufti or working in any consultative body if she is courteous,” said Al-Manea in an Al-Watan interview.
“Women share in the responsibility of discussing social issues.”
He said as long as they do not provide an opportunity for men to view them with lust there is nothing stopping them from becoming the head of an organization.
Suhaila Zain Al-Abdeen, member of the National Human Rights Society said there is a pressing need for women to participate in edicts on sensitive matters.
He said women can work in the same organization as men as long as they work separately.
“Even though men and women are different they share a number of similarities. There is nothing which prohibits a woman from working alongside men as long as they do not mingle,” Al-Manea said.
Al-Manea said in Islam there are no restrictions on men hearing the voice of women, noting that the Prophet’s wives used to answer questions from men they did not know but they were divided by a curtain.
“This shows that a woman’s voice is permissible to be heard by men,” he said referring to an idea that hearing a woman’s voice is a temptation.
“This shows us that knowledge is not limited to men but in the time of the Prophet (pbuh) women were authorities in different fields of knowledge.
Abdul Rahamn Al-Zenadi an Islamic culture teacher at Imam Muhammad Bin Saud Islamic University in Riyadh said “We have in the Kingdom several Saudi women who are authorities on Shariah law. “
“Several law professors are stressing they are more capable of giving edicts than many muftis who appear on some satellite channels,” Al-Zenadi said.
---Saudi Gazette
Sheikh Abdullah Al-Manea said women have the same Shariah obligations in creating religious edicts or ‘Fatwas.’
“I don’t see anything in Shariah law which prevents women from becoming a scholar, mufti or working in any consultative body if she is courteous,” said Al-Manea in an Al-Watan interview.
“Women share in the responsibility of discussing social issues.”
He said as long as they do not provide an opportunity for men to view them with lust there is nothing stopping them from becoming the head of an organization.
Suhaila Zain Al-Abdeen, member of the National Human Rights Society said there is a pressing need for women to participate in edicts on sensitive matters.
He said women can work in the same organization as men as long as they work separately.
“Even though men and women are different they share a number of similarities. There is nothing which prohibits a woman from working alongside men as long as they do not mingle,” Al-Manea said.
Al-Manea said in Islam there are no restrictions on men hearing the voice of women, noting that the Prophet’s wives used to answer questions from men they did not know but they were divided by a curtain.
“This shows that a woman’s voice is permissible to be heard by men,” he said referring to an idea that hearing a woman’s voice is a temptation.
“This shows us that knowledge is not limited to men but in the time of the Prophet (pbuh) women were authorities in different fields of knowledge.
Abdul Rahamn Al-Zenadi an Islamic culture teacher at Imam Muhammad Bin Saud Islamic University in Riyadh said “We have in the Kingdom several Saudi women who are authorities on Shariah law. “
“Several law professors are stressing they are more capable of giving edicts than many muftis who appear on some satellite channels,” Al-Zenadi said.
---Saudi Gazette
Friday, August 1, 2008
Egypt: Shame and Sexual Harassment in Egypt
What an awful time to be woman in Egypt: 98 percent of foreign women visiting Egypt and 83 percent of native Egyptian women, who were recently surveyed, said that they have been sexually harassed, says Mona Eltahawy.
NEW YORK – When I was only 4 years-old, and still living in Cairo, a man exposed himself to me as I stood on a balcony at my family’s home, and gestured for me to come down.
At 15, I was groped as I was performing the rites of the Haj pilgrimage at Mecca, the holiest site for Muslims. Every part of my body was covered except for my face and hands. I’d never been groped before and burst into tears, but I was too ashamed to explain to my family what had happened.
During my 20s, when I had returned to Cairo and wore the hijab, a way of dressing which again covers everything but the face and the hands, I was groped so many times that whenever I passed a group of men I’d place my bag between me and them. Headphones helped block out the disgusting things men -- and even boys barely in their teens -- hissed at me.
I learned to push and punch those whose hands thought my body was fair game, but I never found anything to soothe the burning violation. So imagine how much sharper that violation stung when I tried to complain to the police only to be shooed away --or when it was their hands which groped me.
Once, a riot policeman fondled my breast while he was pushing back a group of us journalists at the trial of an opposition politician. I yelled at him, and I complained to his supervising officer, who moved him to the back row of riot police and told me “Nevermind.”
So it was no surprise to learn that 98 percent of foreign women visiting Egypt and 83percent of native Egyptian women who were recently surveyed said that they, too, had been sexually harassed, and they have recounted a catalog of horrors similar to mine. What an awful time to be woman in Egypt.
When the Egyptian Centre for Women’s Rights reported that 62 percent of Egyptian men admitted to harassing women, I could only shudder at what sexist bullies so many of my countrymen are.
Even worse, when I read that the majority of the more than 2,000 Egyptian men and women that ECWR surveyed blamed women for bringing on the harassment because of the way they dressed, I honestly thought my countrymen and women had lost their minds.
In Egypt today, up to 80 percent of women wear one form of veil or another -- be it a headscarf or a full-body veil that covers the face too -- so you would think it was obvious that sexual harassment had nothing to do with the way a woman dresses.
So what is it that drives such a stubborn wish to fault women?
The answer lies in perhaps the saddest of all the Centre’s findings. Unlike foreign women, most Egyptian women said women should keep their harassment to themselves because they were ashamed or feared it could ruin their reputation. That’s when I was taken back full circle to the time I was groped on the Haj.
Shame.
This shame is fueled by religious and political messages that bombard Egyptian public life, turning women into sexual objects and giving men free reign to their bodies.
In 2006, It was the well-publicized episode of the mufti of Australia comparing women who didn’t wear the hijab to uncovered meat left out for wild cats. He was educated at al-Azhar, the religious institution in Egypt that trains clerics from all over the Sunni Muslim world. He was suspended, but his reprehensible views are very much at work among many other clerics. Today, as two bloggers in Egypt reported recently, there are email and poster campaigns with a message that uses candy to tell women that if they cover they will be safe from harassment, as covered candy is safe from flies.
When did Egyptian women become candy and when did Egyptian men turn into flies?
There is no law criminalizing sexual harassment in Egypt, and police often refuse to report women’s complaints. And when it is the police themselves who are harassing women, then clearly women’s safety is far from a priority in Egypt.
The State itself taught Egyptians a most spectacular lesson in institutionalized patriarchy when security forces and government-hired thugs sexually assaulted demonstrators, especially women, during an anti-regime protest in 2005, giving a green light to harassers.
So there was little surprise that during a religious festival in 2006, a mob of men went on a rampage in downtown Cairo, sexually assaulting any woman they came across as police watched and did nothing.
It was only when bloggers broke the news that the media reported the assaults. Still, the Egyptian regime has never acknowledged it happened. At a demonstration against sexual harassment that I attended in Cairo a few days later, there were nearly more riot police than protestors.
My sister Nora was 20 at the time, and she, with several of her friends, joined the protest. She had never been to a demonstration before but was incensed when she heard the State was denying something that had happened to her many times. We swapped our sexual harassment stories like veterans comparing war wounds, and we unraveled a taboo which shelters the real criminals of sexual harassment and has kept us hiding in shame.
And that is why I began here with my own stories -- to free myself of the tentacles of that shame.
Mona Eltahawy is an award-winning New York-based journalist and commentator, and an international lecturer on Arab and Muslim issues.
---Middle East Online
NEW YORK – When I was only 4 years-old, and still living in Cairo, a man exposed himself to me as I stood on a balcony at my family’s home, and gestured for me to come down.
At 15, I was groped as I was performing the rites of the Haj pilgrimage at Mecca, the holiest site for Muslims. Every part of my body was covered except for my face and hands. I’d never been groped before and burst into tears, but I was too ashamed to explain to my family what had happened.
During my 20s, when I had returned to Cairo and wore the hijab, a way of dressing which again covers everything but the face and the hands, I was groped so many times that whenever I passed a group of men I’d place my bag between me and them. Headphones helped block out the disgusting things men -- and even boys barely in their teens -- hissed at me.
I learned to push and punch those whose hands thought my body was fair game, but I never found anything to soothe the burning violation. So imagine how much sharper that violation stung when I tried to complain to the police only to be shooed away --or when it was their hands which groped me.
Once, a riot policeman fondled my breast while he was pushing back a group of us journalists at the trial of an opposition politician. I yelled at him, and I complained to his supervising officer, who moved him to the back row of riot police and told me “Nevermind.”
So it was no surprise to learn that 98 percent of foreign women visiting Egypt and 83percent of native Egyptian women who were recently surveyed said that they, too, had been sexually harassed, and they have recounted a catalog of horrors similar to mine. What an awful time to be woman in Egypt.
When the Egyptian Centre for Women’s Rights reported that 62 percent of Egyptian men admitted to harassing women, I could only shudder at what sexist bullies so many of my countrymen are.
Even worse, when I read that the majority of the more than 2,000 Egyptian men and women that ECWR surveyed blamed women for bringing on the harassment because of the way they dressed, I honestly thought my countrymen and women had lost their minds.
In Egypt today, up to 80 percent of women wear one form of veil or another -- be it a headscarf or a full-body veil that covers the face too -- so you would think it was obvious that sexual harassment had nothing to do with the way a woman dresses.
So what is it that drives such a stubborn wish to fault women?
The answer lies in perhaps the saddest of all the Centre’s findings. Unlike foreign women, most Egyptian women said women should keep their harassment to themselves because they were ashamed or feared it could ruin their reputation. That’s when I was taken back full circle to the time I was groped on the Haj.
Shame.
This shame is fueled by religious and political messages that bombard Egyptian public life, turning women into sexual objects and giving men free reign to their bodies.
In 2006, It was the well-publicized episode of the mufti of Australia comparing women who didn’t wear the hijab to uncovered meat left out for wild cats. He was educated at al-Azhar, the religious institution in Egypt that trains clerics from all over the Sunni Muslim world. He was suspended, but his reprehensible views are very much at work among many other clerics. Today, as two bloggers in Egypt reported recently, there are email and poster campaigns with a message that uses candy to tell women that if they cover they will be safe from harassment, as covered candy is safe from flies.
When did Egyptian women become candy and when did Egyptian men turn into flies?
There is no law criminalizing sexual harassment in Egypt, and police often refuse to report women’s complaints. And when it is the police themselves who are harassing women, then clearly women’s safety is far from a priority in Egypt.
The State itself taught Egyptians a most spectacular lesson in institutionalized patriarchy when security forces and government-hired thugs sexually assaulted demonstrators, especially women, during an anti-regime protest in 2005, giving a green light to harassers.
So there was little surprise that during a religious festival in 2006, a mob of men went on a rampage in downtown Cairo, sexually assaulting any woman they came across as police watched and did nothing.
It was only when bloggers broke the news that the media reported the assaults. Still, the Egyptian regime has never acknowledged it happened. At a demonstration against sexual harassment that I attended in Cairo a few days later, there were nearly more riot police than protestors.
My sister Nora was 20 at the time, and she, with several of her friends, joined the protest. She had never been to a demonstration before but was incensed when she heard the State was denying something that had happened to her many times. We swapped our sexual harassment stories like veterans comparing war wounds, and we unraveled a taboo which shelters the real criminals of sexual harassment and has kept us hiding in shame.
And that is why I began here with my own stories -- to free myself of the tentacles of that shame.
Mona Eltahawy is an award-winning New York-based journalist and commentator, and an international lecturer on Arab and Muslim issues.
---Middle East Online
Morocco: Moroccan students attend international youth conference in US
[Iman Belhaj] Youths returning from an international conference in the United States talked to Magharebia about representing their homeland and learning about other cultures.
By Iman Belhaj
A delegation of Casablanca high school students recently spent several days in the United States for an international youth conference aimed at increasing global co-operation at the grassroots level.
Ten Moroccan teenagers joined students from Mexico, the United Kingdom, Iraq, India and other countries at the Sister Cities International Youth Conference, held July 16th-19th in Kansas City, USA under the theme, "Global Action: Taking Community Service Abroad".
The youth delegation's trip from Morocco to Missouri was organized by the Casablanca-Chicago Twinning Association. Director Boubker Mazoz said that the students selected to attend the international conference were "outstanding achievers in school in general, and in English in particular".
He explained that the students' secondary schools – Muhamad VI High in Sidi Momen, Muhamad V High in Darb El Sultan Al Fidaa and Ibn Mseek High – are all "twinned", or partnered, with sister schools in Chicago, USA.
"It was a great opportunity for young people our age, a truly unique opportunity. People of various nationalities got together and exchanged views, and we learned about different world civilizations. We hope we managed to convey a good image of our homeland," said 17-year-old Chaimaa Bourrou.
"We did not just represent the Association. Rather, we represented Moroccan youth, who all share the same dreams and aspirations to change things and send out a message of love and tolerance to all nations and individuals," the first year bac student said. She added that the American young people she met were "really thirsty" to learn about other cultures.
The talented young people had a challenging itinerary during their five-day trip. Jihane Dakir, 17, another bac student, said they participated in several social operations, such as sending school supplies to Iraqi children and observing how prison convicts are re-integrated into US society.
"We learned a lot, and it can truly be regarded as an asset to our stock of knowledge," said Awatif Elmelijy. Like other delegates, Awatif was very excited about the conference, telling Magharebia that her trip helped "correct some notions about Americans and the US".
The conference helped present the real image of Morocco and the country's progress in advancing volunteerism and social service, 18-year-old Ilyass Boujnane said.
"We met tolerant American youth," he told Magharebia. "Contrary to what we see on TV, they are people who want to live in peace, just like we do. Despite some challenges incurred by the difference in culture and religions, we managed to overcome that barrier and communicate freely," Ilyass added.
Another student, Khadija Agnaou, had misgivings before the trip about how other young people in the US would react to her as a veiled young woman. She was delighted to see their warm response to her and their acceptance of her ideas. The Moroccan delegation's easy interaction with peers from many cultures was noted by participants in the Sister Cities International Youth Conference.
Many found the performance of the Casablanca teenagers at the concluding ceremony to be very moving. Dressed in traditional Moroccan clothing, the ten high school students went onto the stage at Rockhurst University with their national flag held high to sing Morocco's national anthem.
Representing more than 2,300 communities in 127 countries, Sister Cities International aims to increase global co-operation at the grassroots level. Bringing together youth from around the world, the exchange program promotes peace through mutual respect, understanding and co-operation by focusing on sustainable development, youth
---Magharebia.com
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