By TAMAR LEWIN
New York Times
When John Sexton, the president of New York University, first met Omar Saif Ghobash, an investor trying to entice him to open a branch campus in the United Arab Emirates, Mr. Sexton was not sure what to make of the proposal — so he asked for a $50 million gift.
“It’s like earnest money: if you’re a $50 million donor, I’ll take you seriously,” Mr. Sexton said. “It’s a way to test their bona fides.” In the end, the money materialized from the government of Abu Dhabi, one of the seven emirates.
Mr. Sexton has long been committed to building N.Y.U.’s international presence, increasing study-abroad sites, opening programs in Singapore, and exploring new partnerships in France.
But the plans for a comprehensive liberal-arts branch campus in the Persian Gulf, set to open in 2010, are in a class by themselves, and Mr. Sexton is already talking about the flow of professors and students he envisions between New York and Abu Dhabi.
The American system of higher education, long the envy of the world, is becoming an important export as more universities take their programs overseas.
In a kind of educational gold rush, American universities are competing to set up outposts in countries with limited higher education opportunities. American universities — not to mention Australian and British ones, which also offer instruction in English, the lingua franca of academia — are starting, or expanding, hundreds of programs and partnerships in booming markets like China, India and Singapore.
And many are now considering full-fledged foreign branch campuses, particularly in the oil-rich Middle East. Already, students in the Persian Gulf state of Qatar can attend an American university without the expense, culture shock or post-9/11 visa problems of traveling to America.
At Education City in Doha, Qatar’s capital, they can study medicine at Weill Medical College of Cornell University, international affairs at Georgetown, computer science and business at Carnegie Mellon, fine arts at Virginia Commonwealth, engineering at Texas A&M, and soon, journalism at Northwestern.
In Dubai, another emirate, Michigan State University and Rochester Institute of Technology will offer classes this fall.
“Where universities are heading now is toward becoming global universities,” said Howard Rollins, the former director of international programs at Georgia Tech, which has degree programs in France, Singapore, Italy, South Africa and China, and plans for India. “We’ll have more and more universities competing internationally for resources, faculty and the best students.”
Since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, internationalization has moved high on the agenda at most universities, to prepare students for a globalized world, and to help faculty members stay up-to-date in their disciplines.
Overseas programs can help American universities raise their profile, build international relationships, attract top research talent who, in turn, may attract grants and produce patents, and gain access to a new pool of tuition-paying students, just as the number of college-age Americans is about to decline.
Even public universities, whose primary mission is to educate in-state students, are trying to establish a global brand in an era of limited state financing.
Partly, it is about prestige. American universities have long worried about their ratings in U.S. News and World Report. These days, they are also mindful of the international rankings published in Britain, by the Times Higher Education Supplement, and in China, by Shanghai Jiao Tong University.
The demand from overseas is huge. At the University of Washington, the administrator in charge of overseas programs said she received about a proposal a week. “It’s almost like spam,” said the official, Susan Jeffords, whose position as vice provost for global affairs was created just two years ago.
Traditionally, top universities built their international presence through study-abroad sites, research partnerships, faculty exchanges and joint degree programs offered with foreign universities. Yale has dozens of research collaborations with Chinese universities. Overseas branches, with the same requirements and degrees as the home campuses, are a newer — and riskier — phenomenon.
“I still think the downside is lower than the upside is high,” said Amy Gutmann, president of the University of Pennsylvania. “The risk is that we couldn’t deliver the same quality education that we do here, and that it would mean diluting our faculty strength at home.”
While universities with overseas branches insist that the education equals what is offered in the United States, much of the faculty is hired locally, on a short-term basis. And certainly overseas branches raise fundamental questions: Will the programs reflect American values and culture, or the host country’s? Will American taxpayers end up footing part of the bill for overseas students? What happens if relations between the United States and the host country deteriorate? And will foreign branches that spread American know-how hurt American competitiveness?
“A lot of these educators are trying to present themselves as benevolent and altruistic, when in reality, their programs are aimed at making money,” said Representative Dana Rohrabacher, a California Republican who has criticized the rush overseas.
David J. Skorton, the president of Cornell, on the other hand, said the global drive benefited the United States. “Higher education is the most important diplomatic asset we have,” he said. “I believe these programs can actually reduce friction between countries and cultures.”
Tempering Expectations
While the Persian Gulf campus of N.Y.U. is on the horizon, George Mason University is up and running — though not at full speed — in Ras al Khaymah, another one of the emirates.
George Mason, a public university in Fairfax, Va., arrived in the gulf in 2005 with a tiny language program intended to help students achieve college-level English skills and meet the university’s admission standards for the degree programs that were beginning the next year.
George Mason expected to have 200 undergraduates in 2006, and grow from there. But it enrolled nowhere near that many, then or now. It had just 57 degree students — 3 in biology, 27 in business and 27 in engineering — at the start of this academic year, joined by a few more students and programs this semester.
The project, an hour north of Dubai’s skyscrapers and 7,000 miles from Virginia, is still finding its way. “I will freely confess that it’s all been more complicated than I expected,” said Peter Stearns, George Mason’s provost.
The Ras al Khaymah campus has had a succession of deans. Simple tasks like ordering books take months, in part because of government censors. Local licensing, still not complete, has been far more rigorous than expected. And it has not been easy to find interested students with the SAT scores and English skills that George Mason requires for admissions.
“I’m optimistic, but if you look at it as a business, you can only take losses for so long,” said Dr. Abul R. Hasan, the academic dean, who is from the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology. “Our goal is to have 2,000 students five years from now. What makes it difficult is that if you’re giving the George Mason degree, you cannot lower your standards.”
Aisha Ravindran, a professor from India with no previous connection to George Mason, teaches students the same communications class required for business majors at the Virginia campus — but in the Arabian desert, it lands differently.
Dr. Ravindran uses the same slides, showing emoticons and lists of nonverbal taboos to spread the American business ideal of diversity and inclusiveness. She emphasizes the need to use language that includes all listeners.
And suddenly, there is an odd mismatch between the American curriculum and the local culture.
In a country where homosexual acts are illegal, Dr. Ravindran’s slide show suggests using “partner” or “life partner,” since “husband” or “wife” might exclude some listeners. And in a country where mosques are ubiquitous, the slides counsel students to avoid the word “church” and substitute “place of worship.”
The Ras al Khaymah students include Bangladeshis, Palestinians, Egyptians, Indians, Iraqis, Lebanese, Syrians and more, most from families that can afford the $5,400-a-semester tuition. But George Mason has attracted few citizens of the emirates.
The students say they love the small classes, diversity and camaraderie. Their dorm feels much like an American fraternity house, without the haze of alcohol. Some praise George Mason’s pedagogy, which they say differs substantially from the rote learning of their high schools.
“At my local school in Abu Dhabi, it was all what the teachers told you, what was in the book,” said Mona Bar Houm, a Palestinian student who grew up in Abu Dhabi. “Here you’re asked to come up with your personal ideas.”
But what matters most, they say, is getting an American degree. “It means something if I go home to Bangladesh with an American degree,” said Abdul Mukit, a business student. “It doesn’t need to be Harvard. It’s good enough to be just an American degree.”
Whether that degree really reflects George Mason is open to question. None of the faculty members came from George Mason, although that is likely to change next year. The money is not from George Mason, either: Ras al Khaymah bears all the costs.
Nonetheless, Sharon Siverts, the vice president in charge of the campus, said: “What’s George Mason is everything we do. The admissions are done at George Mason, by George Mason standards. The degree programs are Mason programs.”
Seeking a Partnership
Three years ago, Mr. Ghobash, the Oxford-educated investor from the United Arab Emirates, heard a presentation by a private company, American Higher Education Inc., trying to broker a partnership between Kuwait and an American university.
Mr. Ghobash, wanting to bring liberal arts to his country, hired the company to submit a proposal for a gulf campus run by a well-regarded American university. American Higher Education officials said they introduced him to N.Y.U. Mr. Ghobash spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on the company’s fees, talked with many N.Y.U. officials and paid for a delegation to visit the emirates before meeting Mr. Sexton, the university president, in June 2005.
Mr. Sexton said he solicited the $50 million gift to emphasize that he was not interested in a business-model deal and that academic excellence was expensive. Mr. Ghobash declined to be interviewed. But according to American Higher Education officials, $50 million was more than Mr. Ghobash could handle.
So when the agreement for the Abu Dhabi campus New York University was signed last fall, Mr. Ghobash and the company were out of the picture, and the government of Abu Dhabi — the richest of the emirates — was the partner to build and operate the N.Y.U. campus. The Executive Affairs Authority of Abu Dhabi made the gift in November 2007.
“The crown prince shares our vision of Abu Dhabi becoming an idea capital for the whole region,” Mr. Sexton said. “We’re going to be a global network university. This is central to what N.Y.U. is going to be in the future. There’s a commitment, on both sides, to have both campuses grow together, so that by 2020, both N.Y.U. and N.Y.U.-Abu Dhabi will in the world’s top 10 universities.”
Neither side will put a price tag on the plan. But both emphasize their shared ambition to create an entity central to the intellectual life not just of the Persian Gulf but also of South Asia and the Middle East.
“We totally buy into John’s view of idea capitals,” said Khaldoon al-Mubarak, chairman of the Executive Affairs Authority. “This is not a commercially driven relationship. It’s a commitment to generations to come, to research. We see eye to eye. We see this as a Catholic marriage. It’s forever.”
It is also, for New York University, a chance to grow, given Abu Dhabi’s promise to replace whatever the New York campus loses to the gulf.
“If, say, 10 percent of the physics department goes there, they will pay to expand the physics department here by 10 percent,” Mr. Sexton said. “That’s a wonderful opportunity, and we think our faculty will see it that way and step up.”
Mr. Sexton is leading the way: next fall, even before the campus is built, he plans to teach a course in Abu Dhabi, leaving New York every other Friday evening, getting to Abu Dhabi on Saturday, teaching Sunday and returning to his New York office Monday morning.
“The crown prince loved the idea and said he wanted to take the class,” Mr. Sexton said. “But I said, ‘No, think how that would be for the other students.’ ”
Uncharted Territory
While the gulf’s wealth has drawn many American universities, others dream of China’s enormous population.
In October, the New York Institute of Technology, a private university offering career-oriented training, opened a Nanjing campus in collaboration with Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications, and dozens of American universities offer joint or dual degrees through Chinese universities.
Kean University, a public university in New Jersey, had hoped mightily to be the first with a freestanding undergraduate campus in China. Two years ago, Kean announced its agreement to open a branch of the university in Wenzhou in September 2007. Whether the campus will materialize remains to be seen. Kean is still awaiting final approval from China, which prefers programs run through local universities.
“I’m optimistic,” said Dawood Farahi, Kean’s president. “I’m Lewis and Clark, looking for the Northwest Passage.”
In fact, his negotiations have been much like uncharted exploration. “It’s very cumbersome negotiating with the Chinese,” he said. “The deal you struck yesterday is not necessarily good today. The Chinese sign an agreement, and then the next day, you get a fax saying they want an amendment.” Still, he persists, noting, “One out of every five humans on the planet is Chinese.”
Beyond the geopolitical, there are other reasons, pedagogic and economic.
“A lot of our students are internationally illiterate,” Dr. Farahi said. “It would be very good for them to have professors who’ve taught in China, to be able to study in China, and to have more awareness of the rest of the world. And I think I can make a few bucks there.” Under the accord, he said, up to 8 percent of the Wenzhou revenues could be used to support New Jersey.
With state support for public universities a constant challenge, new financing sources are vital, especially for lesser-known universities. “It’s precisely because we’re third tier that I have to find things that jettison us out of our orbit and into something spectacular,” Dr. Farahi said.
Possibilities and Alarms
Most overseas campuses offer only a narrow slice of American higher education, most often programs in business, science, engineering and computers.
Schools of technology have the most cachet. So although the New York Institute of Technology may not be one of America’s leading universities, it is a leading globalizer, with programs in Bahrain, Jordan, Abu Dhabi, Canada, Brazil and China.
“We’re leveraging what we’ve got, which is the New York in our first name and the Technology in our last name,” said Edward Guiliano, the institute’s president. “I believe that in the 21st century, there will be a new class of truly global universities. There isn’t one yet, but we’re as close as anybody.”
Some huge universities get a toehold in the gulf with tiny programs. At a villa in Abu Dhabi, the University of Washington, a research colossus, offers short courses to citizens of the emirates, mostly women, in a government job-training program.
“We’re very eager to have a presence here,” said Marisa Nickle, who runs the program. “In the gulf, it’s not what’s here now, it’s what’s coming. Everybody’s on the way.”
Some lawmakers are wondering how that rush overseas will affect the United States. In July, the House Science and Technology subcommittee on research and science education held a hearing on university globalization.
Mr. Rohrabacher, the California lawmaker, raises alarms. “I’m someone who believes that Americans should watch out for Americans first,” he said. “It’s one thing for universities here to send professors overseas and do exchange programs, which do make sense, but it’s another thing to have us running educational programs overseas.”
The subcommittee chairman, Representative Brian Baird, a Washington Democrat, disagrees. “If the U.S. universities aren’t doing this, someone else likely will,” he said. “I think it’s better that we be invited in than that we be left out.”
Still, he said he worried that the foreign branches could undermine an important American asset — the number of world leaders who were students in the United States.
“I do wonder,” he said, “if we establish many of these campuses overseas, do we lose some of that cross-pollination?”
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Friday, February 8, 2008
Middle East: Arab charity is blooming – no thanks to America
By Ian Wilhelm from the Christian Science Monitor
Dubai, UAE - Oil and conflict. These are the two topics that dominate news coverage of the Middle East.
But there are signs that amid headlines that scream of suicide bombings and surging energy costs, a quiet social movement is under way – one that could help alleviate some deep-rooted problems of the Arab world.
Last month, while much of the globe watched the oft-hyped World Economic Forum, a first-of-its-kind summit of Arab philanthropists was held in this Persian Gulf city. Middle East royalty and Egyptian businessmen mixed with Lebanese activists and other humanitarian do-gooders to find ways to aid their troubled region. And they carried a pointed message to the Bush administration: Stop making the war on terror a war on Arab goodwill.
The charitable impulses of Arab billionaires and others are growing, according to a report released at the event by the John D. Gerhart Center for Philanthropy and Civic Engagement at the American University in Cairo.
Building on a long tradition of zakat, the Islamic version of tithing, philanthropy in the Mideast looks strikingly similar to that of Bill Gates and Andrew Carnegie and seeks to make profound social changes.
Consider the ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum who pledged $10 billion last year to his own foundation. If this were an American grantmaker, it would be the third largest in the country, according to Chronicle of Philanthropy figures.
The Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation will focus its largess on bolstering education, supporting entrepreneurship, and fostering cultural understanding by translating both classic and modern Arabic books into English and other languages.
But to get organized and be effective aren't easy tasks. Most Arabic nations have murky laws governing nonprofits and charitable giving; support for human rights and democracy is often a taboo subject, and, not least of all, American policy is an obstacle.
Since Sept. 11, the US has viewed Arab donors with a suspicious eye, accusing them of using their money to fund madrassahs or terrorist training camps. After the attacks, for example, US officials pressured Kuwait and Saudi Arabia to set up rules that restrict charitable giving.
During the Dubai conference, a Saudi businessman complained that American investigators met with him 11 times over the past several years to examine his donations. No explanation was given, he said, and there was no official framework to make complaints.
Such scrutiny causes donors to keep quiet about their giving, says the Gerhart report. And because people are more likely to donate if they have role models, below-the-radar efforts hurt philanthropy.
When Warren Buffett publicly pledged most of his fortune to The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in 2006, he inspired other gifts to the fund, including the $35 "life savings" of a 7-year-old.
Aside from government scrutiny of giving, Arab philanthropy has also been criticized because it simply may come from a donor with a different viewpoint from the recipient's.
In 2001, Rudolph Giuliani rejected a $10 million gift from Saudi Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal bin Abdul Aziz al-Saud to help victims of terrorist attacks.
We can debate Mr. Giuliani's reasons – he disliked the prince's suggestion that American policy in Israel spurred the Sept. 11 attack – but the message to Arab philanthropists was clear: Your money's no good here.
To be sure, safeguards are needed. Many terrorism experts say that Al Qaeda, Hizbullah and other militant groups use charities as a front to raise money for their operations.
But a focus only on cracking down on illegal gifts hurts the region, conference participants said.
Why doesn't the country that invented modern philanthropy do more to support it in the Middle East? Why not help Arab nations implement better nonprofit laws that promote, as well as regulate, giving?
The Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation, for instance, is providing college scholarships for Arab students to attend Ivy League schools in America. Speaking of Arab teenagers, Nabil Ali Alyousuf, acting chief executive of the Al Maktoum Foundation, put it best: "We either educate them or we leave them to poverty, no education, and potential extremism."
As a reporter, I have seen what philanthropy and charities can accomplish in disaster-ridden areas like Sri Lanka after the tsunami and in post-Katrina New Orleans. Perhaps a similar humanitarian spirit can generate home-grown solutions in the Arab world.
• Ian Wilhelm is a writer living in Cologne, Germany. He has covered philanthropy and international aid for more than seven years.
Dubai, UAE - Oil and conflict. These are the two topics that dominate news coverage of the Middle East.
But there are signs that amid headlines that scream of suicide bombings and surging energy costs, a quiet social movement is under way – one that could help alleviate some deep-rooted problems of the Arab world.
Last month, while much of the globe watched the oft-hyped World Economic Forum, a first-of-its-kind summit of Arab philanthropists was held in this Persian Gulf city. Middle East royalty and Egyptian businessmen mixed with Lebanese activists and other humanitarian do-gooders to find ways to aid their troubled region. And they carried a pointed message to the Bush administration: Stop making the war on terror a war on Arab goodwill.
The charitable impulses of Arab billionaires and others are growing, according to a report released at the event by the John D. Gerhart Center for Philanthropy and Civic Engagement at the American University in Cairo.
Building on a long tradition of zakat, the Islamic version of tithing, philanthropy in the Mideast looks strikingly similar to that of Bill Gates and Andrew Carnegie and seeks to make profound social changes.
Consider the ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum who pledged $10 billion last year to his own foundation. If this were an American grantmaker, it would be the third largest in the country, according to Chronicle of Philanthropy figures.
The Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation will focus its largess on bolstering education, supporting entrepreneurship, and fostering cultural understanding by translating both classic and modern Arabic books into English and other languages.
But to get organized and be effective aren't easy tasks. Most Arabic nations have murky laws governing nonprofits and charitable giving; support for human rights and democracy is often a taboo subject, and, not least of all, American policy is an obstacle.
Since Sept. 11, the US has viewed Arab donors with a suspicious eye, accusing them of using their money to fund madrassahs or terrorist training camps. After the attacks, for example, US officials pressured Kuwait and Saudi Arabia to set up rules that restrict charitable giving.
During the Dubai conference, a Saudi businessman complained that American investigators met with him 11 times over the past several years to examine his donations. No explanation was given, he said, and there was no official framework to make complaints.
Such scrutiny causes donors to keep quiet about their giving, says the Gerhart report. And because people are more likely to donate if they have role models, below-the-radar efforts hurt philanthropy.
When Warren Buffett publicly pledged most of his fortune to The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in 2006, he inspired other gifts to the fund, including the $35 "life savings" of a 7-year-old.
Aside from government scrutiny of giving, Arab philanthropy has also been criticized because it simply may come from a donor with a different viewpoint from the recipient's.
In 2001, Rudolph Giuliani rejected a $10 million gift from Saudi Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal bin Abdul Aziz al-Saud to help victims of terrorist attacks.
We can debate Mr. Giuliani's reasons – he disliked the prince's suggestion that American policy in Israel spurred the Sept. 11 attack – but the message to Arab philanthropists was clear: Your money's no good here.
To be sure, safeguards are needed. Many terrorism experts say that Al Qaeda, Hizbullah and other militant groups use charities as a front to raise money for their operations.
But a focus only on cracking down on illegal gifts hurts the region, conference participants said.
Why doesn't the country that invented modern philanthropy do more to support it in the Middle East? Why not help Arab nations implement better nonprofit laws that promote, as well as regulate, giving?
The Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation, for instance, is providing college scholarships for Arab students to attend Ivy League schools in America. Speaking of Arab teenagers, Nabil Ali Alyousuf, acting chief executive of the Al Maktoum Foundation, put it best: "We either educate them or we leave them to poverty, no education, and potential extremism."
As a reporter, I have seen what philanthropy and charities can accomplish in disaster-ridden areas like Sri Lanka after the tsunami and in post-Katrina New Orleans. Perhaps a similar humanitarian spirit can generate home-grown solutions in the Arab world.
• Ian Wilhelm is a writer living in Cologne, Germany. He has covered philanthropy and international aid for more than seven years.
Thursday, February 7, 2008
Saudi Arabia: Whatever happened to Saudi reform?
In February 2007 the Saudi secret police stormed the Jeddah villa of lawyer Issam Basrawi and arrested him and five other prominent reformists.
Four others were arrested in Jeddah and nearby Medina.
The 10 men were professional people - lawyers, doctors, academics, a former judge.
A year on, although Mr Basrawi has been released on health grounds, the rest are still in jail - even though none has been formally charged.
The climate is in marked contrast to that in 2005, when King Abdullah came to the throne promising change A lawyer representing some of the men says he has been denied access to them.
At the time of their arrest, the Saudi media alleged the men were financing acts of violence in Iraq and encouraging young Saudis to join the insurgency there.
One of the detainees, Saud al-Hashemi, was active in organising humanitarian aid for Iraq - and was strongly critical of the US presence there.
But the men's supporters are convinced their real crime was speaking out for political reform.
At the time of their arrest they were preparing to launch a reformist movement - and there is a suspicion the authorities wanted to nip their plans in the bud.
Hope betrayed
Both Saudi and international human-rights activists believe 2007 witnessed an intensification of pressure on political dissent.
The current climate is in marked contrast to that in 2005, when King Abdullah came to the throne promising change.
Having pinned their hopes on him, reformists now feel he has failed to deliver.
Saudi blogger Fouad al-Farhan has been detained since December for speaking out on behalf of the jailed reformists.
Veteran Islamist Abdullah al-Hamed - who organised a petition last year calling for a constitutional monarchy - was arrested with his brother in November.
They were accused of encouraging a women's demonstration - a highly unusual event in the conservative kingdom - over the detention of thousands of al-Qaeda suspects.
But despite the pattern of arrest and harassment, the pressure for reform continues.
A group of reformists have posted a petition online on the Menber al-Hewar website, calling for the release of the nine reformists and their ally, the blogger Fouad al-Farhan.
Women's rights activists are openly pressing for the right to drive.
And liberal and Islamist reformists are joining hands to condemn a legal system which - despite the promise of judicial reform - is failing to protect their rights.
By Roger Hardy
Middle East analyst, BBC News
Four others were arrested in Jeddah and nearby Medina.
The 10 men were professional people - lawyers, doctors, academics, a former judge.
A year on, although Mr Basrawi has been released on health grounds, the rest are still in jail - even though none has been formally charged.
The climate is in marked contrast to that in 2005, when King Abdullah came to the throne promising change A lawyer representing some of the men says he has been denied access to them.
At the time of their arrest, the Saudi media alleged the men were financing acts of violence in Iraq and encouraging young Saudis to join the insurgency there.
One of the detainees, Saud al-Hashemi, was active in organising humanitarian aid for Iraq - and was strongly critical of the US presence there.
But the men's supporters are convinced their real crime was speaking out for political reform.
At the time of their arrest they were preparing to launch a reformist movement - and there is a suspicion the authorities wanted to nip their plans in the bud.
Hope betrayed
Both Saudi and international human-rights activists believe 2007 witnessed an intensification of pressure on political dissent.
The current climate is in marked contrast to that in 2005, when King Abdullah came to the throne promising change.
Having pinned their hopes on him, reformists now feel he has failed to deliver.
Saudi blogger Fouad al-Farhan has been detained since December for speaking out on behalf of the jailed reformists.
Veteran Islamist Abdullah al-Hamed - who organised a petition last year calling for a constitutional monarchy - was arrested with his brother in November.
They were accused of encouraging a women's demonstration - a highly unusual event in the conservative kingdom - over the detention of thousands of al-Qaeda suspects.
But despite the pattern of arrest and harassment, the pressure for reform continues.
A group of reformists have posted a petition online on the Menber al-Hewar website, calling for the release of the nine reformists and their ally, the blogger Fouad al-Farhan.
Women's rights activists are openly pressing for the right to drive.
And liberal and Islamist reformists are joining hands to condemn a legal system which - despite the promise of judicial reform - is failing to protect their rights.
By Roger Hardy
Middle East analyst, BBC News
Morocco: Renewed debate over justice reforms
The debate over corruption in Morocco has been rekindled following statements from Prime Minister Abbas El Fassi concerning his planned reforms of the country's judicial system.At a press conference on January 29th – the first of its kind for El Fassi – the prime minister told journalists a restructuring of Morocco's judicial system is one of five main areas on which his government is currently focussing.
Justice Minister Abdelwahed Radi told Magharebia that judicial reform is the single largest challenge faced by his organisation. "Today in Morocco we have sound legislation, competent judges and experienced officials, but the system is under-resourced," he said, adding that if his department can manage to overcome shortages in human and financial resources, Moroccan courts will be able to improve their performance and better serve taxpayers.
Another priority, according to Radi, is the overbooking of judges.
In Morocco, there are 3,320 judges working on more than three million cases per year. This, he says, poses a real problem for the quality of the rulings given. "We think that if we can get the human resources we need, we should be able to improve the quality of our judicial system across the board."
To overcome the present shortfall in the justice sector, the ministry would need roughly 2,600 new magistrates.
In the meantime, Radi announced an action plan for reform based on available resources to improve Moroccan courts and judges' working conditions. Under this plan the government will purchase more than 9,000 computers, establish a new IT database and set up a professional training programme for judges.
The justice minister also proposed the creation of four courts of appeal and 16 courts of first instance. "It is in this area that we must take steps to serve Moroccan taxpayers more effectively," he concluded.
According to some legal experts and civil society workers, success in justice reform remains part of the fight against corruption among magistrates.
NGOs in civil society are calling for an anti-corruption law to be created in Morocco to accompany these reforms to ensure that justice will prevail.
Many Moroccan citizens hope for transparency and judicial independence. Azzeddine is a property developer in his forties. He said he feels justice reforms must be the very top priority today: "It’s urgently needed, because it guarantees individual freedom and citizens’ rights," he said.
Maître Mohamed El Nouidi, a lawyer in Casablanca, said justice reform still has a long way to go. He said it is impossible to engage in a reform programme without seriously tackling the problem of corrupt magistrates. El Nouidi stressed that justice reform requires suitable training for judges, the need to execute judgements and the implementation of administrative procedures which are straightforward and transparent for taxpayers.
To meet these goals, El Nouidi said, the support of the political class is needed and members of the Higher Council of Magistrates should be elected and not appointed.
By Hassan Benmehdi for Magharebia in Casablanca
The Concerns of the Saudi Women
Op-Ed by Fahda bint Saud bin Abdul Aziz
Al-Hayat
The Arab Muslim women in general and Saudi in particular have never in their modern and old history come under the spotlight at the internal and external levels. Nor have their rights been a major cause for concern as is the case now - to the extent that they appear as the sole pivot for the nation's renaissance in its current crisis. This concerted intense campaign calls for optimism should this be the reason behind it!
Indeed, many women rights-related issues need to be reconsidered and this gentle creature must regain her standing. About to lose this divine particularity, women are undergoing a superficial transformation - from altered physical features to loss of internal balance.
Women's human rights were violated prior to Islam but with its ascent, women regained all their rights and were introduced to their obligations, which helped restore social balance for human beings to live in "eternal" happiness.
As a result, women gained power - though not a supernatural one - while men cemented their strength with their respect for women's privacy. In other words, both men and women preserved their natural disposition, which drew them closer to each other and helped them enrich the Muslim civilization in poetry, literature, and diverse sciences. In the meantime, the natural roles within the family were respected, and this nucleus was preserved over generations, even at the gloomiest moments.
During the century-long wars and colonialism era, as the structure and concepts of the Arab Muslim society were substantially altered, the family system, on the other hand, remained until recently a source of pride and honor. Over the years, the family laws have represented and identified all social codes. When duties and obligations were equitably assigned among family members, society suffered from less psychological and social problems - as had been the case of the Saudi society which emerged from the tribal system and drew the socioeconomic relations among its members.
The Saudi generations were at that time known to be productive, living off their own hand-made goods, whether clothes or food. Women, productive as they were, formed an integral part of this system and the cornerstone of the family and tribe. Fully aware of their rights within this framework that guaranteed them protection, respect, and care from cradle to grave, they were only concerned with sheltering, feeding, and clothing all tribe members. In parallel, society provided them, mainly the divorced, widow, and the elderly, with a guardian's protection, for it was shameful to abandon tribe members, whether men or women.
These tribal features prevailed over the Saudi society even when the Island was united as a stable country in line with oil discovery. The State then substituted the tribe in protecting the people and settling their affairs in light of the Sharia. Consequently, the State, intent on teaching men, generalized and opened more schools in an effort previously confined to personal initiatives in Hejaz and Nejd. Unfortunately, women's share of education remained scant in these communal schools (four in Mecca, 5 in Jeddah, and one in Medinah), the most renowned of which was Al-Zahraain Jeddah.
In parallel, "Al Ahlia School For Girls" was set up in 1974 and "Al Nasifiyah" in 1950. In turn, the Saudi Crown Prince Saud bin Abdul Aziz opened in 1951 the first school for girls in the Kingdom, the Riyadh-based Al-Karimat School and sent his own daughters thereto hoping, by so doing, to encourage parents to teach their daughters. This exemplary school became in 1970 the first secondary institution in the Kingdom. In addition, King Saud daughters opened in 1956 Mabarrat Al-Karimat, while Prince Talal bin Abdul Aziz established in 1956 King Abdul Aziz Mabarrat.
Still, as these schools failed to absorb more girls willing to pursue their studies in Riyadh, the parents, forced to send their daughters to Egypt, urged King Saud to open more schools for girls - hence came the 1960 General Presidency for Girls' Education run by senior scholars under Sheikh Mohammed bin Ibrahim Al Sheikh. This school later opened many branches across the Kingdom despite all the objections rebuffed by the King himself.
Since then, conditions started to change for women, who began studying and working in specific fields in tune with society's perception of their work and role. Many working women stood out, notably King Saud daughters who ran King Saud Mabarrat - let alone some female poets and authors who favored, in this conservative society, to write under pseudonyms. Likewise, many Saudi women embraced teaching, a profession previously restricted to ladies from Egypt, Palestine, and Syria.
When the ministry of Labor and Social Affairs was established in 1960 under King Saud, it undertook, in cooperation with the ministries of health, education, and agriculture a huge project: the urban and rural local community development center. To this end, 16 such centers were set up in 1960, where women contributed to eradicating illiteracy, disseminating girl education, cementing respect for handcrafts, and pinpointing the importance of social development.
In addition, women created their own cooperative associations - with some later transformed into charity associations. They also trained girls and helped the poor households after examining their precarious conditions. In other words, women sought primarily to uproot female illiteracy, help poor households and raise awareness, which are all education and work-related concerns within a family-respectful framework. At this, society at large accepted women education and work amid respect for religion and customs. At the same time, social solidarity was preserved and family's financial reliance on working women was viewed as socially shameful, which eventually strengthened family ties.
As the per capita income mounted during the boom - the dangers, dimensions, and concepts of which went unnoticed, as society and its needs evolved, and rural migration increased in quest of education and job opportunities, many concepts, like family care and men's role as guardians, changed. Accordingly, men began relying sometimes on working women. Many social changes prevailed amid higher incomes and the prevalent locally-unacceptable concepts given the impact of the foreign labor force on the traditional families, which proved unable to preserve the inherited Muslim values.
Thus, families were fearfully disrupted, and their members, engrossed in materialism and different consumption patterns, were drawn apart. As a result, some momentous aspects were overlooked, like the need to rehabilitate the individual to become productive and self-sufficient. In parallel, the citizen embraced some of the negative aspects left by the consuming societies. Hence, both the citizen and society lost many values. But women were not the sole segments to suffer from this change as depicted in our media which, in the footsteps of their foreign counterparts, make judgments based on the values of the strong, totally overlooking the fact that the law that protects women equally protects all social categories.
Indeed, Saudi women concerns are now more numerous and violent than ever. Women have unfortunately relinquished most of their Sharia-consecrated rights in light of the social and economic changes and the alteration in the concepts long prevalent in the tribal and family systems which provided women with protection and care. Women were then supposed to economically provide for the family, which added up to their family responsibilities. Their acquired rights were equally violated and their status as working women exploited; hence the prevalent social and psychological problems, the mounting divorce cases referred to courts and the relevant matters - from alimony to the right of guardianship.
The situation was compounded further, since problem solving was no longer a family responsibility amid social disintegration, weak family protection and cohesion, increased interest in easy money and social appearances, diminishing financial assets, and loosening morals.
Personal interests prevailed over laws, which were not implemented on equal footing. Nepotism, bribery, and corruption became rampant, thus disrupting social balance and increasing women concerns as well as family and work responsibilities. Exposed to the foreign winds, women sought to imitate the media-portrayed seducing women. As such, considerable funds were channeled to plastic surgery -which most often yielded reverse results from deformation to death and caused psychological disorders.
Nowadays, women suffer from many factors. Socially speaking, this suffering affects society at large. Values are rapidly changing in a society unable to keep pace and adapt to the swift and unexpected events. At the personal level, women were misled by the material brainwashing consumption-oriented media that leave them unable to grasp their real dimensions. From the legal perspective, the women, ignorant, dependent, and obsessed with luxury, have settled for what is less than their legitimate rights though enshrined in the legislations initially meant to protect them. No wonder that society underestimated their demands and concerns! In other words, women suffer from three-faceted injustice: a self-induced one, another caused by the sweeping globalization laws that undermine man's dignity and finally, the injustice imposed by the strong on the weak.
If we are to tackle women concerns, we must then prioritize these concerns so as to find solutions thereto with the least possible loss and as soon as possible. In this regard, every society must first lay the foundations for a decent life and satisfied basic needs (the right to food, shelter, education, work, and protection). As for the other needs, they are just relative luxuries that evolve with society's needs, values, and classes. For instance, the luxuries of the rich classes match their class concepts and outer appearances.
Thus, the affluent categories, the first to lose the cultural and heritage legacy, distance themselves from popular concerns - a feature recently embraced by the Saudi society with its openness to the West and compliance with its dictates in the aftermath of 9/11 attacks. As for the middle-classes, most often composed of professionals and intellectuals, their luxuries are closer to the proletariat's, who struggle to live decently. The destitute poor classes, for their part, are often contented with the basics when available. They pass on the cultural heritage over generations and preserve traditions, attached as they are to the land away from mingling with different cultures.
Hence, the Saudi women concerns must be classified according to social classes. Otherwise, all efforts in this direction will remain unrealistic. For it is implausible that homeless and jobless women endeavor to drive a car they can't even dream of owning. Therefore, we must question women's right to drive: Which categories are entitled to drive? Is this right a luxury or a basic need? Can the destitute woman ask for luxuries? Can the affluent women eager to change their societies understand and sympathize with their hardworking peers, who represent the majority in any society?
When we manage to grasp the requirements of our society as a whole, when we work in tandem to satisfy them, only then we can cautiously set realistic priorities towards promoting the social awareness we lack at this critical moment in our history. We need to be more resolved and methodical in diagnosing our problems instead of downplaying our troubles, the outcome of the intellectual chaos we are embroiled in.
With no doubt, numerous institutions, committees, conferences, and round tables have pored over many of our priorities, mainly the issues that concern the youth viewed as the largest and most dangerous and influential category in development. Such pressing issues are related to education, unemployment, void, ignorance, and fear of the future in the absence of social institutions likely to advance positive solutions in the form of enforceable sustainable programs, for the consuming society to become productive based on values and concepts that would restore social stability.
Therefore, such critical issues need to be seriously tackled as social and media priorities worthy of specialized conferences and appeals if we really want to spare our society the looming social, economic, and security dangers.
Al-Hayat
The Arab Muslim women in general and Saudi in particular have never in their modern and old history come under the spotlight at the internal and external levels. Nor have their rights been a major cause for concern as is the case now - to the extent that they appear as the sole pivot for the nation's renaissance in its current crisis. This concerted intense campaign calls for optimism should this be the reason behind it!
Indeed, many women rights-related issues need to be reconsidered and this gentle creature must regain her standing. About to lose this divine particularity, women are undergoing a superficial transformation - from altered physical features to loss of internal balance.
Women's human rights were violated prior to Islam but with its ascent, women regained all their rights and were introduced to their obligations, which helped restore social balance for human beings to live in "eternal" happiness.
As a result, women gained power - though not a supernatural one - while men cemented their strength with their respect for women's privacy. In other words, both men and women preserved their natural disposition, which drew them closer to each other and helped them enrich the Muslim civilization in poetry, literature, and diverse sciences. In the meantime, the natural roles within the family were respected, and this nucleus was preserved over generations, even at the gloomiest moments.
During the century-long wars and colonialism era, as the structure and concepts of the Arab Muslim society were substantially altered, the family system, on the other hand, remained until recently a source of pride and honor. Over the years, the family laws have represented and identified all social codes. When duties and obligations were equitably assigned among family members, society suffered from less psychological and social problems - as had been the case of the Saudi society which emerged from the tribal system and drew the socioeconomic relations among its members.
The Saudi generations were at that time known to be productive, living off their own hand-made goods, whether clothes or food. Women, productive as they were, formed an integral part of this system and the cornerstone of the family and tribe. Fully aware of their rights within this framework that guaranteed them protection, respect, and care from cradle to grave, they were only concerned with sheltering, feeding, and clothing all tribe members. In parallel, society provided them, mainly the divorced, widow, and the elderly, with a guardian's protection, for it was shameful to abandon tribe members, whether men or women.
These tribal features prevailed over the Saudi society even when the Island was united as a stable country in line with oil discovery. The State then substituted the tribe in protecting the people and settling their affairs in light of the Sharia. Consequently, the State, intent on teaching men, generalized and opened more schools in an effort previously confined to personal initiatives in Hejaz and Nejd. Unfortunately, women's share of education remained scant in these communal schools (four in Mecca, 5 in Jeddah, and one in Medinah), the most renowned of which was Al-Zahraain Jeddah.
In parallel, "Al Ahlia School For Girls" was set up in 1974 and "Al Nasifiyah" in 1950. In turn, the Saudi Crown Prince Saud bin Abdul Aziz opened in 1951 the first school for girls in the Kingdom, the Riyadh-based Al-Karimat School and sent his own daughters thereto hoping, by so doing, to encourage parents to teach their daughters. This exemplary school became in 1970 the first secondary institution in the Kingdom. In addition, King Saud daughters opened in 1956 Mabarrat Al-Karimat, while Prince Talal bin Abdul Aziz established in 1956 King Abdul Aziz Mabarrat.
Still, as these schools failed to absorb more girls willing to pursue their studies in Riyadh, the parents, forced to send their daughters to Egypt, urged King Saud to open more schools for girls - hence came the 1960 General Presidency for Girls' Education run by senior scholars under Sheikh Mohammed bin Ibrahim Al Sheikh. This school later opened many branches across the Kingdom despite all the objections rebuffed by the King himself.
Since then, conditions started to change for women, who began studying and working in specific fields in tune with society's perception of their work and role. Many working women stood out, notably King Saud daughters who ran King Saud Mabarrat - let alone some female poets and authors who favored, in this conservative society, to write under pseudonyms. Likewise, many Saudi women embraced teaching, a profession previously restricted to ladies from Egypt, Palestine, and Syria.
When the ministry of Labor and Social Affairs was established in 1960 under King Saud, it undertook, in cooperation with the ministries of health, education, and agriculture a huge project: the urban and rural local community development center. To this end, 16 such centers were set up in 1960, where women contributed to eradicating illiteracy, disseminating girl education, cementing respect for handcrafts, and pinpointing the importance of social development.
In addition, women created their own cooperative associations - with some later transformed into charity associations. They also trained girls and helped the poor households after examining their precarious conditions. In other words, women sought primarily to uproot female illiteracy, help poor households and raise awareness, which are all education and work-related concerns within a family-respectful framework. At this, society at large accepted women education and work amid respect for religion and customs. At the same time, social solidarity was preserved and family's financial reliance on working women was viewed as socially shameful, which eventually strengthened family ties.
As the per capita income mounted during the boom - the dangers, dimensions, and concepts of which went unnoticed, as society and its needs evolved, and rural migration increased in quest of education and job opportunities, many concepts, like family care and men's role as guardians, changed. Accordingly, men began relying sometimes on working women. Many social changes prevailed amid higher incomes and the prevalent locally-unacceptable concepts given the impact of the foreign labor force on the traditional families, which proved unable to preserve the inherited Muslim values.
Thus, families were fearfully disrupted, and their members, engrossed in materialism and different consumption patterns, were drawn apart. As a result, some momentous aspects were overlooked, like the need to rehabilitate the individual to become productive and self-sufficient. In parallel, the citizen embraced some of the negative aspects left by the consuming societies. Hence, both the citizen and society lost many values. But women were not the sole segments to suffer from this change as depicted in our media which, in the footsteps of their foreign counterparts, make judgments based on the values of the strong, totally overlooking the fact that the law that protects women equally protects all social categories.
Indeed, Saudi women concerns are now more numerous and violent than ever. Women have unfortunately relinquished most of their Sharia-consecrated rights in light of the social and economic changes and the alteration in the concepts long prevalent in the tribal and family systems which provided women with protection and care. Women were then supposed to economically provide for the family, which added up to their family responsibilities. Their acquired rights were equally violated and their status as working women exploited; hence the prevalent social and psychological problems, the mounting divorce cases referred to courts and the relevant matters - from alimony to the right of guardianship.
The situation was compounded further, since problem solving was no longer a family responsibility amid social disintegration, weak family protection and cohesion, increased interest in easy money and social appearances, diminishing financial assets, and loosening morals.
Personal interests prevailed over laws, which were not implemented on equal footing. Nepotism, bribery, and corruption became rampant, thus disrupting social balance and increasing women concerns as well as family and work responsibilities. Exposed to the foreign winds, women sought to imitate the media-portrayed seducing women. As such, considerable funds were channeled to plastic surgery -which most often yielded reverse results from deformation to death and caused psychological disorders.
Nowadays, women suffer from many factors. Socially speaking, this suffering affects society at large. Values are rapidly changing in a society unable to keep pace and adapt to the swift and unexpected events. At the personal level, women were misled by the material brainwashing consumption-oriented media that leave them unable to grasp their real dimensions. From the legal perspective, the women, ignorant, dependent, and obsessed with luxury, have settled for what is less than their legitimate rights though enshrined in the legislations initially meant to protect them. No wonder that society underestimated their demands and concerns! In other words, women suffer from three-faceted injustice: a self-induced one, another caused by the sweeping globalization laws that undermine man's dignity and finally, the injustice imposed by the strong on the weak.
If we are to tackle women concerns, we must then prioritize these concerns so as to find solutions thereto with the least possible loss and as soon as possible. In this regard, every society must first lay the foundations for a decent life and satisfied basic needs (the right to food, shelter, education, work, and protection). As for the other needs, they are just relative luxuries that evolve with society's needs, values, and classes. For instance, the luxuries of the rich classes match their class concepts and outer appearances.
Thus, the affluent categories, the first to lose the cultural and heritage legacy, distance themselves from popular concerns - a feature recently embraced by the Saudi society with its openness to the West and compliance with its dictates in the aftermath of 9/11 attacks. As for the middle-classes, most often composed of professionals and intellectuals, their luxuries are closer to the proletariat's, who struggle to live decently. The destitute poor classes, for their part, are often contented with the basics when available. They pass on the cultural heritage over generations and preserve traditions, attached as they are to the land away from mingling with different cultures.
Hence, the Saudi women concerns must be classified according to social classes. Otherwise, all efforts in this direction will remain unrealistic. For it is implausible that homeless and jobless women endeavor to drive a car they can't even dream of owning. Therefore, we must question women's right to drive: Which categories are entitled to drive? Is this right a luxury or a basic need? Can the destitute woman ask for luxuries? Can the affluent women eager to change their societies understand and sympathize with their hardworking peers, who represent the majority in any society?
When we manage to grasp the requirements of our society as a whole, when we work in tandem to satisfy them, only then we can cautiously set realistic priorities towards promoting the social awareness we lack at this critical moment in our history. We need to be more resolved and methodical in diagnosing our problems instead of downplaying our troubles, the outcome of the intellectual chaos we are embroiled in.
With no doubt, numerous institutions, committees, conferences, and round tables have pored over many of our priorities, mainly the issues that concern the youth viewed as the largest and most dangerous and influential category in development. Such pressing issues are related to education, unemployment, void, ignorance, and fear of the future in the absence of social institutions likely to advance positive solutions in the form of enforceable sustainable programs, for the consuming society to become productive based on values and concepts that would restore social stability.
Therefore, such critical issues need to be seriously tackled as social and media priorities worthy of specialized conferences and appeals if we really want to spare our society the looming social, economic, and security dangers.
Middle East: How governments handle the news
From The Economist:
PREDICTABILITY is a trait that few would ascribe to the Middle East, yet Arab interior ministers have gathered quietly, every winter for the past 25 years, to talk about how better to secure the regimes they serve. At this year's summit, in Tunis, the security chiefs agreed to toughen rules on publishing, recording or distributing material that might promote terrorism. A worthy goal, surely, except that the region's authorities have a habit of defining as crimes the kind of things their critics would deem legitimate dissent.
Despite the flourishing of alternative media, such as satellite television and internet blogs, that challenge once-impregnable state monopolies on the flow of news, governments keep finding new ways to suppress contrary views. Whereas the dictatorships of old snuffed out opponents or chucked them in jail, today's softer incarnations achieve similar silence by subtler means. Hyper-regulation via catch-all laws, plus financial carrots and sticks, tend to replace cruder direct control.
In draconian Syria, the vague crime of “disseminating false information” carries a stiff jail sentence. But as many journalists in relatively liberal Morocco have discovered, to criticise public officials is to risk libel charges that carry ruinous fines. Jordan, another semi-constitutional monarchy, recently issued a press law that independent-minded journalists suspect will be used against them, stipulating stiff penalties for slander. The regional government of Iraqi Kurdistan, a pro-Western enclave, is working on a similarly restrictive law. In Yemen last year, Abdel Karim Khaiwani, who edits a news website, found himself facing a possible death sentence for allegedly supporting terrorism after reporting on such issues as a bloody tribal rebellion and nepotism in President Ali Abdullah Saleh's government.
In many such cases, the state itself need not dirty its own fingers. Pro-government lawyers in Egypt filed a barrage of private lawsuits last year against editors who had, among other things, rubbished the ruling party and speculated on the state of President Hosni Mubarak's health; four were imprisoned. Plaintiffs in Kuwait, supposedly acting as private citizens, succeeded in winning hefty damages from the al-Jazeera satellite network because it had allegedly insulted their country. In tightly-controlled Tunisia, a journalist who had dared to air widely whispered rumours of corruption among President Ben Ali's relatives was charged with public indecency and insulting a state official after what appeared to be a staged altercation with police. He was sentenced in January to a year behind bars.
Older methods still work, too. According to Reporters Without Borders, a Paris-based lobby, more than 200 media workers have lost their lives in Iraq since 2003. In the same period, prominent journalists in Algeria, Egypt, Iran, Lebanon, Libya and Sudan have been killed or gone missing in suspicious circumstances. In the past two months alone, the authorities in Gaza, Saudi Arabia and Sudan have summarily jailed reporters or internet bloggers.
Non-Arab Iran continues to lead the region in banning newspapers. Under the fundamentalist government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, dozens of reformist publications have had their licences revoked. The most recent victim, a popular women's magazine, was accused of “threatening the psychological security of society” and of having “weakened military and revolutionary institutions”.
In January, after several participants in a call-in television show criticised a recent salary increase for government employees as too small, the Saudi authorities stopped any programme from being beamed live. The kingdom's minister of information then barred journalists from seeing himself questioned in the kingdom's all-appointed proto-parliament, the Shura Council. Saudi Arabia, like Iran, Syria and Tunisia, extensively monitors the internet, blocking tens of thousands of websites, ostensibly to protect public morality. Even Yemen, with its less sophisticated electronic means, has joined in. In recent weeks, half a dozen opposition news sites have suddenly become inaccessible to local users.
With satellite dishes proliferating even in remote villages across the Middle East, television has proved harder to control by such means. Governments have instead put pressure on the states that host stations. A recent rapprochement between Saudi Arabia and Qatar, for instance, has produced a marked toning down of news about the kingdom on al-Jazeera, which is based in Qatar. The mooted new rules on incitement to terrorism may have been partly intended to stop the channel, still by far the most popular across the region, from broadcasting statements by Islamist militants. But the last time al-Jazeera aired a video from al-Qaeda's fugitive leader, Osama bin Laden, Islamist radicals fumed that the footage was so heavily edited that it completely distorted the message.
PREDICTABILITY is a trait that few would ascribe to the Middle East, yet Arab interior ministers have gathered quietly, every winter for the past 25 years, to talk about how better to secure the regimes they serve. At this year's summit, in Tunis, the security chiefs agreed to toughen rules on publishing, recording or distributing material that might promote terrorism. A worthy goal, surely, except that the region's authorities have a habit of defining as crimes the kind of things their critics would deem legitimate dissent.
Despite the flourishing of alternative media, such as satellite television and internet blogs, that challenge once-impregnable state monopolies on the flow of news, governments keep finding new ways to suppress contrary views. Whereas the dictatorships of old snuffed out opponents or chucked them in jail, today's softer incarnations achieve similar silence by subtler means. Hyper-regulation via catch-all laws, plus financial carrots and sticks, tend to replace cruder direct control.
In draconian Syria, the vague crime of “disseminating false information” carries a stiff jail sentence. But as many journalists in relatively liberal Morocco have discovered, to criticise public officials is to risk libel charges that carry ruinous fines. Jordan, another semi-constitutional monarchy, recently issued a press law that independent-minded journalists suspect will be used against them, stipulating stiff penalties for slander. The regional government of Iraqi Kurdistan, a pro-Western enclave, is working on a similarly restrictive law. In Yemen last year, Abdel Karim Khaiwani, who edits a news website, found himself facing a possible death sentence for allegedly supporting terrorism after reporting on such issues as a bloody tribal rebellion and nepotism in President Ali Abdullah Saleh's government.
In many such cases, the state itself need not dirty its own fingers. Pro-government lawyers in Egypt filed a barrage of private lawsuits last year against editors who had, among other things, rubbished the ruling party and speculated on the state of President Hosni Mubarak's health; four were imprisoned. Plaintiffs in Kuwait, supposedly acting as private citizens, succeeded in winning hefty damages from the al-Jazeera satellite network because it had allegedly insulted their country. In tightly-controlled Tunisia, a journalist who had dared to air widely whispered rumours of corruption among President Ben Ali's relatives was charged with public indecency and insulting a state official after what appeared to be a staged altercation with police. He was sentenced in January to a year behind bars.
Older methods still work, too. According to Reporters Without Borders, a Paris-based lobby, more than 200 media workers have lost their lives in Iraq since 2003. In the same period, prominent journalists in Algeria, Egypt, Iran, Lebanon, Libya and Sudan have been killed or gone missing in suspicious circumstances. In the past two months alone, the authorities in Gaza, Saudi Arabia and Sudan have summarily jailed reporters or internet bloggers.
Non-Arab Iran continues to lead the region in banning newspapers. Under the fundamentalist government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, dozens of reformist publications have had their licences revoked. The most recent victim, a popular women's magazine, was accused of “threatening the psychological security of society” and of having “weakened military and revolutionary institutions”.
In January, after several participants in a call-in television show criticised a recent salary increase for government employees as too small, the Saudi authorities stopped any programme from being beamed live. The kingdom's minister of information then barred journalists from seeing himself questioned in the kingdom's all-appointed proto-parliament, the Shura Council. Saudi Arabia, like Iran, Syria and Tunisia, extensively monitors the internet, blocking tens of thousands of websites, ostensibly to protect public morality. Even Yemen, with its less sophisticated electronic means, has joined in. In recent weeks, half a dozen opposition news sites have suddenly become inaccessible to local users.
With satellite dishes proliferating even in remote villages across the Middle East, television has proved harder to control by such means. Governments have instead put pressure on the states that host stations. A recent rapprochement between Saudi Arabia and Qatar, for instance, has produced a marked toning down of news about the kingdom on al-Jazeera, which is based in Qatar. The mooted new rules on incitement to terrorism may have been partly intended to stop the channel, still by far the most popular across the region, from broadcasting statements by Islamist militants. But the last time al-Jazeera aired a video from al-Qaeda's fugitive leader, Osama bin Laden, Islamist radicals fumed that the footage was so heavily edited that it completely distorted the message.
Kuwait: Seminar on Kuwaiti women's political role
KUWAIT: In a casual seminar that took place in the diwan of former MP Abdullah Al-Naibari, Dr. Ebtehal Taher spoke about the political role of women and its relation to religion. The meeting was attended by a number of young thinkers and political activists.
Taher talked about the situation in Kuwait, pointing out at first that Kuwait's society is patriarchal and follows certain rules and regulations that are self-made. "A woman's body is usually used as a board to show the ideology of the nation," she said adding, "In our everyday language we say things like; 'Look at this country. Its people are "free"' and to prove that we say, 'do you see how their women dress?' The case is even similar on a smaller case; people refer to how a family is liberal in its thinking by the way their women dress. Women are contributing more and more in society these days, with two having held the position of a minister. But things are not as advanced as one would think."
"The government's new laws that are allegedly for women are actually against them. Think of the many opportunities that a woman would miss if she is forced into early retirement," said Taher.
She later on referred to a more recent issue, that of the segregation issue in universities. As a professor in Kuwait University, Taher lives the atmosphere first hand. "Students are being pressured to behave a certain way," she said, which she explained leads to total control of their lives. "They are convinced that no matter what they do, they will be eternally damned in hell," she added.
Forcing students to dress a certain way is not only controlling their appearance, but it extends to controlling who they choose to be. Taher talked briefly of the cons of segregation, referring mainly to how it delays students academically, aside from its high cost and the way it makes youth defunct.
By Hussain Al-Qatari, Kuwait Times
Taher talked about the situation in Kuwait, pointing out at first that Kuwait's society is patriarchal and follows certain rules and regulations that are self-made. "A woman's body is usually used as a board to show the ideology of the nation," she said adding, "In our everyday language we say things like; 'Look at this country. Its people are "free"' and to prove that we say, 'do you see how their women dress?' The case is even similar on a smaller case; people refer to how a family is liberal in its thinking by the way their women dress. Women are contributing more and more in society these days, with two having held the position of a minister. But things are not as advanced as one would think."
"The government's new laws that are allegedly for women are actually against them. Think of the many opportunities that a woman would miss if she is forced into early retirement," said Taher.
She later on referred to a more recent issue, that of the segregation issue in universities. As a professor in Kuwait University, Taher lives the atmosphere first hand. "Students are being pressured to behave a certain way," she said, which she explained leads to total control of their lives. "They are convinced that no matter what they do, they will be eternally damned in hell," she added.
Forcing students to dress a certain way is not only controlling their appearance, but it extends to controlling who they choose to be. Taher talked briefly of the cons of segregation, referring mainly to how it delays students academically, aside from its high cost and the way it makes youth defunct.
By Hussain Al-Qatari, Kuwait Times
Kuwait: Segregation at the forefront
KUWAIT: The state's segregation laws have come under fire by both Islamists and liberals with liberals calling for them to be amended or removed altogether and Islamists calling for the laws, which have been on the books for twelve years, to be fully enforced.
The Kuwaiti public remains at odds on the subject with supporters on both sides of the heated issue. "We are an Islamic state and we must segregate. There is no moral question in the matter as it is right," said Omar Abdulaziz.
Liberal MPs have proposed a law to amend the state's current laws which require gender segregation in public and private universities. MP Ali Al-Rashed, one of the three MPs who submitted the proposal, received a death threat via a telephone call on Tuesday claiming the law was contrary to local Islamic tradition.
All three MPs belong to the National Action Block party which supported Minister of Education Nouriya Al-Sabeeh in her bid to quash a no-confidence vote. Al-Sabeeh had been accused of not enforcing segregation laws.
The state's first university segregation law, which required the public system to be segregated, was passed in 1996 and implemented in 2001. The second law, which requires private universities to be segregated, was passed in 2000 and has not yet been fully implemented due to the high cost of building separate facilities for men and women.
The schools cannot afford to pay for two libraries, two computer labs, two scientific labs, two cafeterias. The cost is staggering and I worry that in implementing the law, one sex will suffer with poor facilities or a lack of facilities altogether," said student Amna Fadalah. "I have no problem with segregated schools or co-ed schools, my only issue is that the facilities for both sexes be compatible and have high quality environments," said Manal Abdullah.
"I am fully behind a change in this law which is unrealistic. You cannot expect co-ed schools to snap their fingers and build new schools with two of everything. Besides, we women and men shop at the same stores, eat at the same restaurants, and sit at the same coffee shops. If the society is not segregated, than why the schools? It's absurd!," said Um Nasser.
Forced gender segregation causes resentment and the forbidden fruit syndrome. It is better to allow co-education for those that chose it," said Khaled Muhamed. "I back public choice for education. If the public wanted segregation in the private high schools, than why do so many of us send our children to co-ed schools? It's simply supply and demand and we, the public, do not demand it," said Ahmem Bassem, the father of two high school students enrolled in co-ed schools.
Some Islamists claim gender segregation is required under Sharia law. Islamist MP Ali Al-Omer said he will soon propose a new segregation law for private schools, presumably for private high schools which are not required to segregate under the current laws.
"Segregation of the sexes is necessary, we must protect our daughters. To question this, goes against Islam," said Abu Tareq.
"I support segregation at every level of education," said mother of four Fatma Fahad who continued, "There is far too much mixing going in the private high schools and we cannot allow this kind of thing in our society."
Salah Muhamed said, "Private high schools should have been required to segregate long ago as this is what our culture dictates and what Sharia requires.
By Ahmad Al-Khaled, Kuwait Times
The Kuwaiti public remains at odds on the subject with supporters on both sides of the heated issue. "We are an Islamic state and we must segregate. There is no moral question in the matter as it is right," said Omar Abdulaziz.
Liberal MPs have proposed a law to amend the state's current laws which require gender segregation in public and private universities. MP Ali Al-Rashed, one of the three MPs who submitted the proposal, received a death threat via a telephone call on Tuesday claiming the law was contrary to local Islamic tradition.
All three MPs belong to the National Action Block party which supported Minister of Education Nouriya Al-Sabeeh in her bid to quash a no-confidence vote. Al-Sabeeh had been accused of not enforcing segregation laws.
The state's first university segregation law, which required the public system to be segregated, was passed in 1996 and implemented in 2001. The second law, which requires private universities to be segregated, was passed in 2000 and has not yet been fully implemented due to the high cost of building separate facilities for men and women.
The schools cannot afford to pay for two libraries, two computer labs, two scientific labs, two cafeterias. The cost is staggering and I worry that in implementing the law, one sex will suffer with poor facilities or a lack of facilities altogether," said student Amna Fadalah. "I have no problem with segregated schools or co-ed schools, my only issue is that the facilities for both sexes be compatible and have high quality environments," said Manal Abdullah.
"I am fully behind a change in this law which is unrealistic. You cannot expect co-ed schools to snap their fingers and build new schools with two of everything. Besides, we women and men shop at the same stores, eat at the same restaurants, and sit at the same coffee shops. If the society is not segregated, than why the schools? It's absurd!," said Um Nasser.
Forced gender segregation causes resentment and the forbidden fruit syndrome. It is better to allow co-education for those that chose it," said Khaled Muhamed. "I back public choice for education. If the public wanted segregation in the private high schools, than why do so many of us send our children to co-ed schools? It's simply supply and demand and we, the public, do not demand it," said Ahmem Bassem, the father of two high school students enrolled in co-ed schools.
Some Islamists claim gender segregation is required under Sharia law. Islamist MP Ali Al-Omer said he will soon propose a new segregation law for private schools, presumably for private high schools which are not required to segregate under the current laws.
"Segregation of the sexes is necessary, we must protect our daughters. To question this, goes against Islam," said Abu Tareq.
"I support segregation at every level of education," said mother of four Fatma Fahad who continued, "There is far too much mixing going in the private high schools and we cannot allow this kind of thing in our society."
Salah Muhamed said, "Private high schools should have been required to segregate long ago as this is what our culture dictates and what Sharia requires.
By Ahmad Al-Khaled, Kuwait Times
Saudi Arabia: Religious police arrest mother for sitting with a man
A 37-year-old American businesswoman and married mother of three is seeking justice after she was thrown in jail by Saudi Arabia's religious police for sitting with a male colleague at a Starbucks coffee shop in Riyadh.
Yara, who does not want her last name published for fear of retribution, was bruised and crying when she was freed from a day in prison after she was strip-searched, threatened and forced to sign false confessions by the Kingdom's “Mutaween” police.
Her story offers a rare first-hand glimpse of the discrimination faced by women living in Saudi Arabia. In her first interview with the foreign press, Yara told The Times that she would remain in Saudi Arabia to challenge its harsh enforcement of conservative Islam rather than return to America.
“If I want to make a difference I have to stick around. If I leave they win. I can't just surrender to the terrorist acts of these people,” said Yara, who moved to Jeddah eight years ago with her husband, a prominent businessman.
Her ordeal began with a routine visit to the new Riyadh offices of her finance company, where she is a managing partner.
The electricity temporarily cut out, so Yara and her colleagues — who are all men — went to a nearby Starbucks to use its wireless internet.
She sat in a curtained booth with her business partner in the café's “family” area, the only seats where men and women are allowed to mix.
For Yara, it was a matter of convenience. But in Saudi Arabia, public contact between unrelated men and women is strictly prohibited.
“Some men came up to us with very long beards and white dresses. They asked ‘Why are you here together?'. I explained about the power being out in our office. They got very angry and told me what I was doing was a great sin,” recalled Yara, who wears an abaya and headscarf, like most Saudi women.
The men were from Saudi Arabia's Commission for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, a police force of several thousand men charged with enforcing dress codes, sex segregation and the observance of prayers.
Yara, whose parents are Jordanian and grew up in Salt Lake City, once believed that life in Saudi Arabia was becoming more liberal. But on Monday the religious police took her mobile phone, pushed her into a cab and drove her to Malaz prison in Riyadh. She was interrogated, strip-searched and forced to sign and fingerprint a series of confessions pleading guilty to her “crime”.
“They took me into a filthy bathroom, full of water and dirt. They made me take off my clothes and squat and they threw my clothes in this slush and made me put them back on,” she said. Eventually she was taken before a judge.
“He said 'You are sinful and you are going to burn in hell'. I told him I was sorry. I was very submissive. I had given up. I felt hopeless,” she said.
Yara's husband, Hatim, used his political contacts in Jeddah to track her whereabouts. He was able to secure her release.
“I was lucky. I met other women in that prison who don't have the connections I did,” she said. Her story has received rare coverage in Saudi Arabia, where the press has been sharply critical of the police.
Yara was visited yesterday by officials from the American Embassy, who promised they would file a report.
An embassy official told The Times that it was being treated as “an internal Saudi matter” and refused to comment on her case.
Tough justice
— Saudi Arabia’s Mutaween has 10,000 members in almost 500 offices
— Ahmad al-Bluwi, 50, died in custody in 2007 in the city of Tabuk after he invited a woman outside his immediate family into his car
— In 2007 the victim of a gang rape was sentenced to 200 lashes and six years in jail for having been in an unrelated man’s car at the time. She was pardoned by King Abdullah, although he maintained the sentence had been fair
Source: The Times Archives
Sonia Verma in Dubai
Yara, who does not want her last name published for fear of retribution, was bruised and crying when she was freed from a day in prison after she was strip-searched, threatened and forced to sign false confessions by the Kingdom's “Mutaween” police.
Her story offers a rare first-hand glimpse of the discrimination faced by women living in Saudi Arabia. In her first interview with the foreign press, Yara told The Times that she would remain in Saudi Arabia to challenge its harsh enforcement of conservative Islam rather than return to America.
“If I want to make a difference I have to stick around. If I leave they win. I can't just surrender to the terrorist acts of these people,” said Yara, who moved to Jeddah eight years ago with her husband, a prominent businessman.
Her ordeal began with a routine visit to the new Riyadh offices of her finance company, where she is a managing partner.
The electricity temporarily cut out, so Yara and her colleagues — who are all men — went to a nearby Starbucks to use its wireless internet.
She sat in a curtained booth with her business partner in the café's “family” area, the only seats where men and women are allowed to mix.
For Yara, it was a matter of convenience. But in Saudi Arabia, public contact between unrelated men and women is strictly prohibited.
“Some men came up to us with very long beards and white dresses. They asked ‘Why are you here together?'. I explained about the power being out in our office. They got very angry and told me what I was doing was a great sin,” recalled Yara, who wears an abaya and headscarf, like most Saudi women.
The men were from Saudi Arabia's Commission for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, a police force of several thousand men charged with enforcing dress codes, sex segregation and the observance of prayers.
Yara, whose parents are Jordanian and grew up in Salt Lake City, once believed that life in Saudi Arabia was becoming more liberal. But on Monday the religious police took her mobile phone, pushed her into a cab and drove her to Malaz prison in Riyadh. She was interrogated, strip-searched and forced to sign and fingerprint a series of confessions pleading guilty to her “crime”.
“They took me into a filthy bathroom, full of water and dirt. They made me take off my clothes and squat and they threw my clothes in this slush and made me put them back on,” she said. Eventually she was taken before a judge.
“He said 'You are sinful and you are going to burn in hell'. I told him I was sorry. I was very submissive. I had given up. I felt hopeless,” she said.
Yara's husband, Hatim, used his political contacts in Jeddah to track her whereabouts. He was able to secure her release.
“I was lucky. I met other women in that prison who don't have the connections I did,” she said. Her story has received rare coverage in Saudi Arabia, where the press has been sharply critical of the police.
Yara was visited yesterday by officials from the American Embassy, who promised they would file a report.
An embassy official told The Times that it was being treated as “an internal Saudi matter” and refused to comment on her case.
Tough justice
— Saudi Arabia’s Mutaween has 10,000 members in almost 500 offices
— Ahmad al-Bluwi, 50, died in custody in 2007 in the city of Tabuk after he invited a woman outside his immediate family into his car
— In 2007 the victim of a gang rape was sentenced to 200 lashes and six years in jail for having been in an unrelated man’s car at the time. She was pardoned by King Abdullah, although he maintained the sentence had been fair
Source: The Times Archives
Sonia Verma in Dubai
Morocco: Government boosts vocational education programmes
The Moroccan government has launched an ambitious plan to reduce unemployment by expanding job training resources. A new vocational education strategy aims at providing the labour market with some 750,000 graduates over the next four years from various private and public training institutions, compared with just 500,000 between 2003 and 2007. Officials expect that the number of people graduating from vocational training establishments will increase by 50% between 2008 and 2012.To meet these targets, different measures will be introduced in 2008. The government looks to promote vocational training by strengthening partnerships with chambers of commerce, professional associations and businesses. To encourage workplace training, Morocco also wants to set up sector-based vocational training programmes on a contractual basis with professionals.
Some 10m dirhams will be allocated to finance studies on the best strategy to realise these objectives. Conducted under the guidance of a steering committee, the studies will determine the actual needs of the labour market and focus on adding new dynamism to the training sector. Study results will enable an emergency action plan to be set up by the start of the next academic year to implement necessary reforms.
Employment and Vocational Training Minister Jamal Aghhmani has stressed that the professional work world and the vocational training sector need a shared strategy. Such a co-operative plan will determine the national economy’s requirements in terms of skills and training and allow businesses to anticipate their future labour needs.
The strategy is also a response to the growing number of workers who do not fit the needs of the market and the problem of unemployment in the country.
Jamila Radi, who teaches in a vocational training institute, said it is not the work which is lacking, but rather the workers capable of doing it. She noted that while the aeronautics sector is "promising", the employee shortage is making itself felt in other areas. "We need to train some 70,000 graduates in tourism, 75,000 in textiles, 60,000 in information and communication technology [and] 60,000 in agriculture," Radi said, adding that young people who want to learn a trade need an effective career guidance system.
Professional training is coming to be valued more and more. In recent years, 4,000 graduates have joined vocational training institutions in recent years. Of these students, 41% graduate with high marks and 80% receive their diploma at the end of the programme.
To meet training needs, the government intends to create 50 new centres and increase the capacity of ten more by 2010.
However, a great many graduates from vocational training institutions find it hard to get a job once they have been awarded their diploma. To help them find their way into employment, there is a plan to set up 20 new national agencies to promote work and skills (ANAPEC), to meet a target of 70 total agencies in 2008.
Four other agencies will provide help for graduates who opt to take the foreign employment route.
By Sarah Touahri for Magharebia in Rabat
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Saudi Arabia: Shoura to Draft Law on Women’s Rights at Work Places
RIYADH - The Shoura Council has taken up the issue of protecting the rights of women at the work places. A resolution to this effect was moved in the House on Monday by Dr. Mazen Baleela who maintains that the Kingdom lacks a clear-cut law safeguarding working women's rights.
Dr Saleh Bin Humaid, Speaker of the Shoura Council, directed the Social Affairs, Family and Youth Committee at the Shoura to urgently draft a law on the issue.
Dr Al-Humaid underlined the desirability of the law and stressed that it should also include a dress code for the working women.
The issue of working women was raised recently by the Minister of Culture and Information, Iyad Madani, in which he referred to the long working hours for women in TV studios and on channels.
This prompted Dr. Baleela to present a proposal for issuing a legislation governing women's and men's relations in the work place.
In his proposal - which many of the Shoura members have supported including the speaker - Dr Baleela says that the Kingdom's labor law ensures the safety of workers from any damage while on duty regardless of their gender. Besides the law also encourages the health insurance. "But it has not yet promulgated laws protecting women's dignity while they are at work," he said.
He added that the law which should be applicable to men and women alike should clearly define the relationship between men and women at work and whoever violates the law either by words or deeds should be penalized.
Dr. Rashid Al-Kathairy, head of the Family's Committee at the Shoura, expressed the committee's readiness to come up with such such a law.
Al-Kathairy pointed out that the law will be flexible on the veil issue because there are some schools of thought in Islam that allow the uncovering of the face.
By Amal -Al-Zahrani, Saudi Gazette
Dr Saleh Bin Humaid, Speaker of the Shoura Council, directed the Social Affairs, Family and Youth Committee at the Shoura to urgently draft a law on the issue.
Dr Al-Humaid underlined the desirability of the law and stressed that it should also include a dress code for the working women.
The issue of working women was raised recently by the Minister of Culture and Information, Iyad Madani, in which he referred to the long working hours for women in TV studios and on channels.
This prompted Dr. Baleela to present a proposal for issuing a legislation governing women's and men's relations in the work place.
In his proposal - which many of the Shoura members have supported including the speaker - Dr Baleela says that the Kingdom's labor law ensures the safety of workers from any damage while on duty regardless of their gender. Besides the law also encourages the health insurance. "But it has not yet promulgated laws protecting women's dignity while they are at work," he said.
He added that the law which should be applicable to men and women alike should clearly define the relationship between men and women at work and whoever violates the law either by words or deeds should be penalized.
Dr. Rashid Al-Kathairy, head of the Family's Committee at the Shoura, expressed the committee's readiness to come up with such such a law.
Al-Kathairy pointed out that the law will be flexible on the veil issue because there are some schools of thought in Islam that allow the uncovering of the face.
By Amal -Al-Zahrani, Saudi Gazette
Saudi Arabia: Shoura Panel Drafting Law to Protect Women in Workplace
wJEDDAH, 6 February 2008 — The Social, Family and Youth Affairs Committee at the Shoura Council is currently drafting a legal system for protecting women’s rights in the workplace, including sexual-harassment laws.
“The concept of women working in mixed environments is legally undefined according to Shariah and is understood in compliance with social norms,” said Mazen Balilah, Shoura member at the Cultural and Informational Affairs Committee, who proposed the idea of legislating the system during the council’s meeting on Monday. “It was a must to seriously consider a legislated system that governs the relationship between men and women in the workplace.”
The Research and Women Empowerment Department at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s Khadija bint Khuwailid Center conducted a study about the problems that hinder the work of businesswomen. The department examined the Eighth Development Plan along with agreements the Kingdom has signed with international bodies and then organized a workshop for a group of businesswomen to discuss hurdles and difficulties they face.
“For women to contribute to the development of the country in all fields, problems that occur in the business world must be solved. There has to be a defined law that protects the rights of men and women in the workplace,” said Nashwa Taher, board member at JCCI. “For instance, an all-woman establishment isn’t allowed to run without having a director or chairman who is a man. This has to change. Women have proved to be professional and efficient in running their businesses.”
Maha Al-Hujailan, a medical researcher at King Khaled University Hospital in Riyadh, wrote an article in July 2007 discussing the problem of sexual harassment women undergo when hunting for jobs.
“Many Saudi women complain about sexual harassment when they apply for jobs or when they work in mixed environments,” said Al-Hujailain in her article. “A Saudi woman fears scandals and defamation even if she’s tyrannized ... There are no clear strict laws that prohibit sexual harassment against women regardless of their circumstances. This legal gloominess opens the door for violators and makes the Saudi woman an easy prey.”
When asked about statistics for sexual harassment cases in the Kingdom, Balilah told Arab News that current studies would collect qualitative, not quantitative, statistics through contacting companies, banks and organizations that employ women and suffered from similar problems.
“We’ve been receiving sexual harassment complaints every now and then from human recourses officials in different companies or reading about such cases in local media reports,” said Balilah. “Sexual harassment laws exist everywhere around the world in communities where women are part of the labor force such as in America and Europe. Once the law is discussed and drafted, the committee will present it to Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah for approval and implementation.”
- Hassna’a Mokhtar, Arab News
“The concept of women working in mixed environments is legally undefined according to Shariah and is understood in compliance with social norms,” said Mazen Balilah, Shoura member at the Cultural and Informational Affairs Committee, who proposed the idea of legislating the system during the council’s meeting on Monday. “It was a must to seriously consider a legislated system that governs the relationship between men and women in the workplace.”
The Research and Women Empowerment Department at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry’s Khadija bint Khuwailid Center conducted a study about the problems that hinder the work of businesswomen. The department examined the Eighth Development Plan along with agreements the Kingdom has signed with international bodies and then organized a workshop for a group of businesswomen to discuss hurdles and difficulties they face.
“For women to contribute to the development of the country in all fields, problems that occur in the business world must be solved. There has to be a defined law that protects the rights of men and women in the workplace,” said Nashwa Taher, board member at JCCI. “For instance, an all-woman establishment isn’t allowed to run without having a director or chairman who is a man. This has to change. Women have proved to be professional and efficient in running their businesses.”
Maha Al-Hujailan, a medical researcher at King Khaled University Hospital in Riyadh, wrote an article in July 2007 discussing the problem of sexual harassment women undergo when hunting for jobs.
“Many Saudi women complain about sexual harassment when they apply for jobs or when they work in mixed environments,” said Al-Hujailain in her article. “A Saudi woman fears scandals and defamation even if she’s tyrannized ... There are no clear strict laws that prohibit sexual harassment against women regardless of their circumstances. This legal gloominess opens the door for violators and makes the Saudi woman an easy prey.”
When asked about statistics for sexual harassment cases in the Kingdom, Balilah told Arab News that current studies would collect qualitative, not quantitative, statistics through contacting companies, banks and organizations that employ women and suffered from similar problems.
“We’ve been receiving sexual harassment complaints every now and then from human recourses officials in different companies or reading about such cases in local media reports,” said Balilah. “Sexual harassment laws exist everywhere around the world in communities where women are part of the labor force such as in America and Europe. Once the law is discussed and drafted, the committee will present it to Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah for approval and implementation.”
- Hassna’a Mokhtar, Arab News
Kuwait: MP's life threatened for supporting co-education
KUWAIT CITY - A senior Kuwaiti liberal MP said on Wednesday that his life was threatened after he proposed amendments to two laws that enforce the segregation of the sexes at universities.
Ali Al Rashed issued a statement calling on the interior ministry to apprehend the ‘terrorist’ who threatened him in a telephone call late on Tuesday.
Kuwait’s parliament, controlled by Islamists and conservatives, passed a law in 1996 stipulating that male and female students at Kuwait University and other higher education institutions be completely separated.
It also passed another law in 2000 extending the ban on co-education to private universities.
Rashed and two other liberal MPs on Tuesday filed a bill calling for the two laws to be amended in order to allow co-education, saying that the segregation laws had a strong negative impact on students.
The three lawmakers also argued that Islamic Sharia law does not ban the mixing of the sexes because men and women can mix freely in markets, shopping malls and in workplaces.
Parliament speaker Jassem Al Khorafi strongly condemned the threat against Rashed and urged the interior ministry to try to apprehend the culprit.
The Gulf state of Kuwait is a conservative country, but unlike neighbouring Saudi Arabia it does not impose a strict dress code on women who are allowed the full freedom to drive, work and travel.
Kuwaiti women also have full political rights.
(AFP)
Ali Al Rashed issued a statement calling on the interior ministry to apprehend the ‘terrorist’ who threatened him in a telephone call late on Tuesday.
Kuwait’s parliament, controlled by Islamists and conservatives, passed a law in 1996 stipulating that male and female students at Kuwait University and other higher education institutions be completely separated.
It also passed another law in 2000 extending the ban on co-education to private universities.
Rashed and two other liberal MPs on Tuesday filed a bill calling for the two laws to be amended in order to allow co-education, saying that the segregation laws had a strong negative impact on students.
The three lawmakers also argued that Islamic Sharia law does not ban the mixing of the sexes because men and women can mix freely in markets, shopping malls and in workplaces.
Parliament speaker Jassem Al Khorafi strongly condemned the threat against Rashed and urged the interior ministry to try to apprehend the culprit.
The Gulf state of Kuwait is a conservative country, but unlike neighbouring Saudi Arabia it does not impose a strict dress code on women who are allowed the full freedom to drive, work and travel.
Kuwaiti women also have full political rights.
(AFP)
Saudi Arabia: Saudi royal gives boost to women journalists
A Saudi princess said on Tuesday she was offering prizes and scholarships worth 270,000 dollars a year to boost female journalists in a country where women are subjected to a host of restrictions.
The goal is "to encourage Saudi women to work in journalism and help them develop their professional skills through training and practice," Princess Hassa bint Salman told AFP.
Hassa, daughter of Riyadh governor Prince Salman bin Abdul Aziz, a half-brother of King Abdullah, said she would allocate 160,000 dollars a year for scholarships for study and training in a specialised centre which will launch a special section for women.
Prize money of 54,000 dollars will be awarded every year to women journalists whose careers span more than 15 years.
Two prizes of 27,000 dollars each will be awarded for the best journalistic work of the year and for a woman journalist who has distinguished herself, the British-educated princess said.
"Women journalists are best placed to promote cultural communication between men and women in Saudi society in a manner compatible with sharia (Islamic law) and moderate social norms," she said.
She said her initiative was aimed at making up for the absence of women's journalism departments in Saudi universities and training institutes for women, and noted that some Saudi female journalists had "excelled despite working in difficult social and professional conditions."
Women in Saudi Arabia, which applies a rigorous doctrine of Islam known as Wahhabism, face a host of constraints, including a ban on driving. They are forced to cover from head to toe in public, and cannot mix with men other than relatives or travel without written permission from their male guardian.
- Agence France-Presse
The goal is "to encourage Saudi women to work in journalism and help them develop their professional skills through training and practice," Princess Hassa bint Salman told AFP.
Hassa, daughter of Riyadh governor Prince Salman bin Abdul Aziz, a half-brother of King Abdullah, said she would allocate 160,000 dollars a year for scholarships for study and training in a specialised centre which will launch a special section for women.
Prize money of 54,000 dollars will be awarded every year to women journalists whose careers span more than 15 years.
Two prizes of 27,000 dollars each will be awarded for the best journalistic work of the year and for a woman journalist who has distinguished herself, the British-educated princess said.
"Women journalists are best placed to promote cultural communication between men and women in Saudi society in a manner compatible with sharia (Islamic law) and moderate social norms," she said.
She said her initiative was aimed at making up for the absence of women's journalism departments in Saudi universities and training institutes for women, and noted that some Saudi female journalists had "excelled despite working in difficult social and professional conditions."
Women in Saudi Arabia, which applies a rigorous doctrine of Islam known as Wahhabism, face a host of constraints, including a ban on driving. They are forced to cover from head to toe in public, and cannot mix with men other than relatives or travel without written permission from their male guardian.
- Agence France-Presse
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Egypt: Women Activists Without a Movement
by Mariz Tadros
There are signs that Egyptians are challenging the political inertia that has gripped the country for so long. Workers are protesting poor wages and potential lay-offs, the Muslim Brotherhood is campaigning despite government crackdowns, university students are protesting frequently, and even property tax collectors are camping out with their families to protest meager wages. So where is the Egyptian women’s movement, which has historically been considered the mother of all women’s movements in the Arab world?
The lack of a unified and visible women’s movement in Egypt is not due to the lack of a need for it, or even to a lack of accomplishments. There have been advancements in women’s legal rights in recent years. Women have gained the right to khul’ (the ability to divorce unilaterally on condition of foregoing some financial rights) and to confer citizenship on their children (even if the father is not Egyptian).
Family courts have cut down on the red tape that made accessing rights a nightmare in the past. In 2003, Tahany al-Gabaly was appointed to the constitutional court as Egypt’s first female judge, and in 2007 thirty women judges were appointed to various courts, allowing them for the first time to preside over civil and criminal cases.
At the same time, these legal advances are eclipsed by an edifice of economic, religious, and political obstacles. In a country where over 40 percent of the population lives on less than $2 per day (according to the World Bank), the limited work opportunities available for women whose families made financial sacrifices to educate them are now causing many poor parents to reconsider the rewards of sending their girls to school. Increasing religious conservatism also has taken its toll.
While the growing role of religion has opened some avenues for participation in activities based in mosques and charities, it has also meant that women’s traditional gender roles as wife and mother are re-enforced more than ever before, for Muslim and Coptic Christian women alike. Fewer women were elected to parliament in 2005 than in earlier decades. The recent resignation of an active female MP, Shahinaz al-Naggar, after marrying a business tycoon was another blow to those who have lobbied for women’s greater political activism.
Egyptian women have not retreated from activism altogether. Women workers were the first to strike and female students have been just as active and defiant as their male counterparts. A significant proportion of the property tax workers participating in the sit-ins were women; even the Bedouin women of Sinai have risen to demand freedom for their family members incarcerated after terrorist bombings in 2004.
But women have been less active on behalf of explicitly feminist causes. A protest against sexual harassment in 2006, which followed the harassment of women en masse during Eid al-Adha in downtown Cairo (many incidents captured on camera), attracted a modest number of men and women, but this was the exception rather than the rule.
Social reasons for the decline in feminist consciousness in Egypt may include general political apathy and the increasing prevalence of religious norms, but there are also more direct causes.
The emergence of state feminism, manifested in a series of semi-governmental institutions such as the National Council for Women (whose offices are co-located with those of the ruling National Democratic Party in downtown Cairo) has played an important role.
The National Council has co-opted previously independent women activists and positions itself as “the” representative voice for Egyptian women. It adopts an essentially apolitical approach to controversial violations of women’s rights—for example the non-enforcement of laws against doctors performing female genital mutilation—especially in situations where the government is an accomplice or perpetrator.
Another factor in the marginalization of feminist activism was the NGOization of the movement in the 1990s. As scholar Islah Jad has shown, the proliferation of women’s NGOs that depend on foreign funding has made NGOs less responsive to the needs at the grassroots level. Not all women’s NGOs are donor-driven, but in the aggregate they are influenced by the fads and inconsistencies of foreign donors. In any case, the increasing number of women’s NGOs does not reflect a thriving feminist movement.
There is also a gap between the older generation of feminists and young women in Egypt, as elsewhere. Political parties and women’s NGOs have resisted promoting young women to positions of leadership, leading some to seek alternative avenues of female activism. Through blogging, for example, young women are contesting social mores that inhibit women’s rights and questioning patriarchal and narrow interpretations of women’s rights, whether in government, the opposition Muslim Brotherhood movement, or the Coptic Orthodox Church. The pressing question is whether the many forms of women’s activism will eventually coalesce into a movement. Diversity is certainly healthy, but without some sort of unity women activists’ efforts will be too scattered to effect change.
Mariz Tadros is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the American University in Cairo.
There are signs that Egyptians are challenging the political inertia that has gripped the country for so long. Workers are protesting poor wages and potential lay-offs, the Muslim Brotherhood is campaigning despite government crackdowns, university students are protesting frequently, and even property tax collectors are camping out with their families to protest meager wages. So where is the Egyptian women’s movement, which has historically been considered the mother of all women’s movements in the Arab world?
The lack of a unified and visible women’s movement in Egypt is not due to the lack of a need for it, or even to a lack of accomplishments. There have been advancements in women’s legal rights in recent years. Women have gained the right to khul’ (the ability to divorce unilaterally on condition of foregoing some financial rights) and to confer citizenship on their children (even if the father is not Egyptian).
Family courts have cut down on the red tape that made accessing rights a nightmare in the past. In 2003, Tahany al-Gabaly was appointed to the constitutional court as Egypt’s first female judge, and in 2007 thirty women judges were appointed to various courts, allowing them for the first time to preside over civil and criminal cases.
At the same time, these legal advances are eclipsed by an edifice of economic, religious, and political obstacles. In a country where over 40 percent of the population lives on less than $2 per day (according to the World Bank), the limited work opportunities available for women whose families made financial sacrifices to educate them are now causing many poor parents to reconsider the rewards of sending their girls to school. Increasing religious conservatism also has taken its toll.
While the growing role of religion has opened some avenues for participation in activities based in mosques and charities, it has also meant that women’s traditional gender roles as wife and mother are re-enforced more than ever before, for Muslim and Coptic Christian women alike. Fewer women were elected to parliament in 2005 than in earlier decades. The recent resignation of an active female MP, Shahinaz al-Naggar, after marrying a business tycoon was another blow to those who have lobbied for women’s greater political activism.
Egyptian women have not retreated from activism altogether. Women workers were the first to strike and female students have been just as active and defiant as their male counterparts. A significant proportion of the property tax workers participating in the sit-ins were women; even the Bedouin women of Sinai have risen to demand freedom for their family members incarcerated after terrorist bombings in 2004.
But women have been less active on behalf of explicitly feminist causes. A protest against sexual harassment in 2006, which followed the harassment of women en masse during Eid al-Adha in downtown Cairo (many incidents captured on camera), attracted a modest number of men and women, but this was the exception rather than the rule.
Social reasons for the decline in feminist consciousness in Egypt may include general political apathy and the increasing prevalence of religious norms, but there are also more direct causes.
The emergence of state feminism, manifested in a series of semi-governmental institutions such as the National Council for Women (whose offices are co-located with those of the ruling National Democratic Party in downtown Cairo) has played an important role.
The National Council has co-opted previously independent women activists and positions itself as “the” representative voice for Egyptian women. It adopts an essentially apolitical approach to controversial violations of women’s rights—for example the non-enforcement of laws against doctors performing female genital mutilation—especially in situations where the government is an accomplice or perpetrator.
Another factor in the marginalization of feminist activism was the NGOization of the movement in the 1990s. As scholar Islah Jad has shown, the proliferation of women’s NGOs that depend on foreign funding has made NGOs less responsive to the needs at the grassroots level. Not all women’s NGOs are donor-driven, but in the aggregate they are influenced by the fads and inconsistencies of foreign donors. In any case, the increasing number of women’s NGOs does not reflect a thriving feminist movement.
There is also a gap between the older generation of feminists and young women in Egypt, as elsewhere. Political parties and women’s NGOs have resisted promoting young women to positions of leadership, leading some to seek alternative avenues of female activism. Through blogging, for example, young women are contesting social mores that inhibit women’s rights and questioning patriarchal and narrow interpretations of women’s rights, whether in government, the opposition Muslim Brotherhood movement, or the Coptic Orthodox Church. The pressing question is whether the many forms of women’s activism will eventually coalesce into a movement. Diversity is certainly healthy, but without some sort of unity women activists’ efforts will be too scattered to effect change.
Mariz Tadros is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the American University in Cairo.
North Africa: Countries Need to Overhaul Education Systems - World Bank
A new report by the World Bank finds that countries in the Middle East and North Africa need to overhaul their education systems to meet the demands of an increasingly competitive world.
The report notes that 40 years of education investments have closed the gender gap at the primary school level and resulted in nearly universal education.
However, the region - which still lags behind East Asia and Latin America in literacy and in average years of schooling among people 15 and older - faces new challenges posed by globalization and the "increasing importance of knowledge in the development process."
"Since education is the main source of knowledge creation, the task is clear," the report says.
"The education systems must be changed to deliver new skills and expertise necessary to excel in a more competitive environment."
This means that students in the region need to acquire a new set of "soft skills" - problem solving, communications, foreign language - that are critical to further advancement.
"In order to become competitive, there has got to be a shift from the ability to perform routine tasks towards those soft skills which are absolutely essential for increasing productivity," says Michal Rutkowski, Sector Director for Human Development in the World Bank's Middle East and North Africa region.
"This shift is in the process, but the countries really need to accelerate it in order to remain competitive," he adds.
Mr. Rutkowski also notes that countries in the region are not enjoying the same returns on education investment at the higher-education level as some fast-growing middle-income countries in Asia, such as Malaysia and the Republic of Korea.
"What we see in the region is that those who graduate from universities cannot find jobs. The unemployment rate is very high among them. Therefore, the average return that you observe is also not high, and this is a serious problem," he says.
From AllAfrica.com
The report notes that 40 years of education investments have closed the gender gap at the primary school level and resulted in nearly universal education.
However, the region - which still lags behind East Asia and Latin America in literacy and in average years of schooling among people 15 and older - faces new challenges posed by globalization and the "increasing importance of knowledge in the development process."
"Since education is the main source of knowledge creation, the task is clear," the report says.
"The education systems must be changed to deliver new skills and expertise necessary to excel in a more competitive environment."
This means that students in the region need to acquire a new set of "soft skills" - problem solving, communications, foreign language - that are critical to further advancement.
"In order to become competitive, there has got to be a shift from the ability to perform routine tasks towards those soft skills which are absolutely essential for increasing productivity," says Michal Rutkowski, Sector Director for Human Development in the World Bank's Middle East and North Africa region.
"This shift is in the process, but the countries really need to accelerate it in order to remain competitive," he adds.
Mr. Rutkowski also notes that countries in the region are not enjoying the same returns on education investment at the higher-education level as some fast-growing middle-income countries in Asia, such as Malaysia and the Republic of Korea.
"What we see in the region is that those who graduate from universities cannot find jobs. The unemployment rate is very high among them. Therefore, the average return that you observe is also not high, and this is a serious problem," he says.
From AllAfrica.com
West Bank/Gaza: Women are still more Supportive of Hamas
Arab World for Research and Development (AWRAD) conducted an opinion poll dated 16-18 January 2008 after and during the latest Gaza attacks. A representative sample, of 3200 Palestinians, was interviewed in all West Bank and Gaza districts.
The main results were published on January the 23rd showing a decline in the support for Fateh and a slight increase in the support for Hamas. One must note that the latest attacks on Gaza influenced Palestinian views on most issues. Other important factors in this poll were gender, age and education that are clearly correlated with political attitudes.
During the last decade, various polls had shown that women, youth and educated Palestinians comprised the main bulk of support for Hamas. This poll shows major shifts, where these groups do not seem to be as supportive of the movement as traditionally believed. The opposite is true for Fateh that seems to have made gains among young and educated respondents, but still lagging behind among women.
Fewer Women Supporting Hamas; No Signs of Reconciliation between Women and Fateh
Previous polling had shown that fewer women, than men, support the peace process, and more women, than men, support Hamas. The current poll shows a continuation in the gender gap for most political issues, but a declining gap on support for Hamas. Women are, however, still more reluctant to support Fateh.
Around 31% of men fully support the outcome of Annapolis and the continuation of negotiations.
This view is shared by 23% of the female respondents.
Again, 39% of men support the division of Jerusalem and exchange of sovereignty, compared with 25% of women.
51% of men support steps taken by Abbas to end the occupation, compared with 41% among women.
28% of women believe that Hamas has a real alternative to end the occupation, compared with 23% of men.
In terms of support for Hamas, the gender gap is declining with only 18% of the women stating that they will vote for the movement, compared with 16% among men.
When it comes to Fateh, the gender gap continues where 27% of the women and 37% of the men declared that they might vote for Fateh in a PLC election.
The main results were published on January the 23rd showing a decline in the support for Fateh and a slight increase in the support for Hamas. One must note that the latest attacks on Gaza influenced Palestinian views on most issues. Other important factors in this poll were gender, age and education that are clearly correlated with political attitudes.
During the last decade, various polls had shown that women, youth and educated Palestinians comprised the main bulk of support for Hamas. This poll shows major shifts, where these groups do not seem to be as supportive of the movement as traditionally believed. The opposite is true for Fateh that seems to have made gains among young and educated respondents, but still lagging behind among women.
Fewer Women Supporting Hamas; No Signs of Reconciliation between Women and Fateh
Previous polling had shown that fewer women, than men, support the peace process, and more women, than men, support Hamas. The current poll shows a continuation in the gender gap for most political issues, but a declining gap on support for Hamas. Women are, however, still more reluctant to support Fateh.
Around 31% of men fully support the outcome of Annapolis and the continuation of negotiations.
This view is shared by 23% of the female respondents.
Again, 39% of men support the division of Jerusalem and exchange of sovereignty, compared with 25% of women.
51% of men support steps taken by Abbas to end the occupation, compared with 41% among women.
28% of women believe that Hamas has a real alternative to end the occupation, compared with 23% of men.
In terms of support for Hamas, the gender gap is declining with only 18% of the women stating that they will vote for the movement, compared with 16% among men.
When it comes to Fateh, the gender gap continues where 27% of the women and 37% of the men declared that they might vote for Fateh in a PLC election.
Sunday, February 3, 2008
Bahrain: Government will reward firms empowering women
Two organisations in Bahrain — one public and another private — will be awarded by the government for their women empowerment strategies.
They would be granted with the Shaikha Sabika Award for Bahraini Women Empowerment that is being organised for the second year by the Supreme Council for Women (SCW). The award is part of the SCW’s keenness to enhance gender equality in private and public sectors.Named after Bahrain’s first lady, the award targets all public and private establishments and it aims at motivating employers to consider women as productive manpower.
The award, launched last year, will be presented by the SCW’s Chairwoman Shaikha Sabika bint Ibrahim Al Khalifa.Last year’s winners — Central Informatics Organisation and Al Ahli Bank — were selected by a judging committee from 30 establishments who had submitted their papers for the award. Of the 30 entries that took part in the competition, 22 were government organisations while GPIC, Bapco, the housing Bank and National Bank of Bahrain were among the private organisations that were in the fray.
The winners will be provided with cash prize of BD10,000, certificates signed by Shaikha Sabika and plaques. The organisations will be allowed to use the award’s logo on their official letterheads and carry the award’s flag for two years.
The General-Secretary of the SCW Lulwa Al Awadhi said that the award was the first of its kind in the Arab world and would might motivate companies to promote women empowerment strategies. “The award was launched as part of a plan to motivate employers to appoint women in executive and other important posts and motivate them to be involved in the national development.”
She said that the award also aims to eliminate any type of discrimination against women. It was given to organisations that ensure gender equality in selecting employees for top managerial posts, promotion, salary increment and other work privileges. Priority was given for establishments that give its women workers the chance to take part in workshops and conferences inside and outside the kingdom.
Supporting matters related to empowerment of women such as the conduction of scientific research is a good winning chance for the organisations, she explained. The award will be announced on July 30.
- Khaleej Times
Friday, February 1, 2008
Saudi Arabia: UN calls for Saudis to end male guardianship
GENEVA - (AP) A United Nations human rights body called on Saudi Arabia on Friday to immediately end its system of male guardianship which it said severely limits the basic freedoms of women in the kingdom.
The UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women, in its first scrutiny of Saudi Arabia’s gender equality record, said Islamic Sharia law should not trump an international women’s rights treaty that Riyadh signed in 2000.
The committee’s 23 independent experts urged Saudi Arabia to ‘amend its legislation to confirm that international treaties have precedence over domestic laws,’ and ‘enact a comprehensive gender equality law’.
They also said that Riyadh should ‘take immediate steps to end the practice of male guardianship over women’ and work to eliminate ‘negative cultural practices and stereotypes’ which discriminate against women.
Saudi Arabia’s system of male guardianship severely curtails the rights afforded in the 1979 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, the committee said.
The rules restrict women’s legal rights in marriage, divorce, child custody, inheritance, property ownership and decision-making in the family, as well as choice of residency, education and jobs, the committee said.
It ‘contributes to the prevalence of a patriarchal ideology with stereotypes and the persistence of deep-rooted cultural norms, customs and traditions that discriminate against women,’ the committee said. A de facto ban on Saudi women driving further reinforces such stereotypes, the UN body concluded.
Although the body has no legal power to enforce its recommendations, it is regarded as a moral authority on women’s rights.
Saudis say no discrimination
A report submitted by Riyadh on its compliance with the treaty said that generally there was ‘no discrimination against women in the laws of the kingdom’.
A Saudi delegation led by Zeid Bin Abdul Mushin Al Hussein, vice president of the Saudi Human Rights Commission, told the committee during a recent debate: ‘Human rights in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia are based on Sharia law.’
Saudi clerics, who rule according to the strict religious tenets, have wide powers in Saudi Arabia under a traditional pact with the royal family.
The country drew international criticism after its Supreme Judicial Council ordered a 19-year-old to 200 lashes and six months in jail for having been with a man she was not related to when she was attacked and raped by seven other men in 2006.
King Abdullah pardoned the gang-rape victim in December.
The UN committee urged Riyadh to withdraw its proviso that Islamic law take precedence over the women’s rights treaty, particularly as Saudi authorities have given assurances that there is ‘no contradiction in substance’ between the two.
The committee’s conclusions were issued at the end of a three-week meeting during which it also reviewed other states.
The UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women, in its first scrutiny of Saudi Arabia’s gender equality record, said Islamic Sharia law should not trump an international women’s rights treaty that Riyadh signed in 2000.
The committee’s 23 independent experts urged Saudi Arabia to ‘amend its legislation to confirm that international treaties have precedence over domestic laws,’ and ‘enact a comprehensive gender equality law’.
They also said that Riyadh should ‘take immediate steps to end the practice of male guardianship over women’ and work to eliminate ‘negative cultural practices and stereotypes’ which discriminate against women.
Saudi Arabia’s system of male guardianship severely curtails the rights afforded in the 1979 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, the committee said.
The rules restrict women’s legal rights in marriage, divorce, child custody, inheritance, property ownership and decision-making in the family, as well as choice of residency, education and jobs, the committee said.
It ‘contributes to the prevalence of a patriarchal ideology with stereotypes and the persistence of deep-rooted cultural norms, customs and traditions that discriminate against women,’ the committee said. A de facto ban on Saudi women driving further reinforces such stereotypes, the UN body concluded.
Although the body has no legal power to enforce its recommendations, it is regarded as a moral authority on women’s rights.
Saudis say no discrimination
A report submitted by Riyadh on its compliance with the treaty said that generally there was ‘no discrimination against women in the laws of the kingdom’.
A Saudi delegation led by Zeid Bin Abdul Mushin Al Hussein, vice president of the Saudi Human Rights Commission, told the committee during a recent debate: ‘Human rights in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia are based on Sharia law.’
Saudi clerics, who rule according to the strict religious tenets, have wide powers in Saudi Arabia under a traditional pact with the royal family.
The country drew international criticism after its Supreme Judicial Council ordered a 19-year-old to 200 lashes and six months in jail for having been with a man she was not related to when she was attacked and raped by seven other men in 2006.
King Abdullah pardoned the gang-rape victim in December.
The UN committee urged Riyadh to withdraw its proviso that Islamic law take precedence over the women’s rights treaty, particularly as Saudi authorities have given assurances that there is ‘no contradiction in substance’ between the two.
The committee’s conclusions were issued at the end of a three-week meeting during which it also reviewed other states.
Saudi Arabia: UN Committee urges government to take concrete steps to enforce gender equality
GENEVA - Women in Saudi Arabia are the victims of systematic and pervasive discrimination across all aspects of social life, a United Nations report said on Friday.
The UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women urged the Saudi government to take concrete steps to enforce gender equality and end violence against women.
The committee overseas the application of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, a UN treaty regarded as a global bill of rights for women.
"Neither the Constitution nor other legislation embodies the principle of equality between women and men," the committee said in a report.
Saudia Arabia imposes almost complete separation of the sexes.
As such, it is illegal for a woman to be in the company of a man who is not in her immediate family.
Women suffer from domestic violence, poor healthcare provision and high levels of illiteracy, the committee said in its report.
They are also shackled by the obligation to have a male "tutor" or guardian to accompany them for many daily tasks, it found.
"The concept of male guardianship contributes to the prevalence of a patriarchal ideology with stereotypes and the persistence of deep-rooted cultural norms that discriminate against women," the report said.
"The level of representation of women in public and political life, at the local, national, and international levels and in particular in decision-making positions, is very low," it added.
The committee also expressed concern about female domestic migrant workers in the kingdom, who are vulnerable to economic and sexual exploitation and do not have ready access to the law.
Earlier this month, a Saudi delegation told a meeting of the committee in Geneva that "Saudi society is still largely a tribal society and changes in mentality allowing new ideas to be accepted take time".
Earlier this month, a Saudi delegation told a meeting of the committee in Geneva that "Saudi society is still largely a tribal society and changes in mentality allowing new ideas to be accepted take time".
- Middle East Online
Saudi Arabia - Work Out Change From Within — Brundtland to Saudi Women
RIYADH — Former Prime Minister of Norway Gro Harlem Brundtland, who is also the Special Envoy on Climate Change for the United Nations Secretary-General, visited Saudi Arabia last week to speak at the Global Competitiveness Forum. Brundtland spoke to Arab News about the condition of Saudi women.Brundtland is seen as a left-wing version of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. She was the Norwegian minister for environmental affairs from 1974 to 1979, and became Norway’s first — and to date only — woman prime minister in 1981. Her Cabinet was renowned internationally for having eight women ministers out of a total of 18.
Empowering women in Norway was not enough for her. “My perspective is always global. It was not only what Norway should be doing in Norway but also what we should be doing to other countries,” she said.
Brundtland is aware of the happenings in the Middle East and the talk of reform in Saudi Arabia. In terms of democracy and bettering women’s conditions in developed countries, the UN can play an important role in opinion making, she said. However, she strongly believes that change should come from within.
“There is no one outside that can force change on Saudi Arabia. The change should come from Saudis themselves,” she said, adding that young Saudis could start change by asking difficult questions.
In her global outlook, change is necessary and urgent in developed countries, even from an economic point of view. She said she was shocked to learn that only 16 percent of Saudi women work. She compared that to Norway where 75-80 percent of women work, saying that this was due to the efforts and strategies of the government. When she was a young minister, she and other women pushed economists, who said that it was impossible to increase the numbers of working women. Giving women opportunities is the key to advancement in all societies.
Speaking about Saudi Arabia, Brundtland believes that religion does not hinder change and does not prevent women from having equal opportunities.
Brundtland believes that the problem lies with the tradition and culture that people have been brought up with and which “might be hard to break out from.” She added that positive change would come “because we live in the era of globalization and learn about other societies.”
At the UN conference on population in Cairo in September 1994, she aroused the ire of Muslims and Catholics by calling for abortion to be decriminalized and accusing religious opponents of hypocrisy.
Knowing that Saudi women cannot undergo surgery in hospitals without their guardians’ approval, Brundtland said it is “outrageous that women are treated as if they were children.”
She also expressed her deep shock at the case of the Qatif Girl, who was sentenced to 200 lashes and six months in prison by a Saudi court before she was granted a royal pardon.
“I find it hard to understand if a woman is in a place where her brother or father is not there to protect her, then what happened to her is her fault. What kind of logic is behind this?”
She said that her participation in the Riyadh Global Competitiveness Forum is all about creating a society full of energy.
“If you keep women down, society will never be as productive as you want it to be,” she said, adding that the United Nations could play an important role in dealing with oppressive societies.
“There are countries who signed international treaties but don’t comply with them and there is a lot of pressure than can be put on them,” she said, adding that international help would take longer if change does not come from within.
“You don’t need to spend 100 years to make that change in Saudi Arabia. It will happen if there is simmering discussion and criticism.” Her last word to Saudi women was a wish that the next generation will have better opportunities.
- Ebtihal Mubarak, Arab News
Saudi Arabia: Women-Only Hospitals: Who Will Rule the Roost, Idealists or Pragmatists?
JEDDAH, 1 February 2008 — Would having hospitals run exclusively by women — from doctors to janitors — be a better environment for women? This is a proposition that the Ministry of Health is currently studying.
Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al-Asheikh, the grand mufti of Saudi Arabia, recently proposed the establishment of women-only hospitals during a symposium in Riyadh entitled “Applying religion in medical issues.” Describing intermingling of sexes at hospitals as a “disaster” that infringes upon the modesty of Muslim societies, the mufti said medical professionals should only treat patients of the same gender except in time of emergencies.
Dr. Khaled Mirghalani, official spokesman for the Ministry of Health, said the ministry was considering the establishment of such hospitals, but he added that the move has nothing to do with the mufti’s recommendation.
“The ministry has been considering women-only hospitals for a long time. Such hospitals would be for specialties related to women, such as gynecology and obstetrics, but would have male staff. However, women employees will have preference,” he said.
Mirghalani said the Kingdom was not self-sufficient in terms of the number of Saudi doctors it needs. Only 20 percent of total doctors in the Kingdom are Saudi. “Having women-only hospitals is still being studied. More girls might consider going to medical schools when they are guaranteed that they can work in a women-only environment. But this is not a necessity now as there are already a large number of girls enrolling in medical schools, especially at the King Abdul Aziz University in Jeddah. Medicine is after all a humane job and it must be thought of in that way,” he added.
The idea of having single-gender hospitals has attracted mixed reactions from women. Some women feel such hospitals would be convenient, while others are against them.
“I don’t think this is a good idea. We all live on one planet so we cannot segregate the genders. If the Holy Mosque in Makkah, which is the holiest place on earth, does not segregate women, then why would the Ministry of Health want to segregate them?” said Maha Al-Nuwaisser, 26.
Al-Nuwaisser said doctors should not be selected according to their gender. She added that she would go to professional doctors who would be able to diagnose her problem and give her the best treatment, regardless of their gender.
“I prefer doctors who are professional in studying my situation and solving my problem, regardless of whether they are male or female. I cannot imagine a men’s hospital without female nurses and doctors, and I also cannot imagine women’s hospitals without men playing a role in them,” she added.
Amani Henaidi said she would prefer using a women’s only hospital. “It would be more practical and easier. Since it is possible, then why not?” she said. “Of course it would be more private, because I don’t have to worry about hijab while I’m in pain and all of those things,” she said.
“There is only one advantage and that is the issue of privacy,” said Hana Omar, adding that some male doctors are more professional than women. Omar believes that women-only hospitals would be good for women-related illnesses, such as breast cancer.
Fatima said such hospitals would “only serve those conservative close-minded people who would leave their wives to die because there is no woman doctor on the night shift.”
Samia asks whether other women-only establishments have been successful. She said that women-only shopping centers in Jeddah have been unsuccessful in attracting women. The idea of employing saleswomen in lingerie shops has also been unsuccessful. “Hospitals include maintenance team, engineers, and other staff other than doctors and nurses. How would the minister of health tour women-only hospitals? How could that be possible? What would the situation in case of a fire or other emergencies when the interference of men is necessary?” she asked.
These questions and others have to be answered since the Health Ministry spokesman said the proposal was still under the study. Arab News tried continuously to contact other officials in the ministry for further information, but they were not reachable.
- Lulwa Shalhoub, Arab News
Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al-Asheikh, the grand mufti of Saudi Arabia, recently proposed the establishment of women-only hospitals during a symposium in Riyadh entitled “Applying religion in medical issues.” Describing intermingling of sexes at hospitals as a “disaster” that infringes upon the modesty of Muslim societies, the mufti said medical professionals should only treat patients of the same gender except in time of emergencies.
Dr. Khaled Mirghalani, official spokesman for the Ministry of Health, said the ministry was considering the establishment of such hospitals, but he added that the move has nothing to do with the mufti’s recommendation.
“The ministry has been considering women-only hospitals for a long time. Such hospitals would be for specialties related to women, such as gynecology and obstetrics, but would have male staff. However, women employees will have preference,” he said.
Mirghalani said the Kingdom was not self-sufficient in terms of the number of Saudi doctors it needs. Only 20 percent of total doctors in the Kingdom are Saudi. “Having women-only hospitals is still being studied. More girls might consider going to medical schools when they are guaranteed that they can work in a women-only environment. But this is not a necessity now as there are already a large number of girls enrolling in medical schools, especially at the King Abdul Aziz University in Jeddah. Medicine is after all a humane job and it must be thought of in that way,” he added.
The idea of having single-gender hospitals has attracted mixed reactions from women. Some women feel such hospitals would be convenient, while others are against them.
“I don’t think this is a good idea. We all live on one planet so we cannot segregate the genders. If the Holy Mosque in Makkah, which is the holiest place on earth, does not segregate women, then why would the Ministry of Health want to segregate them?” said Maha Al-Nuwaisser, 26.
Al-Nuwaisser said doctors should not be selected according to their gender. She added that she would go to professional doctors who would be able to diagnose her problem and give her the best treatment, regardless of their gender.
“I prefer doctors who are professional in studying my situation and solving my problem, regardless of whether they are male or female. I cannot imagine a men’s hospital without female nurses and doctors, and I also cannot imagine women’s hospitals without men playing a role in them,” she added.
Amani Henaidi said she would prefer using a women’s only hospital. “It would be more practical and easier. Since it is possible, then why not?” she said. “Of course it would be more private, because I don’t have to worry about hijab while I’m in pain and all of those things,” she said.
“There is only one advantage and that is the issue of privacy,” said Hana Omar, adding that some male doctors are more professional than women. Omar believes that women-only hospitals would be good for women-related illnesses, such as breast cancer.
Fatima said such hospitals would “only serve those conservative close-minded people who would leave their wives to die because there is no woman doctor on the night shift.”
Samia asks whether other women-only establishments have been successful. She said that women-only shopping centers in Jeddah have been unsuccessful in attracting women. The idea of employing saleswomen in lingerie shops has also been unsuccessful. “Hospitals include maintenance team, engineers, and other staff other than doctors and nurses. How would the minister of health tour women-only hospitals? How could that be possible? What would the situation in case of a fire or other emergencies when the interference of men is necessary?” she asked.
These questions and others have to be answered since the Health Ministry spokesman said the proposal was still under the study. Arab News tried continuously to contact other officials in the ministry for further information, but they were not reachable.
- Lulwa Shalhoub, Arab News
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Jordan and Kuwait: New Public Service Announcements
In December 2007, representatives of Jordanian and Kuwaiti civil society organizations successfully produced their own Public Service Announcements (PSAs), after undergoing digital media training organized by the New York-based organization, Barefoot Workshops. The training taught participants how to conceptualize, film, produce, and edit their own PSAs, and provided these organizations a new tool for engaging a wide audience of fellow citizens on key issues of public concern.
Some of the PSAs have already been screened on television and posted to the participant organizations’ websites. All of the PSAs were posted on YouTube, where they have already been viewed in Arabic and English by more than seven thousand visitors. To watch the PSAs, click here.
Some of the PSAs have already been screened on television and posted to the participant organizations’ websites. All of the PSAs were posted on YouTube, where they have already been viewed in Arabic and English by more than seven thousand visitors. To watch the PSAs, click here.
Saudi Arabia: 8,000 Female Graduates to Sue Ministry
TAIF - Some 8,000 female graduates of teachers training institutes plan to sue the Ministry of Education for not hiring them.
The teachers, unemployed since graduating 15 years ago, based the validity of their complaint on Article 2 of the education regulation which mandates the ministry to hire those who have earned a degree from a teachers' institute.
- Saudi Gazette
By Muhammed Seed Al-Zahrani
The teachers, unemployed since graduating 15 years ago, based the validity of their complaint on Article 2 of the education regulation which mandates the ministry to hire those who have earned a degree from a teachers' institute.
- Saudi Gazette
By Muhammed Seed Al-Zahrani
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