Pakistan’s President signed an amendment to a controversial Islamic law on Friday that will allow 1,300 women facing charges of adultery and other minor crimes to be released from prison on bail. President Gen. Pervez Musharraf’s amendment to the Hadood Ordinance allows women awaiting trial to be released on bail, excluding those accused of murder […]
A priest who attacked a women’s health clinic in 2001 has been assigned a top position in a Catholic Church in Elgin, Illinois. Rev. John P. Earl was charged with two counts of criminal damage to property in 2001 after he crashed his car into the Northern Illinois Women’s Clinic and used an ax to […]
More than 50 Californian advocacy groups, including the Pharmacy Access partnership and the Feminist Majority Foundation, have joined together to form the California Emergency Contraception Network. The coalition intends to work to reduce California’s unintended pregnancy rate. California has the seventh highest teenage pregnancy rate in the nation, with more than 100,000 teens becoming pregnant […]
The Human Rights Campaign has released a report on Fortune 500 companies, finding that 51 percent offer full benefits to domestic partners. In addition, 430 (86 percent) of the organizations include sexual orientation in their non-discrimination policies, which is a tenfold improvement compared with 2001. The report also highlights individual state victories, such as the […]
A Portuguese Court of Appeals charged a doctor and his assistant on Tuesday with providing illegal abortions. Three women were also charged with obtaining illegal abortions. Abortion is illegal in Portugal, with few exceptions, including endangerment of the mother’s life and other specified conditions. Tuesday’s ruling is a reversal of a 2004 ruling where the […]
In Saudi Arabia, recent changes to business regulations will now allow women to launch and register businesses by themselves. The Saudi Ministry of Commerce has simplified the procedures so that women can apply for and receive a business license and complete the registration process alone. Women will not be allowed to start businesses in some […]
New York’s highest court ruled against gay marriage today in a 4-2 decision. The ruling states that New York’s marriage laws do not allow for marriages between same-sex couples and that the legislature must decide whether same-sex marriages should be allowed. Opposing the ruling were Judge Carmen Beauchamp Ciparick and Chief Justice Judith Kaye, who […]
Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni announced Tuesday that if peace talks are successful, he will grant amnesty to Joseph Kony, head of a Ugandan terrorist organization, despite the atrocities Kony has committed over the past 19 years. Under Kony’s leadership, the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) has killed thousands and kidnapped approximately 20,000 Ugandan children. Many of […]
A former US soldier was accused on Monday of raping and murdering a young Iraqi woman and killing her three family members in their home. According to the Washington Post, former Pfc. Steven D. Green and four other unnamed members of his regiment planned the attack over drinks after seeing the girl, Abeer Qasim Hamza, […]
Following recent figures that indicate 15 Irish women go to the United Kingdom for an abortion every day, Alliance for Choice has called on the Irish government to legalize abortion. Spokeswoman Sian Muldowney said that “Ireland needs to face up to its responsibility to Irish men and women to provide a comprehensive sex education strategy, […]
Oglala Sioux Tribe president Cecelia Fire Thunder was impeached on Thursday for her proposal to build a women’s health clinic on tribal land in South Dakota. Fire Thunder suggested the idea in May after South Dakota passed a law that bans abortion in the state, with no exception for rape, incest, or the health of […]
A new study published in June shows marked disparities in rates of unintended pregnancy and abortion among women of different socioeconomic backgrounds. The study (PDF), published by the Guttmacher Institute, shows that women below the poverty line and women without high school diplomas have fallen behind their more affluent, college-educated peers in their capacity to […]
In Baghdad this weekend, two women legislators were targets of political violence. On Saturday, Taiseer Mashhadani, a Sunni lawmaker, and several of her bodyguards were abducted at a checkpoint in a Shiite neighborhood. The following day, Shiite Muslim lawmaker Liqa Yaseen and her driver escaped a kidnapping attempt, though eight of her bodyguards were captured, […]
The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices recommended yesterday that all girls ages 11 to 12 receive the newly-licensed human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine. The HPV vaccine, called Gardasil, prevents cervical cancer and genital warts caused by HPV types 6, 11, 16, and 18. The recommendation is expected to be accepted by the Center for Disease Control […]
On June 28, the Michigan House of Representatives passed three bills that would allow single-sex public schools, classes, and programs. Similar legislation passed in the MI Senate last week. According to the Bay City Times, MI Governor Jennifer Granholm has indicated that she will approve the decision to create sex-segregated public schools, as long as […]
In spite of political gains for women in 2005, Kuwaiti voters failed to elect any women to parliament in yesterday’s election, though 27 of 250 candidates were women. Kuwaiti women voted in parliamentary elections yesterday for the first time after receiving the right to vote and run for office in May of 2005. The parliamentary […]
In Denmark, nine people were sentenced to prison this week for the “honor killing” of 18-year-old Ghazala Khan. Those sentenced included Khan’s older brother, her father, three uncles, an aunt, and a family friend. Khan’s Pakistani family plotted the murder in response to their disapproval of her choice of husband. In September of 2005, two […]
Coast Guard cadet Webster Smith, 23, was sentenced yesterday to six months in prison for extortion, sodomy, indecent assault, and other charges. He was also expelled from the Coast Guard Academy. Smith is the first Coast Guard cadet to be court-martialed in the history of the academy. Smith was accused by four female cadets of […]
An official with the US Department of the Interior has been charged with a misdemeanor account of falsely claiming that he did not receive any prohibited gifts in 2003 in a financial filing. Roger G. Stillwell told the Washington Post that he had accepted gifts from disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff, including free dinners at Abramoff’s […]
The Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains is providing free emergency contraception (EC) at its 24 clinics on June 30, in protest of Colorado Governor Owens’s veto of a bill that would have allowed pharmacists in the state to dispense EC without a prescription. “Gov. Bill Owens has turned his back on the women of […]
