U.S. Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and David H. Souter dismissed claims that the Court discriminates against women and minorities in hiring clerks during testimony before a House Appropriations subcommittee yesterday. Thomas and Souter were brought before the subcommittee to discuss the Court’s budgetary needs for the coming year. Democratic Representatives Julian C. Dixon of […]
The blind-folded and bullet-ridden bodies of activists Ingrid Washinawatok, 41, Lahe’ena’e Gay, 39, and Terence Freitas, 24, were returned to the United States yesterday from the Venezuelan field where they were found last week. The three Americans were abducted in Columbia and later killed by members of Columbia’s largest rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces […]
For the first time in history, two women will serve as ministers in the Swiss cabinet. Ruth Metzler’s 126 to 118 victory over her Rita Roos marked the first time that Switzerland’s parliament has elected more than one woman to its cabinet. Interior Minister Ruth Dreifuss had been the sole female cabinet member prior to […]
In 1995, financial constraints forced Whitehall-Robins Healthcare to stop manufacturing the Today Sponge, to the great dismay of the women who had depended on the contraceptive device. Now, the Associated Press has reported that Allendale Pharmaceuticals Inc. purchased rights to the sponge from its former manufacturer and hopes to being selling the product by this […]
Fourteen-year-old Natalia Toro became the youngest-ever winner of the prestigious Intel Science Talent Search. Formerly known as the Westinghouse Science Search, the contest is now sponsored by Intel Corp. and a nonprofits science news organization called Science Service. Toro, an exceedingly gifted child who began attending college courses while in sixth grade, won the prize […]
Last August, forty United Nations foreign staff members were withdrawn from Afghanistan after Carmine Calo, a military advisor to the United Nations, was murdered in Kabul. Calo was murdered in retaliation for U.S. missile raids. The U.N. is now preparing to return a limited number of its international staff to Afghanistan. Before all employees return […]
In sharp contradiction to past medical research, a 14-year study of 88,795 women bore no evidence that a low-fat diet protects against breast cancer or that a high-fat diet increases women’s risk for breast cancer. Medical experts have long hypothesized that a high-fat diet may increase a woman’s risk for cancer. This hypothesis was based […]
A California state official has ordered San Francisco’s Rio Bravo-Greeley Union School District to rescind an anti-gay action. Officials of the school district agreed to removed 15 students from the teacher James D. Merrick after the parents complained that they were uncomfortable with the teacher’s mannerisms and his public support of gay rights. Parents began […]
Harvard University faculty voted to dismiss student and D. Drew Douglas for raping a female classmate. The faculty opted to reject a possible lesser sentence of withdrawal, which would have allowed Douglas the opportunity to seek readmission to the school in the future. Douglas had pleaded guilty to battery and indecent assault, or improper sexual […]
The United Nations hosted a global, inter-agency videoconference entitled “A World Free of Violence Against Women,” on International Women’s Day, March 8. The conference linked U.N. officials, journalists, experts on violence against women, and others from 5 different sites in New York, New Delhi, Mexico City, Nairobi, and the European Parliament in Strasbourg. Speakers included […]
The Women’s Bar Association of the District of Columbia will host a special program entitled “War on Women: The Taliban’s Destruction of Human Rights in Afghanistan” this Thursday, March 11 at noon. The group has invited Afghan native and Physicians for Human Rights public health researcher Zorah Rasekh to speak about the Taliban’s abuses of […]
Retailer Mervyn’s California and the Women’s Sports Foundation will jointly offer more than $300,000 in scholarships to high school girls this July. Scholarship recipients will be selected based on their participation in athletics, their academic performance, their history of community service, and their financial need. Two hundred and eighty senior high school girls will be […]
The U.S. Supreme Court refused, without comment, to hear two separate appeals cases concerning Santa Barbara’s restrictions on how close anti-abortion demonstrators can come to abortion clinics and their patients. The city of Santa Barbara bars anti-abortion demonstrators from coming within 8 feet of clinic entrances and driveways. The ordinance, originally passed in 1993 but […]
Both the United States government and NGOs are calling attention to the plight of women and girls in Afghanistan at the 43rd annual session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women in New York. The United States Mission to the United Nations has proposed a resolution on the situation of women and […]
The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday that the federal Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) is unconstitutional. The case was brought by plaintiff Christy Brzonkala, who filed a federal lawsuit against the two former Virginia Tech students who are charged with raping her. Passed in 1994, the VAWA gave victims of sex-based crimes […]
Anti-abortion protestor Teresa Van Camp is apparently trying to force a test of U.S. District Judge Robert E. Jones’ ruling prohibiting anti-abortion protesters from contributing to “The Nuremberg Files” Web site. Last month, a federal jury awarded $170 million to a group of abortion providers, doctors, and clinics, arguing that creators of “The Nuremberg Files” […]
Amnesty International urged Pakistan’s government to take steps to protect the women who will protest against the Taliban’s abuse of Afghan women and girls on International Women’s Day, March 8. Amnesty International reported that a particular activist group, Revolutionary Association of Women of Afghanistan (RAWA), has received “continued threats” from warring factions in Afghanistan and […]
The China Youth Daily reported Sunday that 32 lawmakers have drafted a sexual harassment law and submitted their proposal to the Chinese legislature, the National People’s Congress. The newspaper reported that sexual harassment in China has become rampant in many areas, and especially within private businesses, foreign-funded businesses, and industries in which large numbers of […]
In a speech to United Nations staff and delegates yesterday, Hillary Rodham Clinton spoke out against the Taliban’s abuse of Afghan women and girls and the trafficking of women in children for use as prostitutes in Thailand and many other nations. “There probably is no more egregious and systematic trampling of fundamental rights of women […]
After nine years of resistance, the Japanese Health Ministry has finally conceded that there is no reason to withhold approval for contraceptive pills. After the male impotency drug Viagra was approved for use in only 6 months, Japanese feminists and members of the news media questioned the Health Ministry’s decision. Dr. Kunio Kitamura, director of […]
