Friday Links | July 4, 2014

Friday Links | July 4, 2014 July 4, 2014

Human Rights Watch has issued a report on how the war in Syria has affected women.

Several human rights organisations accuse Egypt of allowing (sexual) abuse and torture to be used against its female prisoners, despite the promise to fight sexual harassment. Recently, Egypt adopted a new law that makes sexual harassment punishable by law, but during the month of Ramadan it is somehow seen as offensive to address the issue of sexual harassment.

More than half of the Islamophobic attacks in Britain are aimed at Muslim women; an average of two attacks a day are being reported since the murder of the British soldier Lee Rigby nine months ago.

A Pakistani couple in the Punjab province has been killed by the girl’s family, as she had not only married out of love, but had married a man from what is considered a lesser tribe.

The UN warns that an estimated 20,000 Iraqi women and girls are at an increased risk of sexual violence, because of the recent crisis.

The European Court for Human Rights has ruled that the French law that bans the face veil in public does not breach the European Convention on Human Rights. French Muslim women and human rights activists are shocked at the decision. Some say that the decision could mean that a similar ban will be adopted in other European countries, like Denmark.

In Brazil, refugee women, predominantly from Syria, are having their own “World Cup,” despite their Ramadan fast.

The wives of two prominent Nigerien officials have been arrested following the dismantling of what is said to be an international baby-trafficking ring. In total around 20 suspects were arrested in an investigation that covers three countries, most of the suspects were women.

Earlier this year, an American woman was arrested at the airport, when she tried to leave the USA to actively support ISIS in Syria and meet her online suitor there. Al Jazeera speaks with one Kyrgyz woman, who says that she will be going to Syria to join the cause there, no matter what.


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