Education
UN: Women Gain in Political Clout, Lag in Schooling
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A new report by the United Nations indicates that women are gaining political power around the world, while they continue to suffer unequal access to education and employment.
Funding Serious Change
$34 Million Friends Campaign Expands to Europe
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A grass-roots campaign led by two women is aiding the leading international reproduction-health group, which lost all its U.S. funding last summer after a damaging anti-choice report whose findings were not officially corroborated.
Domestic Violence
U.N. Pact Sinks on Issue of Violence Against Women
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The U.N. commission on women found itself at a diplomatic impasse for the first time in its history over a document describing what steps nations should take to reduce violence against women and girls.
Fine Art
Exhibit Features Women’s Art from 177 Nations
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A new collection of women’s art from almost every country in the world offers a broad-spectrum vision of the role of women in society.
Commentary
When Mothers Leave Home
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As America begins a full-scale war, thousands of active-duty soldiers and reservists are streaming onto foreign battlefields–and a record number of those combatants are not just women, but mothers.
Intl
CNN Star Producer Back in Baghdad
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CNN producer Ingrid Formanek says the HBO film based on her career, “Live from Baghdad,” makes it seem that she did little but bat her eyelashes, smoke cigarettes, and drink. A tough journalist, Formanek is back in Iraq, covering weapons inspections.
Intl
U.S. Delegation Tries Rewriting 1994 Cairo Pact
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(WOMENSENEWS)–A U.S. government official told the United Nations that the United States “supports the sanctity of life from conception to natural death,” according to a New York Times article.The head of the United States delegation to the United Nations made the remark at the seven-day Fifth Asian and Pacific Population Conference in Bangkok. Nations attending the conference were discussing how to implement the 1994 Cairo agreement on family planning, which calls for improved health care, education and women’s rights in developing nations. The U.S. approved the agreement in 1994 after days of negotiations over its failure to include anti-abortion language sought by the Vatican, conservative Latin American and Islamic nations.The current U.S. delegation now has made repeated attempts to insert anti-abortion provisions into the agreement, arguing that the phrases “reproductive health services” and “reproductive rights” should be deleted because they promote abortion. The United States also pressed to remove references to adolescent reproductive rights, arguing that the references promoted sexual activity among teenagers.Administration officials also suggested adding language promoting “natural” family planning methods, such as abstinence.The American delegation’s attempts to make these changes were rejected by votes of 31 to 1 and 32 to 1. Also voted down was a U.S. attempt to add a “general reservation” denouncing abortion to the conference’s final plan for action.
Intl
Women in Black Stand Silent, Oppose War, Reprisal
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Women in Black, an international network of women protesting war, holds silent vigils worldwide to protest U.S. plans to wage war following the Sept. 11 terror attacks. Their silence also underscores women’s historic voicelessness.
Commentary
The Day After, We Are Better Prepared to Unite
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America is better prepared to unite than it was 60 years ago when we joined the fight against Hitler, Stalin and Japan. After the war, we sought to conquer our inner demons of bias and intolerance–issues that tear nations and worlds apart.
Equality
Special U.N. Report Details Racial, Gender Bias
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As much of the world focused on the debates in South Africa over the role of racism, a special 18-page report describes the effects of multiple discrimination.