We attempt to keep track of the latest news, developments, issues, policies, strategies, reports and publications on violence against women across the globe and particularly in the six countries that ‘We Can’ is operational.

If you would like to inform us of something new

Handbook on Law of Domestic Violence

• Lawyer’s Collective Rights Initiative with the support of UNIFEM has brought out a handbook on the law on domestic violence in India in 2009. It has also brought out two other volumes ‘Ending Domestic Violence through Non-Violence: A Manual for PWDA Protection Officers’ and ‘Staying Alive: First and Second Monitoring and Evaluation Report 2008 and 2007 on the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence.’ See http://www.unifem.org.in/violenceagainstwomen.html

UN Secretary General’s Database Violence Against Women 2009

• The information for this database has been derived from member states and state parties report, see http://webapps01.un.org/vawdatabase/home.action

Progress of the World’s Women 2008-2009

• This report demonstrates that one of the most powerful constraints on realising women’s rights and the Millennium Development Goals is a deficit of accountability to women, see http://www.unifem.org/progress/2008/whoAnswersToWomen.html

Sparing Lives: Better Reproductive Health for Poor South Asian Women

• The World Bank has released a report (2009) on the poor reproductive health care available for women in South Asia.

UNFPA’s Report on Addressing Gender Based Violence

• An action framework to address gender based violence has been released in 2009.

Global Employment Trends for Women

• In this report, ILO warns that the current economic downturn could result in 22 million more unemployed women in 2009, see http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/---dgreports/---dcomm/documents/...

Map of Gaps

• A unique campaign set up by Equality and Human Rights Commission and the end of Violence Coalition that documents significant shortfalls in the provision of specialised services for women who have experienced violence in Britain, see http://www.mapofgaps.org/docs/map_of_gaps_08.pdf

The State of the World’s Children 2009

• This report highlights how maternal mortality remains a globally intractable problem, see http://www.unicef.org/sowc09/report/report.php

Global Gender Gap Report 2007

• The World Economic Forum ranks 115 countries on the issue of prevailing gender gaps for the years 2006 and 2007. The South Asian countries rank low, except for Sri Lanka that figures high on the list. For the full report, see http://www.weforum.org/en/initiatives/gcp/Gender%20Gap/index.htm

Global Monitoring Report 2007

• The World Bank’s Global Monitoring Report 2007 - Millennium Development Goals: Confronting the Challenges of Gender Equality and Fragile States - assesses the contributions of developing countries, developed countries, and international financial institutions toward meeting universally agreed development commitments. Fourth in a series of annual reports leading up to 2015, this year’s report reviews key developments of the past year, emerging priorities, and provides a detailed region-by-region picture of performance in the developing regions of the world, drawing on indicators for poverty, education, gender equality, health, and other goals. The focus is on two key thematic areas - gender equality and empowerment of women (the third MDG) and the special problems of fragile states, where extreme poverty is increasingly concentrated.

Economic and Social Survey of Asia and the Pacific 2007

• This report says gender discrimination in Asia and the Pacific costs the region an estimated $80 billion a year. http://www.unescap.org/survey2007/backgrounders/gender_inequality.pdf

Gender Equity Index 2007

• The results of the 2007 Social Watch Gender Equity Index (GEI) clearly demonstrate that a country’s level of wealth does not automatically determine its degree of equity. The regions with the lowest GEI values are Central Asia (60), sub-Saharan Africa (54), South Asia (52) and the Middle East and North Africa (48). See http://www.socialwatch.org/en/noticias/noticia_198.htm

39th Session of the Committee for the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW)

• The 39th Session of the Committee to Eliminate Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) was held from 23 July-10 August 2007 at UN headquarters in New York, US. This session marked the occasion of the Committee’s twenty-fifth anniversary. The Committee reviewed country reports from 15 states, including Cooks Islands, Belize, Brazil, Estonia, Guinea, Honduras, Hungary, Indonesia, Jordan, Kenya, Liechtenstein, New Zealand, Norway, Republic of Korea and Singapore. See http://www.iisd.ca/recent/recentmeetings.asp?id=7

Encyclopedia of Domestic Violence

• The Encyclopedia of Domestic Violence (2007) published by Routledge is a modern reference from the leading international scholars in domestic violence research. The primary goal of the Encyclopedia is to provide information on a variety of traditional, as well as breakthrough issues in this complex phenomenon. The coverage of the Encyclopedia is broad and diverse, encompassing the entire life span from infancy to old age. The entries include the traditional research areas, such as battered women, child abuse and dating violence, and many under-studied areas of domestic violence, such as ritual abuse-torture within families, domestic violence against women with disabilities, pseudo-family violence and domestic violence within military families. It is also unique in that it examines cross-cultural perspectives of domestic violence.

Gender & Development Journal - Oxfam: Gender-Based Violence Issue

• The new issue of Oxfam’s gender mainstreaming journal ’Gender & Development’ (G&D), Volume 15, No.1 2007, has a series of articles on the diminishing tolerance for arguments that such violence is a ’private’ or a ’cultural’ matter and the extensive legislative framework to protect women and girls from specific forms of gender-based violence at both the national and international levels. Articles in this issue of the journal also describe successful intervention programmes in very different settings, and show that the attitudes and beliefs that support and justify gender-based violence against women can and are being challenged at every level of society, and that these attitudes can be changed. Abstracts of articles appearing in the issue can be found at [informaworld]

Because I am a Girl: the State of the World’s Girls 2007

• Because I am a Girl: The State of the World’s Girls’, by Plan International highlights the appalling situation in which girls find themselves - sometimes through poverty, sometimes because they are young but often simply because of their gender. The report is the first in a series of global reports on girls to be published over the next nine years by Plan.

WHO Report on Violence Prevention 2007

• The WHO report on Violence Prevention surveys the costs of violence, particularly health costs, and examines the initiatives undertaken to curb violence from 2002 to 2007. See http://whqlibdoc.who.int/publications/2007/9789241595476_eng.pdf

World Development Report 2007

• The World’s Bank’s World Development Report: Development and the Next Generation discusses priorities for government action across five youth transitions that shape young people’s human capital: learning, working, staying healthy, forming families, and exercising citizenship. For its observations on gender.

Human Rights Watch’s Report on Violence against Girls

• Human Rights Watch recently released three background papers summarising research on violence against girls: Violence against Schoolgirls, Violence against Child Domestic Workers and Violence against Girls in Conflict with the Law. These reports are based on investigations in 15 countries, including: Afghanistan; Brazil; the Democratic Republic of Congo; Egypt; El Salvador; Guatemala; Indonesia; Iraq; Malaysia; Morocco; Papua New Guinea; South Africa; Togo; the United States; and Zambia. To read Human Rights Watch’s background papers on violence against girls. Please visit: http://hrw.org/english/docs/2007/02/20/global15357.htm

UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women - Report 2007

• The UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women report in 2007 focuses on progress by health and human rights movement over the years. See http://www.wunrn.com/news/2007/02_07/02_12_07/021707_united2.pdf

UN Commission on the Status of Women

• The report of the fifty first session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women held from 28 Febraury -9 March 2007 is available on http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/csw/csw51/OfficialDocuments.html

Statistics on Violence against the Girl Child

• The United Nations Division for the Advancement of Women in collaboration with UNICEF has released its collated statistics on violence against the girl child. See http://www.wunrn.com/news/2007/02_07/02_12_07/021707_gender2.htm

UNFPA: Ten Case Studies

• Programming to Address Violence Against Women: Ten Case Studies – This volume documents UNFPA’s experience addressing many forms of violence against women. Intended primarily for development practitioners and others seeking to change attitudes and practices, it offers lessons that can help scale up responses. Projects in Bangladesh, Colombia, Ghana, Kenya, Mauritania, Mexico, Morocco, Romania, Sierra Leone and Turkey are discussed. Some of the principles derived from the case studies are summarized in a complementary handbook. http://www.unfpa.org/publications/detail.cfm?ID=322

Ending Impunity for Violence against Women and Girls

• In 1975, during International Women’s Year, the United Nations began celebrating 8 March as International Women’s Day. Two years later, in December 1977, the General Assembly adopted a resolution proclaiming a United Nations Day for Women’s Rights and International Peace to be observed on any day of the year by Member States, in accordance with their historical and national traditions. For the United Nations, International Women’s Day has been observed on 8 March since 1975. The Day is traditionally marked with a message from the Secretary-General. The theme for 2007 is: Ending Impunity for Violence against Women and Girls.

Commission on the Status of Women

• The Commission on the Status of Women dedicated to gender equality and advancement of women gathers each year at United Nations Headquarters in New York to evaluate progress on gender equality, identify challenges, set global standards and formulate concrete policies to promote gender equality and advancement of women worldwide. The fifty first session of the Commission on the Status of Women from 26 February to 9 March 2007 will consider the elimination of all forms of discrimination of violence against girl child.

State of World’s Children 2007

• The South Asia edition of the UNICEF’s State of World Children 2007 focusses on the discrimination and disempowerment that women in the region face. See http://72.14.235.104/search?q=cache:XTKBBzBIWGEJ:www.unicef.org/sowc07/d...

Marking 16 Years of 16 Days of Activism against Violence against Women

• To mark 16 years of 16 Days of Activism against violence against women, various initiatives were kicked off across the globe. For details see http://72.14.235.104/search?q=cache:jqsasJp5vVUJ:www.iwtc.org/312.html+v...

In-Depth Study on All Forms of Violence

• A UN Study In-depth Study on all Forms of Violence was released by the UN Secretary General at the 61 UN Assembly, October 2006. It says, “The individual who carries out any form of violence against women has committed a crime. A government that does not develop, fund, and implement all necessary laws and programs to prevent and to punish this violence violates international human rights law. Both the individual committing the violence and the government blithely letting it happen must be held responsible.”

Ninth Sustainable Development Conference

• The Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) is holding its Ninth Sustainable Development Conference (SDC) from 13-15 December 2006 in Islamabad, Pakistan. Each SDC is designed to be a forum for sharing and exchanging dialogues on sustainable development with practitioners, civil society and policy-makers. The overarching theme of the SDPI’s Ninth SDC is “Missing Links in Sustainable Development (SD): South Asian Perspectives” with emphasis on gender gaps.

The Impact of Domestic Violence on Children

• Some of the biggest victims of domestic violence are the smallest. According to the latest report from UNICEF ‘Behind Closed Doors: The Impact of Domestic Violence on Children’ (2006), nearly 275 million of children worldwide are witnessing abuse in their everyday life. In South Asia, the estimates range from 40.8 million to 88 million children. See www.unicef.org/media/files/BehindClosedDoors.pdf

Violence against Pregnant Women

• A new study demonstrates conclusively that physical abuse by husbands and boyfriends compromises a woman’s health during pregnancy, her likelihood of carrying a child to term and the health of her newborn. A Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) study, published in the July 2006 issue of the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, finds that violence from male partners both in the year prior to and during a woman’s pregnancy harms the health of women during pregnancy and the health of newborn children, and increases the risk of serious health complications during pregnancy. Abuse also increases a woman’s risk of delivering prematurely and having a child who is born clinically underweight and in need of intensive care.

Involving Men in Eliminating Violence against Women

• Involving Men in Eliminating Violence against Women (UNESCAP 2006) -- This publication encompasses material that was prepared for a training workshop on eliminating violence against women (VAW). The paper and the inventory of organisations and initiatives are aimed at highlighting ideas, concepts, policies, approaches and strategies for a greater involvement and engagement of men to eliminate gender violence.

Let’s Talk Men

• ’Let’s Talk Men’, the South Asian Masculinities Film Project set up by Save the Children and UNICEF, has produced a set of four films aimed at raising awareness of HIV/AIDS among adolescents and violence against girls in the region. The films challenge entrenched gender stereotypes in South Asia.

Property Ownership and Women

• The International Center for Research on Women recently released a study Property Ownership and Inheritance Rights of Women for Social Protection – The South Asia Experience (2006) that is a synthesis report of three studies. Based on a multi-site study, it explores the links of women’s ownership of property and inheritance rights and their experiences of domestic violence. See http://www.icrw.org/docs/2006_propertyrights-southasia.pdf

Women in Parliament: Beyond Numbers

• This new and updated edition of Women in Parliament: Beyond Numbers Handbook by International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) covers the ground of women’s access to the legislature in three steps: It looks into the obstacles women confront when entering Parliament – be they political, socio-economic or ideological and psychological. It presents solutions to overcome these obstacles, such as changing electoral systems and introducing quotas, and it details strategies for women to influence politics once they are elected to parliament, an institution which is traditionally male dominated. Case studies included are from : Argentina, Burkina Faso, Ecuador, France, Indonesia, Rwanda, South Africa and Sweden, as well as regional overviews from the Arab World, Latin America, South Asia and a case study on the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU).

Global Summit of Women 2006

• The Global Summit of Women 2006 or ‘The Davos for Women’ held between June 10 and 12, 2006, in Cairo, Egypt, focused on accelerating women’s economic development through the effective use of technology, and maximising the benefit of cross-border business alliances. It gathered outstanding women business, professional, and governmental leaders from around all corners of the globe.
• Prior Summits were hosted by Montreal, Canada (1990); Dublin, Ireland (1992); Taipei, Taiwan (1944); Miami, Florida (1997); London, U.K. (1998); Buenos Aires, Argentina (1999); Johannesburg, South Africa (2000); Hong Kong S.A.R. (2001); Barcelona, Spain (2002), Marrakech, Morocco (2003), Seoul, Republic of Korea (2004)and most recently, Mexico City, Mexico (2005).
• The Summit also featured a pre-summit ministerial roundtable, which brought together women ministers of varied portfolios to discuss policies that have positively impacted women’s economic status in their own countries. Summit outcomes have ranged from the formation of national and regional networks to the launch of numerous successful business initiatives to exchange of creative ideas and best practices that have inspired Summit participants.

35th Session of CEDAW

• The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) held its 35th session at United Nations (UN) Headquarters in New York City from May 15th to June 2nd, 2006. Interestingly, this meeting to discuss the fair and equitable treatment of women was held in the only country that signed the convention and never ratified it -- the United States of America. It reviewed reports submitted by States Parties on measures taken to implement the CEDAW and its Optional Protocol, particularly from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Malaysia, Saint Lucia, Turkmenistan, Cyprus, Guatemala, Malawi and Romania. See http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/cedaw/

Human Rights World Watch Report 2006

• The Human Rights World Watch Report 2006 contains survey information on human rights development in more than 70 countries in 2005. It brings to light facts on violence against women and expresses particular concern about abuse against women in Nepal under the rule of the King Gyanendra recently unseated from power by a huge people’s protest. The report is available on: http://hrw.org/wr2k6/

Global Accountability Charter for Non-profit Sector

• Heads of 11 of the world’s human rights, environmental and social development international organisations have endorsed the first global accountability charter for the non-profit sector in June 2006. The Accountability Charter sets out values and operating principles for international NGOs and includes good governance and management; fundraising and multi-stakeholder engagement. It makes specific reference to respect for universal principles (such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights), independence, responsible advocacy, effective programmes, non-discrimination, transparency and ethical fundraising.

New Publication on Outcomes on Beijing Conference on Women

• In 1996, the Commission on the Status of Women adopted a programme of work to monitor the implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action based on the outcome of the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. Interactive expert panels were organised by the Commission to stimulate exchange of experience, lessons learned and good practices at the national level. The outcomes of the consideration of the themes of the Commission are reflected in action oriented agreed conclusions. It was recently presented in the publication titled The Agreed Conclusions of the Commission on the Status of Women on the Critical Areas of Concern of the Beijing Platform for Action 1996.

Amnesty International USA: International Campaign to Stop Violence Against Women

• Currently, Amnesty International USA is involved in an international campaign to stop violence against women. It has started an innovative blog against violence against women and urges people to see Indian film maker Deepa Mehta’s ‘Water’, a profoundly moving story of India’s widow houses, where women of all ages are taken to live apart from society (even today) following the deaths of their husbands.

US Passes Bill on Violence against Women

• The bill H.R. 3402: Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorisation Act of 2005 has been passed as a law effective January 2006 and will aid women seeking legal redress for violence against them. Since it was first enacted in 1994, VAWA has been critical in protecting women from domestic violence, sexual assault, and stalking.

Economic Costs of Domestic Violence

• A recent study (2006) evaluates the economic costs of domestic violence in the United States. See http://files.dcp2.org/pdf/dcp/dcp40.pdf

Study Links Teenage Depression to Domestic Violence

• A new study has found that teenagers who witness domestic violence between their parents are significantly more likely to suffer from symptoms of depression, reports Asian News International. The study, of adolescents in the Philippines, was conducted by Michelle Hindin, PhD, a researcher at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and Socorro Gultiano, PhD, of the University of San Carlos in the Philippines. As a part of the study, the researchers studied data from 2,051 young men and women aged 17 to 19, collected from the 2002 Cebu Longitudinal Health Nutrition Survey.

BANGLADESH : Women and Children Die Due to Extremism

• Deep-rooted social conventions and a rise in Islamic extremism resulted in the deaths of thousands of women and children last year in Bangladesh, according to Women Living Under Muslim Laws, an international solidarity network that provides information, support and a collective space for women whose lives are shaped, conditioned or governed by laws and customs said to derive from Islam. And, according to the report, released by local media monitoring group Mass Line Media Centre, more than 3,000 women and about 4,000 children were tortured to death in 2005 across the country.

Sri Lanka: Sixty Women’s Groups Unite

• More than 60 women’s groups have formed the Coalition for Assisting Tsunami Affected Women (CATAW) in Sri Lanka in January 2006 to address threats to the physical and psychological safety of women and children who survived the December 26, 2005 tsunami. According to the coalition, it is vital that women be protected and empowered in rehabilitation projects.

India’s National Crime Records Bureau: Disquieting Revelations

• One woman is raped every 30 minutes in India, while one is killed every 75 minutes - most often burned to death for not bringing a large enough dowry. Violence against children rose by nearly a quarter in 2004 and recorded cases of female foeticide increased by half, according to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). The national capital is the least safe place for women. In 2004, it accounted for 30 percent - or 457 - of the 1,510 rapes recorded in the country’s 35 major cities, according to the report. The bureau’s latest report (first obtained and reported by Reuters) is to be submitted to parliament in July 2006.

Stemming Child Marriages in India

• The seemingly ineradicable practice of child marriage in India will face new legal obstacles following a Supreme Court decision in 2006 requiring marrying couples to register their age and consent with local authorities.

India’s Blank Noise Project to Counter Sexual Harassment

• On March 7 2006, a day before International Women’s Day, three young women in India launched what they called the Blank Noise Project (blanknoiseproject.blogspot.com). It had a "blog-a-thon", a marathon on the net. The project, they explain, seeks to "recognise eve-teasing as a sexual crime and establish the issue as something that may be normal, but is unacceptable." They asked women to write in what they thought about street harassment or "eve-teasing". The response was enormous. Read http://www.indiatogether.org/2006/apr/ksh-net.htm

India: Battling Dowry

• Customs like dowry can end only when young men and women decide to go against the tide. In India, Maharashtra’s Home Minister, Mr. R.R. Patil, has decided to have a go at the "dowry menace" by setting up Dowry Prohibition Committees and local committees headed by women sarpanches (leaders) and women heading self-help groups in villages who will act as "watchdogs" to ensure that the police is alert and catches offenders.

Nepal: Gender Issues in Policy

• In a recent decision, the Governing Council of the National Judicial Academy, the supreme policy making body, headed by the Chief Justice of Nepal will mainstream gender issues in its policy and practices to bring gender responsive reforms.

Pakistan: Shocking Statistics

• There seems to be no end to incidents of violence against women in Pakistan, statistics of January 2006 suggest. At least 126 cases of violence against women were reported in the national press in January in which 86 women were killed. A majority of the incidents occurred in urban areas, with at least 10 murders in Lahore. Data collected from the AGHS Legal Aid Cell shows that of the women killed in January, 25 were victims of honour killings.

Pakistan: Police and National Commission on the Status of Women Get Proactive

• Women were in the news again in February 2006 in Pakistan, thanks to the interest being taken in their rights and concerns by the Supreme Court and the new chairperson of the National Commission on the Status of Women. The Supreme Court, which had been looking into the vani cases relating to five girls in Mianwali, has directed the police chiefs of the four provinces to protect women against the un-Islamic customs of vani and swara which require a woman to be handed over to a man as compensation in a settlement of a dispute. Dr Arifa Syeda, the chairperson of the NCSW, has demanded the repeal of the Hudood Ordinances that have inflicted injustice of the worst kind on women.

Status of Women in Afghanistan: Special Rapporteur’s Comments

• A report from the Special Rapporteur on violence against women in Afghanistan (April 2006) noted that despite some significant developments, the situation of women remains abysmal and severe violence against them all-pervasive.

UNIFEM Attempts Database on Violence against Women in Afghanistan

• A new pilot project to capture cases of violence against women in a comprehensive database has been launched by UNIFEM in Afghanistan. The database will be used to analyse trends and determine strategies to tackle the issue, including identifying gaps in nation-wide response mechanisms and service provision for victims.