News
Countless Moroccan women continue to face abuse and sexual violence at the hands of their husbands. About 6 million women in Morocco are victims of violence, or around one in three.
Morocco’s Social Development Minister Bassima Hakkaoui, the only female minister in the country, says she would try to push forward a law protecting women that has been stuck in Parliament for eight years.
Read more at Bikya.
Arabic version by the international network Women Living Under Muslim Laws here.
The Lebanese organisation ABAAD breaks new ground with its innovative work on masculinities giving insights into – for example – how gender inequalities are transformed and violence is reduced when men become agents of change.
Read more at WILPF’s Mena Agenda 1325.
Arabic version here.
Arab women in leading positions in their fields of medicine, human rights, media and business, speaks about the role of women in the changes taking place as a result of the Arab Spring.
Listen to the radio programme at ABC.
Reports say that Amina Tyler – the Tunisian activists baring her breasts on Facebook – has been arrested for writing ‘Femen’, on a cementery wall in the holy town on Kairouan in Tunisia. Femen is a feminist organisation from Ukraine.
Read more at watch video at Huffington Post.
The Women Human Rights Defenders program at Nazra for Feminist Studies is launching its manual on Women Human Rights Defenders (WHRDs) tailored specifically for an Egyptian context.
The manual includes sections on Egyptian legislation and military verdicts used to constrain public action; regional and international mechanisms that WHRDs can utilize to report violations committed against them; and security tips that can be of special use during perilous circumstances.
Nazra is a partner organisation to KVINFO.
Read more at Nazra for Women's Studies.
Yemen
Yemen
The Republic of Yemen was established in1990, when North Yemen and South Yemen united. The country is one of the poorest in the Middle East and is marked by unemployment and corruption. It has the doubtful honour of ranking lowest in several gender equality charts describing the level of equality on a number of factors.
In 2011 and the beginning of 2012 massive protests broke out in several cities throughout the country, the Yemenis protesting against the poor economic conditions, the widespread corruption and against the Sana’a government and president Ali Abdullah Saleh, who had ruled the country for 33 years. The president did not step down until February 2012, when a presidential election was held and vice president Abd Rabbi Mansur al-Hadi won and was inaugurated president. The agreement is that Abd Rabbi Mansur al-Hadi will serve two years until new parliamentary and presidential elections will be held in 2014.
| Total population (2011 est.) | 24,133,492 |
| Female population | 11,883,499 |
Total 0-14 years | |
Total 15-64 years | |
Total 65 years and over |
| Life expectancy at birth | 65. 87 years |
| Fertility rate | 4,63 child born/woman |
| Total literacy rate | 50,2 % |
| Total literacy rate among females | 30% |
| School life expectancy (primary to tertiary education) | 7 years |
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By Nadia Zaabi, Signe Lund & Rikke Hostrup Haugbølle