Amnesty: Yemen s Houthis must release model fearing virginity testing
FILE PHOTO: People shop at a market in the old quarter of Sanaa, Yemen April 9, 2020. REUTERS/Mohamed al-Sayaghi/File Photo reuters tickers
This content was published on May 7, 2021 - 16:57
May 7, 2021 - 16:57
DUBAI (Reuters) - Amnesty International said on Friday Yemen s Houthi authorities must halt plans for forced virginity testing and release an actor and model the human rights group says has been detained on spurious grounds.
Twenty-year-old Yemeni Intisar al-Hammadi was arrested in February at a checkpoint in the capital Sanaa, which is controlled by the Houthi group in Yemen s six-year conflict.
7 May 2021, 15:37 UTC
Yemenâs Huthi de facto authorities must halt plans to carry out a forced âvirginity testâ on a Yemeni actress and model who has been arbitrarily detained for more than two months on spurious grounds said Amnesty International, calling for her immediate release. Forced âvirginity testsâ are a form of sexual violence and amount to torture under international law.
Intisar al-Hammadi was arrested by plainclothes security forces at a checkpoint in Sanaâa on 20 February. While detained, she was interrogated while blindfolded, physically and verbally abused, subjected to racist insults and forced to âconfessâ to several offences, including drug possession and prostitution. Intisar al-Hammadi has regularly appeared in photographs online including in social media posts, without a headscarf defying strict societal norms in Yemen.
Correspondent
Japan’s lower house election later this year is seen as a chance to address the gender gap in the country’s political representation. But even though a law aims to boost the number of female candidates, some parties haven’t set targets for the proportion of women they plan to support in the upcoming poll.
Japan’s poor record on gender equality was highlighted in this year’s World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report. The country is ranked 147 out of 156 for women’s political empowerment. According to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, just 9.9 percent of the Diet’s lower house members are female, well below the 25.5 percent global average.
Gender gap in electoral rolls
The major reason for this is obviously the low female literacy rate in the country
May 04, 2021
Gender gap in electoral rolls in Pakistan had already been the second lowest in the world. It has worsened as the electoral rolls published this year shows that the gap has slipped to 10.4%. This electoral roll is based on the results gathered under a pilot project of the Election Commission of Pakistan. The project was recently carried out in 20 districts of the country to see things on the ground and identify the causes. The exercise shows that the main reason for the increased gender gap is that large numbers of females in these districts have failed to get their names registered in the voter lists due to the lack of CNIC. The major reason for this is obviously the low female literacy rate in the country. The ECP has enumerated other reasons too for this state of affairs. These reasons are valid. In rural areas, NADRA registration centres are located at
Backed by opposition parties, Haruko Miyaguchi, center, won in the Upper House re-election in Hiroshima in April. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)
Women make up half of the population, yet they account for only 10 percent of Lower House members and occupy just 20 percent of seats in the upper chamber, a level of political representation that ranks among the lowest in the world.
Each political party has an obligation to field as many female candidates as possible in the Lower House election that must be held by autumn to help correct this gender disparity in politics.
Three years have passed since a law to promote candidate gender parity in both national and local elections came into force. It calls for political parties to make utmost efforts to ensure the numbers of their male and female candidates match as far as possible.