Not safe for a woman to be unaccompanied by a male in Iraq now. Even in the Green Zone

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2007/12/18/2003393045

The crumbling rights of Iraqi women

After the invasion of Iraq, Washington claimed that women there had 'new rights and new hopes.' Their lives have in fact become immeasurably worse, with rape, burning and murder a daily occurrence

By Mark Lattimer
THE GUARDIAN, LONDON
Tuesday, Dec 18, 2007, Page 9

<snip>In March 2004, US President George W. Bush said: "The advance of freedom in the Middle East has given new rights and new hopes to women ... the systematic use of rape by Saddam's former regime to dishonor families has ended."

This may have given some people the impression that the US-British invasion of Iraq had helped to improve the lives of its women. But this is far from the case.

Even under the late Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, women in Iraq -- including in semi-autonomous Kurdistan -- were widely recognized as among the most liberated in the Middle East. They held important positions in business, education and the public sector, and their rights were protected by a statutory family law that was the envy of women's activists in neighboring countries.

But since the 2003 invasion, advances that took 50 years to establish are crumbling away. In much of the country, women can now only move around with a male escort. Rape is committed habitually by all the main armed groups, including those linked to the government. Women are being murdered throughout Iraq in unprecedented numbers.

In October the UN Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI) expressed serious concern over the rising incidence of so-called honor crimes in Iraqi Kurdistan, confirming that 255 women had been killed in just the first six months of this year, three-quarters of them by burning.


http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jV5xuc498YXQIehDNoqHpSQSanyA

A jogger's guide to Baghdad's Green Zone

4 days ago

BAGHDAD (AFP) — Run in pairs, stay alert, do not run at night, do not venture off the beaten track... most of the advice from joggers about running in Baghdad's heavily fortified "Green Zone" makes sense. snip

The two women, who asked that their names not be published, said that the main problem with running in the Green Zone was that they had to put up with men harassing them -- some even stopping their cars to proposition them.

"We always run with a guy," said one woman, a press affairs officer wearing shorts and a Lycra running vest. "Men stop us all the time -- it's very annoying."

Regular joggers have many tales of adventure to tell.

[Bucky]

1. If I was in business in Iraq, I'd sell jogging treadmills to all those shut ins.

Also guns and kevlar vests. Bet there's a market for that too.

[global1]

2. So Did Condi Go There Today To Get Lucky?.........nt

[lonestarnot]

3. 255 women killed since the first of the year? Honor killings?

[NNN0LHI]

4. And that is in an area billed by Bush and his thugs as a great success story

Just imagine what the rest of the country is like.

Don

[lonestarnot]

6. Fucked up in my imagination. Pretty much so.

[China_cat]

7. Honey, that IS a great success story

One that Bush supporters would like to copy in the US.

[uppityperson]

5. k&r for Iraqi women and the whole world.

[NMMNG]

8. Aren't those women lucky they have the men to protect them from....other men?

:sarcasm:





:grr: